hpr-knowledge-base/hpr_transcripts/hpr0060.txt

Episode: 60
Title: HPR0060: Claws Email client
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr0060/hpr0060.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-07 10:52:33

---

.
.
Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of Hacker Public Radio.
I am Deep Geek and I will be your host for this episode.
This episode is a first for Hacker Public Radio
as it is a sort of a new in-depth series on lightweight applications.
But what makes this one a first is that it is going to be the first in-depth series
which is open to all contributors to Hacker Public Radio.
If you want your episode to be part of this series,
just tell our administration when you submit your show.
Why did I make the effort to find out we could do this with our software?
Well, one of the things that fascinates me is the question,
how can we make our box and go even faster?
One solution is lightweight applications.
Just like the risk architecture of computers goes faster
because the processors do less so to can we choose our applications
so that we use smaller, less functional apps that load faster
and do their thing faster.
What will make this series so interesting and what I hope happens
is when others who like their box and to just be more zippy
use this series to create a dialogue.
It should become an interesting spin-in out already great practice
of giving software reviews.
So, lightweight applications.
First off, it is a relative term.
When I was on Windows and went from Internet Explorer to Opera,
I was going to a lightweight alternative.
Now that I am a Linux guy and I have a billion web browsers to choose from,
I keep picking smaller and faster ones.
Also, my favorite Linux, Debian, handles dependency packages
in a very narrow way.
So, if I leave Conqueror, which is KDE's web browser,
because it depends on some Damon process that takes time to start
and go to Firefox, it is a move to a more lightweight application.
If I go from Firefox to Dillow, I can do this again.
It's creating quite an odd effect for me.
I find all the people around me talking about how much time the suspend feature
and their computer saves them in boot time.
And I just get confused because I just re-did my system again
and I now boot in about 30 seconds.
Of course, my tastes run a little spartan.
And I don't expect all around me to adopt my extreme practice.
But I would just love to hear of people doing similar things on their boxes.
But I don't come here tonight to review web browsers.
Tonight, it is email.
Namely, the Silfeet clause email client.
So, my first Linux email was K-mail.
Because I never liked GNOME.
I went there first.
And it was great, rich, full-featured client.
But it took forever to kick off.
I felt like clicking on the K-mail icon took as long as turning on my system.
The reason for this was that it has heavy dependencies within the KDE environment.
So, I began researching email.
I'm not sure if it was on Wikipedia that I read it.
But I heard of this old odd email client called Silfeet
that was stored in Japan by a group of computer people
who did not appreciate HTMLized or as it is sometimes called enhanced email.
So, I decided to try this.
Turns out it was a great little client.
It was a lot like using the old forte agent newsreader
and email software in its layout and way of handling things.
So, I immediately fell for it.
But it was not agent.
It was all about email.
And as I got into it more, I found that it had some other great features that appeal to me.
For one thing, it stores email in the Unish mail-der format.
Well, K-mail uses mail-dears, which mail-dears.
It's a shortening of the word mail and directories, mail-der.
It was more of a KDE interpretation of mail-dears
with their own special weird indexing of messages.
Silfeet clause does put a few ad files in its mail-dears
but you can also have the Unish program Prokmail
directly add messages into its directories
and it will handle it fine.
I immediately wrote a white listing script for Prokmail.
Now, when mail comes in, if Prokmail recognizes the from address,
it puts the mail in my regular queue,
which my window manages taskbar recognizes
and I get a beep in an icon by the clock in my system tray.
If it is unrecognized, it goes into a cell fuller called Suspect
that I check much, much later.
You may be able to dream of some cooler applications yourself.
Also, in the basics of this program are, of course,
an address book and a bunch of effective export and import functions,
along with other things nobody would want to be without,
like SSL support for email.
But please don't think that this program is just this little basic email program
with very few dependencies, because it isn't.
It has plugins, so you can extend it to do just the functions you want.
My first plugin was the themes plugin.
There is nothing better for me than a little zippy application that looks great.
Then I used the newsreader plugin.
I didn't stay the course with that one, as it was not as well suited for binaries
as it was for text-based news groups.
The RSS feed aggregator is a favorite.
I particularly like to get the doc-dropper articles as they are published
right there with my emails.
There are tons of other plugins too.
To see them all, check out the clause-mail.org webpage.
Here's a quick list of some of the highlights.
HTML viewers for both Dillo and GTK HTML2, PDF viewers.
Attachment detachers, Bayesian filtering, a pearl extension,
so you can write your own filters in pearl.
Synchronization would window CE devices,
and an Outlook Evolution V Calendar plugin.
So check it out.
Perhaps you too will like it.
Feedback is always welcome.
You can email me at HPR at deepgeek.us.
Today's GeekTidbit.
Let's have a Geek Hiku from Jim Griffith.
No keyboard present.
Hit F1 to continue.
Then engineering?
Thank you.
Have a great day.
Thank you for listening to Hackers of the Gradio.
HPR is sponsored by Carol.net.
She'll head on over to C-A-R-O dot E-C for all of her students.
Thanks for watching.
Thanks for watching.