#67 Drop Evolution from the default install
Closed: Fixed 5 years ago Opened 5 years ago by aday.

The UI quality is poor and looks old fashioned. It makes the platform look bad.

Also, Evolution fights with GNOME Calendar, which is also installed by default. For example, if I open an event from the shell's calendar, it is opened in the Mail view of Evolution, rather than the Calendar app, as I'd expect.


Agree, please choose Geary as default client.

I support dropping Evolution from the default install, with or without replacement. (The only suitable replacement would be Geary, but after using Geary for roughly one year now, I can say that has some reliability issues still, so I think I favor no email client at all.)

Metadata Update from @catanzaro:
- Issue tagged with: meeting

5 years ago

But Evolution’s interface is better than Geary’s and even follows the GNOME HIG better (see Geary’s message view). There are some very visible bugs and incorrect or strange behavior in Geary (see the sidebar, switching from one service to another in the account creation dialog, what happens when viewing messages in Geary with small window sizes, or... really just use Geary, the bugs and general strangeness should be obvious enough).

There’s another issue which is the lack of features. The only reason Geary gets away with client-side decorations for all its actions is that it lacks most of Evolution’s features, a great number of which are useful enough to be worth the increased interface complexity. I think there are some kinds of applications, including email clients and office suites, that require and benefit from more interface complexity than others and that should not attempt to put all of their controls in a header bar. So I don’t think it is possible even in the long term for Geary to become a better client than Evolution without changing its design and losing that part of its appeal.

And Evolution’s UI isn’t poor quality. On the contrary, it is the most polished of the open source email clients for Linux. It isn’t a poorly maintained project using legacy technologies.

Calendar, To Do and Notes would be better than Evolution if they weren’t so buggy. Calendar crashes when I try to add a web calendar or when I try to remove one I added from Evolution. Or when I try to do any number of other things. To Do used to have similar issues. Bijiben too, I think. They are probably better than Evolution even while being so buggy, but (ignoring email) not enough to remove Evolution (how else would I add web calendars to be able to use them in Calendar?). If anything, Evolution is necessary to export and back up calendars, notebooks and task lists created in the other applications. Thus having Evolution installed by default actually makes the three other applications better and more useful, at least for now.

I think Evolution should be kept in Workstation, instead of Geary or nothing. As should LibreOffice and Firefox, instead of AbiWord, Gnumeric, Inkscape, Epiphany or nothing. (Replacing Firefox with Epiphany might be the most promising though.) Email is important enough to be installed by default, and the alternatives are not currently better. And of course Fedora should not (implicitly or otherwise) replace Evolution with webmail any more than it should replace LibreOffice with Google Docs—ethics is part of design, too.

Heh, what a big crying post.

Instead of a lot of talking, let's see the most popular email clients:

macOS Mail - https://bit.ly/2MqT1xj

Spark - https://sparkmailapp.com/img/spark2/desktop/index/alldevices.png

Mailbird - https://www.getmailbird.com/wp-content/themes/MailbirdTheme/assets/images/UI-contact-manager.png

Canary - https://canarymail.io/assets/img/mac-email-app-4x.png

Mailspring - https://getmailspring.com/static/img/hero_graphic_linux@2x.png

So, let's say without sentiments: Evolution (and Thunderbird too) looks like garbage in comparison with these apps. For 10 year old interface - it's OK, but not for today.

Heh, what a big crying post.

There's no need to use language like that. Please, let's stick to the facts and have a reasonable discussion.

We probably have a fundamental disagreement as to how much of the popularity of these applications is due to their design. And also as to how much of their design results from the incentive their developers have to create a good design. I think this incentive, because of agency problems and coordination issues in how corporations operate, might not be as large as we could otherwise expect.

Is difficult to choose a suitable client interface of Gnome 3; but to elegance I can suggest Geary; although on the other hand, also pantheon-mail adapts very well to Gnome

https://fedoramagazine.org/email-clients-fedora/

It would have been better if this was discussed earlier in the development cycle. That would have given us more time, both upstream and downstream, to deal with any fallout from such a change.

I'd mention:

  • Evolution's UI isn't great, but it does have a full-time maintainer. Are the replacement applications similarly maintained? It's not necessary to have a full-time maintainer, but it would be unfortunate to swap Evolution out for a replacement that's very weakly maintained.

