First login to the account imports all my emails

Mutual Help
1

Hello,
First time here :vulcan_salute:,
thanks to the team for the app :+1:

Some context… As an email user I do not archive any emails. So all my emails are stored in inbox.
When I connect the deltachat client it syncs all my emails and the only option I found is to delete them one by one and create the rooms for conversations.

Maybe I miss something, can you help ?

Delta Chat version

Version 1.36.4 (git: flathub)

Expected behavior

Don’t import my whole mailbox. Just let me choose before the connection if I want to or not

Actual behavior

import my whole mailbox

Steps to reproduce the problem

  1. add account
  2. sync
  3. all my inbox emails as conversation
2

Only the last 100 messages should be fetched, but link2xt recently fixed a bug where sometimes the whole inbox was fetched: fix: fetch at most 100 existing messages even if EXISTS was not received by link2xt · Pull Request #4383 · deltachat/deltachat-core-rust · GitHub.

So, in the next version, there should be a lot fewer chats already.

3

We could also think about lowering this value, like, only importing the newest 50 messages.

4

Thanks @Hocuri
Perhaps you could also leave the option of “no import” and have the user create their conversations?
Getting the team on board was very complicated because of the import. Like me, they were convinced by the interest of managing mails in a conversational format.
Everyone has been waiting for Ditching Slack Messenger.
But the mass import of messages was a negative episode.
Especially as they can only be deleted one at a time.

5

Asking questions to the user is always difficult, because many users just want to get on with things, and making decisions breaks their flow.

Maybe we need some way to multi-select chats on DC Desktop, though I’m not sure how the UI would look (and then, we’d also need someone from the Desktop team to implement it, who are currently understaffed).

What’s the underlying problem? I mean, if you wait for some weeks, won’t you also get 100 new chats (at least if you use email as much as me), which you have to either ignore (that’s what I usually do), or delete/archive?

6

Maybe asking during setup is the best time?
[ ] Import my first 100 emails as conversation
[ ] Create my conversations from scratch

For the multiple selection it can be good if you want to delete the imported emails easily

I plan to use deltachat as a replacement for slack. So I’ll create conversation rooms and invite people.
I’m still managing my emails in thunderbird

7

Another option is to use a separate e-mail address for the chat, if you want to separate chat from e-mail. You can also use the “Clear chat” to delete all messages.

Nevertheless the feature to select and delete several chat messages at once on desktop is a feature I also miss.

1 Like
8

So, you are setting “Show All E-Mails” to “No, only Chats”? Or do you also want your new classical emails to be shown in DC, just not old ones?

Using a separate e-mail for DC also gets you rid of some other annoyances.

+1

9

I’m sorry to continue this dormant conversation, though, I have something to add for the topic.

Let me tell you my user story.
I want to use DeltaChat as a resilient messenger application that is encrypted and can overcome censorship to keep in touch with my loved ones who are in censored states. And they’re not always tech-savvy people. They usually don’t know how the internet works. When I ask them to install the application to stay connected in case of internet shutdowns or something, everyone expects it to be a chat application, not an email application.

So, what happens now when a new user installs DeltaChat:

  • They get confused when they see all the emails. It’s supposed to be a messenger, isn’t it?
  • When they want to write to me, they’re not sure if it’s safe. They can see all the emails from their usual web interface. Sometimes they use email that are hosted by a corps that is to share all the information with the authorities. So new users don’t feel protected because they assume that all messages are clearly visible from the web interface and therefore for the company that offers such a service.
  • They tend to not use the application at all, because of “too many messages”. After all, these people convinced to try DeltaChat to chat with me (maybe a few others in the future). Instead they get tons of emails in their face. I think it’s not a secret that most of ordinary people have only one email inbox address and that it’s usually full to the top with various promotions, spam-alike emails and so forth.

I can understand that some users could prefer to see all the emails, but is it really a behavior that should be the default one? Sorry if this is an a harsh judgement, but I consider this to be a catastrophically bad user experience, making it very hard for me to invite more users. Could yo please consider changing the default to make it show only secured PM chats?

I’m not a developer of DeltaChat, but if I try to think “what benefits for the app this default behavior of showing all the emails bring?”, I can find no cons of such decision. If you are not willing to change this, could you please consider explaining your decision?

P.S.: BTW, if you were going to recommend a separate email address, I don’t find it a good option. Usually there are not so many places when you can get an address. They all ask for you phone number and the registration process is quite long. If people have to make a new email to use DeltaChat it would be very hard to convince them to spend time on it.

10

Hello :wave:,

Delta Chat recently started its own email server that is optimized for chats.
Registration is simple, quick and anonymous.

An account can be created here:

https://nine.testrun.org

A random address is generated via the QR code.
There is also the option to choose one.

https://nine.testrun.org/info.html

The server only allows sending encrypted messages. Therefore, a QR code is necessary to add new contacts. The easiest way to do this is to meet in person or via an encrypted video conference.

11

Asking questions to the user is always difficult, because many users just want to get on with things, and making decisions breaks their flow.

Respectfully, I find this a condescending attitude. You are right that many users just want to get on with things, but I think that for example a setup screen with “import recent emails” checked by default or click-to-expand “advanced” setup options hardly place a significant cognitive burden on this type of user.

Also over-catering to the “just get things done” user base leaves many other users feeling disempowered by the lack of control they are given.