I didn’t even believe that I got reminded of the Mail App on Apple tablet devices. The one on Windows 8 surely looks like it but the lack of toolbars makes the app on crack. The top toolbar is missing for sure but at least, the bottom bar has enough features and top-right buttons are somewhat enough for this app.
So here are the following experiences they have when they developed this app.
- Multiple email accounts are common - This may be needed for redundancy as there may be security issues going on today and you must make sure that your email account is secure with strong security level and strong password. You also have both the personal and work email accounts in which these two types of email accounts serve different purposes.
- Lots of email everyday – It is true that everyone is receiving emails regularly. According to the developers of this app, there are two types of email users. The light email users receive less mails every week than the heavy email users who receive lots of messages every week.
- Email is real-time – Sure, the service itself is synchronously working in real time but in fact, the communication itself is asynchronous for email, where you don’t expect the mails to come in immediately. I think the reason is all about the regards of the bandwidth.
What’s special about the Mail app in Windows 8 is that there will be three-pane support for 16:9 screens compared to 4:3 screens where there will be two-panes instead similar to Apple tablet devices. When selecting multiple messages, the bottom app which is the App bar appears automatically and you can select what to do with them. Selecting the name of the sender or the recipient in the message pane brings you to the People App so you can add in the sender to the contacts list.
When writing email to your friends, the screen will be made up for two-panes and the left-pane is optimized for touch, and keyboard. Now for formatting, you have to enter some text first and then select some text you want to format. You can choose to make the text italic, underlined, bold or even highlighted. You can also choose to change the font and the font color.
Then, using the Metro Snap for Email app, you can refer to certain stuffs and then put them in the email you’re writing to. Also, you can check out the email while doing other stuffs, hoping that the app will be working in real time. This is much better than going back to the Hotmail website or Windows Live Mail app which may be taking you time to re-check for new emails.
Now, when it comes printing e-mails, you can use the Devices Charm and then choose the printer you want to print the mail. This may be needed in case you need to have the hard copy of the email you’re supposed to fill in before submitting.
The lock screen on Windows 8 is kind of flawed. Sure on the IOS, you can slide from left to right on the notification message box which is on the center on the screen as well as to slide from left on the unread message you want to read. So for the unread message list on the IOS Lock Screen, it lists down the following unread messages so you can choose which message you want to read but before that, you’re asked for the passcode or password if you have one. On the Start Screen, you can check out the incoming messages on the Mail tile as long as the tile has Live Tile turned on. You can also pin the respective messages to the Start Screen for future reference similar to saving E-mail messages on the desktop apps. Just like the email notification box on smartphones, you can check out the notification box on the top-right corner of the screen.
Today, email is one of the important parts in our daily lives of technology. It is believed that people want the great email apps that meet their modern expectations. However, it may seem that the Email Metro app is not as good as Windows Live Mail but there may be more features to come.
