[Hermesmail-discuss] Hermes Mail - UTF 8 ETA vs Pandora

[Butch K. <bu...@ke...>]

At 05:16 PM 12/28/2020 -0500, Pete Maclean wrote:
>>Hi Darrell,
>>
>>It is indeed the case that there is no ETA for UTF-8 compliance.  Actually 
>it is looking more and more like that will never happen.
>>
>>I have posted about this before but I think it would be useful to describe 
>again why supporting UTF-8 is such a big deal.  It is because a lack of 
>UTF-8 capability in Eudora/Hermes is not actually the problem. The Eudora 
>that most or all of us are using knows about UTF-8 and has an appropriate 
>amount of support for it.  The real problem is that Eudora does not support 
>display of Unicode characters.  I don't want to make a fuss about how we 
>refer to the problem -- we all now know too well what we mean when we talk 
>about the "lack of UTF-8 support" so I think it's okay to go on referring 
>to it in this way.  But the real issue is larger and much deeper.  If 
>Eudora was capable of displaying Unicode but lacked support for UTF-8 
>(which would be rather odd, but possible) the fix would be very easy, maybe 
>even something that could be done with a patch to the existing binary.  As 
>things are, it means changing a very large number of calls to a particular 
>third-party library called Stingray that renders text for Eudora.  We have 
>precious few volunteers on the project to begin with and none who has 
>experience with Stingray.  I believe we have a connection to one contractor 
>who does have some Stingray expertise but we have negligible funds to pay 
>him.  What is more, working with this library is formidably difficult in 
>one way:  the Eudora developers customized it and we do not have any good 
>records of these customizations.  For this reason and others we are not 
>even able to rebuild Eudora in its original form.
>>
>>As far as I know, I am the only person on the project who actually uses 
>Eudora and who has any real passion for the project.  But I cannot do it 
>alone.  When I was younger I might have taken it on but now I am old, 
>slower than I used to be, and just not up to it.  I have heard nothing from 
>the project leader in several months, no progress is being made that I am 
>aware of and I fear the whole thing has effectively ground to a halt.
>>
>>Pete Maclean
>


Pete,

Your last paragraph fairly sums up what I have thought for a long time and I am not close to or part of the Hermes Project.  The release of Eudora Source Code created many unrealizable expectations both inside the project and outside in the potential user community.  Reality has finaly arrived and I do not think the Hermes project will ever generate anything useful beyond the TLS extensions for Eudora.

However, there is a very successful product available that advances the "Eudora Look and Feel" into a modern email client - Pandora which is found at:
            
            http://www.drivehq.com/web/brana/pandora.htm

I abandoned Eudora; switched to Pandora two years ago; and found Pandora meets my needs.  Occasionally something goes bump and Brana is responsive to either correct a false understanding of what should happen; explain what I should have done; or accept a bug report.

Now the Pandora Project from what I understand is a "one man band and show" and not Brana's primary source of income.  We need to determine how we can best assist the project to move forward.  I tried to work on the HELP documentation but was unable to create the drive and passion necessary to make a meaningful contribution.  Someone else may have better results.  Now, I monitor the Forum and offer assistance when possible.

I think the best way now to assist Brana is to purchase a Pandora license.  Keeping in mind the license cost is small and depending on your location, it is less than a good burger for lunch.  Then install Pandora and give it a good evaluation.  When something does not work as expected, use the Pandora Forum or submit a bug report.

There are some people that cannot make the change because Pandora does not have some feature or function they need.  However, there are many Eudora shortcomings that are solved such as UTF-8, OAUTH2 authorization, TLS, attachments stored as files or as MIME embedded entities inside the messages; and until a evaluation is attempted people will never know if they can switch or not.

Enough ranting on my part.  May you be blessed in the coming New Year and may the Covid-19 vaccine be rapidly deployed and prove successful.

Regards,

Butch

There’s no escaping the fact that you are what you think.
You can’t change anything if you can’t change your thinking.
                                            -Angel Chernoff