  • How's the GNOME Online Accounts integration in the replacement applications? Evolution integrates pretty heavily with GOA. So, if we are going to shake things up in this area, I'd also take a hard look at the GOA integration. I don't want to have a pile of account types that don't offer a compelling feature to most users. So, if we ship without a GOA-integrated email client, I'd remove the email bits from GOA.

Here is some more background around this:
https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/GnomeOnlineAccounts/Goals

I can understand the reasons not to ship Evolution in the default installation. It's a full-featured personal information manager. Microsoft also doesn't ship Outlook with Windows.

I have reserves regarding Geary. I don't think its development and polish is on the level for default applications in Fedora Workstation. I agree with rishi. Good integration with GOA should be a must. E.g. I can't even connect to my Gmail account with Geary. It doesn't support oauth2 and when I generate a special password for an application it can't use it.

I'm not sure that there necessarily needs to be a replacement mail app. But I agree: if we do evaluate one, then Online Accounts integration is a consideration.

So, if we ship without a GOA-integrated email client, I'd remove the email bits from GOA.

I assume you're referring to the manual IMAP/SMTP account type, rather than removing email from all the account types?

I'd prefer to keep an email client too in the default installation. My Android phone comes with one, and seems like iPhones and iPads also do: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201320

Native apps are more important on mobile than on the desktop and my impression is that, on the desktop, most people access their email through a web app nowadays.

This isn't to say that mail apps aren't useful, and I would like us to have a good email client as a part of the default install, but it's different from saying that a mail app is a requirement.

So, if we ship without a GOA-integrated email client, I'd remove the
email bits from GOA.

I assume you're referring to the manual IMAP/SMTP account type, rather
than removing email from all the account types?

Umm... probably all of them. If we don't consider an email client to be important enough, or if we don't have one that's of sufficiently good quailty to be on the default installation, and if this situation is not going to change in the near to mid-term future, then why have a switch in there that won't do anything out of the box? In that case, an email client is something that's standalone and meant to be installed and configured separately if one really needs it.

In other words, if we think that we are going to go without an MUA for one or two releases while we polish up Geary or Evolution or whatever, then I'd probably not remove email from all account types; but if we go MUA-less for the forseeable future, then I'd be inclined to remove it everywhere.

... if we think that we are going to go without an MUA for one or two releases ...

What's an MUA?

From what I understood on the evolution-list, an Evolution user mailing list maintained by GNOME, there are many users using Evolution doe to the Microsoft Exchange connector (evolution-ews these days). Similar as in GOA, it offers all the parts by one go, not only Mail and the server itself has it integrated as well. You can ask them why they prefer a standalone application instead of Miscrosoft's Web interface, but they do. I do not know why.

Rishi, would you drop also the EWS integration? It would kind of make sense, because EWS without Mail is useless, from my point of view.

I've been on #gnome-design in January this year, trying to start a discussion how would Evolution change to better match GNOME, or just to have its interface modernized, but it didn't lead to any suggestion. If you know it's wrong, I'd expect you'd also be able to suggest how to make it right.

I do not mind whether Fedora Workstation will or will not have installed Evolution by default (MATE has Claws Mail). If you think it'll be better without it, maybe because you do not use it (or you do not use the other applications extensively enough, like GNOME To Do limits which sources it uses from evolution-data-server and GNOME Contacts is awfully slow with more than few books), then it is your decision. After all, users can always install it, this is only about the default offer.

I personally find 'default app' discussions very uninspiring and somewhat pointless. Our entire direction for the last few years has been to move apps away from the OS, and make them a user choice, rather than a builtin thing.

I would be ok with not shipping an email client by default.

Reasons why I am sympathetic to removing evolution is the obnoxious, broken reminder window that it pops up sporadically on my system now, without me ever asking for it.

Evolution's UI isn't great, but it does have a full-time maintainer. Are the replacement applications similarly maintained? It's not necessary to have a full-time maintainer, but it would be unfortunate to swap Evolution out for a replacement that's very weakly maintained.

Yes, Geary is adequately well-maintained by Michael Gratton, as can be verified by skimming its git log.

How's the GNOME Online Accounts integration in the replacement applications?

I'm not sure. If it supports goa, I don't use that.

goa is nice, but IMO a purely secondary concern relative to UI issues.

I personally find 'default app' discussions very uninspiring and somewhat pointless. Our entire direction for the last few years has been to move apps away from the OS, and make them a user choice, rather than a builtin thing.

