MS Mail Identities

[end user]

I have several Mail 'Identities' that I use in Outlook Express under 1
logged on userid.
This feature is quite handy for keeping separate activities
compartmentalized.

This Beta version of mail does not support identities (it does offer to
collect/combine them into 1 account) will the production mail system do
this?

 

[Jim Pickering]

No. Consider identities a feature of the past since they died with Outlook
Express. What MS has in mind now is that users will create new profiles or
accounts if they wish to keep things separated. It's a shame since the
identities feature offered a chance to create a complete new registry set of
keys when an earlier identity "went south" and to use as a test bed to help
in solving problems with mail.

Progress is not always what it seems and all the MVPs present when the
announcement to "kill" identities was made to them were quite vocal in their
opposition to the idea. To no avail. The WinMail program was for all
purposes at that time "locked in cement" and would not be changed.

 

[end user]

Then if Outlook Express (or a mail program with equivalent features) will
not available in Vista; we will not be moving to Vista.

This feature has numerous benefits for small (and likely large) work groups,
I can't believe it is being trashed. I know several people in other
companies who also make extensive use of this feature.

How would the 'new profiles or accounts ' you refer to be implemented? Are
we talking about separate user logon ids? I currently have 6 active
identities and have had as many as 14. These are defined on a desk top and
notebook and kept in sync.

 

[Jim Pickering]

Can I suggest that you review the info in Help and Support about profiles.
Identities are gone and that's a fact. If that fact makes Vista unusable
for you, I think you fail to understand the advantages that can accrue if
using profiles/accounts. But there is nothing else that can be done.

Identities in Windows Mail no longer exist. Sorry.

 

[end user]

I have read some of the 30 entries found with a search of 'profile'. I have
more reading to do but it appears there is a one to one correspondence
between userid and profile rather than the one to many correspondence of
userid/identity that OE provides. In this respect MS Mail appears to act
just like Outlook.

Also (partly tongue in cheek) re: "...I think you fail to understand the
advantages that can accrue if using profiles/accounts. " Procrusties felt
the users of his bed should conform but they probably did not have an
enjoyable 'end user' experience. Being forced to logon 5 times to access 5
different mail accounts (if indeed that is required) is too much of a
stretch (or truncation depending on how you look at it).

 

[James Waterfall]

I also agree that it is a shame that MS have decided to ditch identities
with the new mail program. My family have an an identity each to use with
Outlook express. It's much easier and quicker to use this function than
switching between profiles on windows. Still there is always Thunderbird.
Jim waterfall

 

[end user]

To expand on my previous comment MS seems to think the only use for
identities was for multiple users to share 1 account.

"The ability to create e-mail identities in Outlook Express, which allowed
multiple people sharing the same computer to keep their e-mail separate, has
been removed in Windows Mail. Instead, Windows Mail enables you to create a
separate Windows user accounts for each person who wants to use e-mail on a
single computer. ..." From the entry "What happened to e-mail identities?"
in Help and Support

It does not seem the possibility of 1 user having multiple accounts (and
wanting to access/store data from them in 1 place) was considered.

*Snipped*

 

[Frank Saunders, MS-MVP, OE/WM]

I have read some of the 30 entries found with a search of 'profile'. I have
more reading to do but it appears there is a one to one correspondence
between userid and profile rather than the one to many correspondence of
userid/identity that OE provides. In this respect MS Mail appears to act
just like Outlook.

Also (partly tongue in cheek) re: "...I think you fail to understand the
advantages that can accrue if using profiles/accounts. " Procrusties felt
the users of his bed should conform but they probably did not have an
enjoyable 'end user' experience. Being forced to logon 5 times to access 5
different mail accounts (if indeed that is required) is too much of a
stretch (or truncation depending on how you look at it).

On my WinXP machine I use one OE identity for four different email accounts.
The email is sorted into separate folder by message rules as it arrives. I
don't have all of those accounts in WinMail because, of course, my Vista
machine is not my production machine.

 

[Jim Pickering]

Procrusties felt the users of his bed should conform but they probably did
not have an enjoyable 'end user' experience.

And Theseus squeezed him until he died. So much for stretching them until
they fit. <G>

 

[Steve Cochran]

This is all Greek to me.

steve

And Theseus squeezed him until he died. So much for stretching them until
they fit. <G>

 

[Steve Cochran]

A number of people are not happy about this and once things finalize and the
registry usage of WinMail is better figured out, then I think it will not be
unlikely that someone will come up with a 3rd party addition that could
emulate the Identities feature of OE for WinMail.

There are bugs right now in WinMail's programming interface that preclude
much being done until they are fixed (and I'm told they are in future
builds), so once that gets done, then such endeavors can proceed.

So don't despair yet. <G>

steve