We need to continue having these discussions to make sure our out-of-the-box user experience is as good as possible. There is a balance to strike between ensuring we have enough useful applications installed, and ensuring we don't have more than are really needed. You might want to simply avoid these threads if you're disinterested.

I would be ok with not shipping an email client by default.

Me too. I'm also OK with having one. I'm not OK with the current options we have to choose from, though. Neither Geary nor Evolution are good enough to have installed by default in Workstation right now.

Since Milan is interested in making major design changes to Evolution, and that's the crux of our complaints, we should consider that possibility.

From what I understood on the evolution-list, an Evolution user mailing list maintained by GNOME, there are many users using Evolution doe to the Microsoft Exchange connector (evolution-ews these days).

I honestly don't care about this. Exchange is really only popular in corporate environments, right? That might be important for Red Hat's clients, but I've never used it myself, and I don't think it's important for Workstation. IMAP is way more important.

Of course, Exchange support is surely a point in favor of Evolution, but only a small one IMO.

Similar as in GOA, it offers all the parts by one go, not only Mail and the server itself has it integrated as well. You can ask them why they prefer a standalone application instead of Miscrosoft's Web interface, but they do. I do not know why.

This is actually an issue for us because we already have a separate Calendar and Contacts apps installed by default, and we would prefer Evolution to integrate with those instead of provide its own. GNOME also has separate Notes and To Do apps. So we would really rather Evolution offer mail and only mail.

We've previously thrown around ideas such as having an "Evolution lite" interface for GNOME with just the mail functionality, hiding the other bits.

I've been on #gnome-design in January this year, trying to start a discussion how would Evolution change to better match GNOME, or just to have its interface modernized, but it didn't lead to any suggestion. If you know it's wrong, I'd expect you'd also be able to suggest how to make it right.

And I remember you asking me for design help earlier than that. But I am not good at design, so I referred you to the GNOME designers.

Allan, do you or the other designers have time to help Milan by providing some more GNOME Mail mockups for him? The existing mockups are extremely simplistic and more an attempt to guide the creation of a new mail app from scratch (which is extremely unlikely to happen) rather than to, ahem, evolve Evolution's existing user interface. Perhaps you could help with this?

Since Milan appears willing to consider major design changes (correct?), I think we should allow some time to wait and see how this plays out, and revisit this proposal next cycle.

P.S. Some design feedback. I've used Evolution for many years, and Geary for a year or so. I believe I have relatively extensive experience with both. Geary is definitely closer to what we're looking for right now. My main requests for Evolution would be:

  • Ditch the menu bar. GNOME apps use header bars and menu buttons, not menu bars. I know it's not an easy undertaking, but it will be worthwhile.
  • Ditch or hide all of the calendar, to-do, notes, and contacts functionalities. (They could be hidden behind preferences, for example, to make them easy to restore for users who like them.)
  • Load all messages in a thread at once, in conversation view, like Geary does. With Evolution, I have to wait two to four seconds for Evolution to load each individual mail in a thread. With Geary, I wait that long for it to load all the mails at once. Waaaay faster.

I have reserves regarding Geary. I don't think its development and polish is on the level for default applications in Fedora Workstation. I agree with rishi. Good integration with GOA should be a must. E.g. I can't even connect to my Gmail account with Geary. It doesn't support oauth2 and when I generate a special password for an application it can't use it.

Well you need to "enable access for less-secure applications" in GMail. I've had that enabled for ages because it used to be required for Evolution (perhaps a long time ago :)

Anyway, I see https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/geary/commit/b8b1482e068b5ae071e7dc91636d8f9d9fcecce7. I think it requires... gnome-online-accounts? @rishi might like that. Not sure about the details. Ideally you would be able to create your mail account in Geary itself and have it support OAuth2.

Anyway, I see https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/geary/commit/b8b1482e068b5ae071e7dc91636d8f9d9fcecce7. I think it requires... gnome-online-accounts? @rishi might like that.

This might sound like nitpicking over semantics, but I want to point out that it's not about my personal preferences. It has always been an unwritten policy that we only add things to GOA that are widely used on a freshly installed instance of GNOME, and by extension Fedora Workstation. As I mentioned before, I have tried to turn this into a written document with the justification behind such thinking: https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/GnomeOnlineAccounts/Goals

Therefore, given the way things stand, it doesn't make sense to have things in GOA if they are not considered essential to the basic user experience.

In this case, if we want to leave it to the user to install Evolution or Geary or whatever other MUA, then it doesn't make much sense to keep the configuration in GOA. In fact, both Evo and Geary already come with their own configuration UI.

So, to be clear, if we drop Evo without a foreseeable replacement, I am also going to drop the email bits from GOA. If nothing else, I'll have less code to maintain.

... Exchange is really only popular in corporate environments, right?
...
This is actually an issue for us because we already have a separate Calendar and Contacts apps installed by default ...
So we would really rather Evolution offer mail and only mail. ...
We've previously thrown around ideas such as having an "Evolution lite" interface for GNOME with just the mail functionality, hiding the other bits.
...
Allan, do you or the other designers have time to help Milan by providing some more GNOME Mail mockups for him? The existing mockups are extremely simplistic

It seems that there are two related questions here: 1) Evolution's role as part of the default application suite. 2) Evolution's UX quality.

Regarding 1, the GNOME core app designs have been organised around separate apps for Mail, Contacts, Calendar and Notes for as long as they've existed. This is a fairly standard arrangement for both mobile and desktop OSs, and has some obvious advantages.

There's no reason why Evolution couldn't existing alongside these as an app that users can install, if they want a combined Outlook-style solution. However, I'm not sure a big combined app makes for a good stock app.

As for 2, it's great that Milan's interested in improving the UI. One of us on the design side can probably provide some superficial advice but improving the overall Evolution UX is a massive design task.

Reasons why I am sympathetic to removing evolution is the obnoxious, broken reminder window that it pops up sporadically on my system now, without me ever asking for it.

If it's about 3.29.x, then removing evolution will not help, that dialog comes from evolution-data-server and it's logged as https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1618354 , eventually https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-shell/issues/500 , while it would be fixed months ago with https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-shell/issues/155 , but, well, it isn't. I tried my best there, prepared all the sides as much as I could.

Since Milan appears willing to consider major design changes (correct?),...

Correct, I am. I do not see much difference in suggesting a design for an application written from scratch and for an already existing application, because we are talking mainly about the front end, the user interface. Yes, background things would need (semi)massive changes too, to be able to cover the new design smoothly and efficiently, but that might not be a problem of the designer. Honestly, I'd probably do it similarly as Firefox, where I've been told (long time ago) that they use different interface for GNOME and for other desktop environments.

... I think we should allow some time to wait and see how this plays out, and revisit this proposal next cycle.

I'm not sure of the time frame. One of the reasons why I begun to ask in January was that I knew it'll take some time. It can take a cycle or two, or more, hard to guess. I also expect it to be a giant task.

Ditch or hide all of the calendar, to-do, notes, and contacts functionalities. (They could be hidden behind preferences, for example, to make them easy to restore for users who like them.)

That's possible for the switcher buttons, with changes from https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=759536 which had been done long time ago.

I still kind of miss why integration is wrong, like while I should not be able to manage my contacts in the same application where I want to use them (in the mail or calendar view), but it's a discussion for another thread and I'd not like to diverge from the original topic.

I honestly don't care about this. Exchange is really only popular in corporate environments, right?

Possibly.

That might be important for Red Hat's clients,...

Let me make one thing clear, I didn't speak as a Red Hat representative here. I clearly stated that I speak of the upstream/GNOME mailing list, which has nothing to do with Red Hat customers. I doubt any/many Red Hat customers access that list, they'd rather use Red Hat bugzilla, but I didn't mention anything about that. Thus, please, avoid to imply that my intention is only about the business of certain company, because it isn't. I speak about users, not about customers. I also do not use Exchange servers, I have it only for testing, but it doesn't mean I'm going to ignore those users, only because I'm not using that part of the software.

FWIW I am also in favour of dropping Evolution from the WS Live image.
I feel it is easy enough for those users that need it to post-install it.

voted on in the meeting on dec 17: agreed: drop evolution

This decision was unanimous, but I want to express some disappointment that Milan never received much support from design team for an Evolution redesign, despite repeatedly expressing willingness to redesign according to our needs.

comps PR will follow momentarily.

Metadata Update from @catanzaro:
- Issue untagged with: meeting
- Issue close_status updated to: Fixed
- Issue status updated to: Closed (was: Open)

5 years ago

OK I see kalev is on top of comps :)

For posterity, the vote was: (+7, 0, -0)

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