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superkuh

If it's a problem you should stop using both gmail and Chrome. Don't support companies that are anti-user.

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My choice to use gmail was made by my employer.

I like my job.

How am I supposed to pass, again?

Are you sure? My employer uses gmail, which I access via Mail.app exclusively. I bet I open the web app maybe once or twice a year, usually by clicking a link in a calendar event.

It's perfectly possibly to use gmail-the-service without using gmail-the-app.

I find Mail.app to have a terrible UX, but I did try it, thanks.

My standing solution is to use one browser to log into big-G services, another to log into FB, and a third for everything else.

If you have a "zero inbox" type approach, I find Mail.app to be serviceable, but to each their own.

There are a few others to try. I used Airmail a few years ago. However, be on the lookout for "native" email clients that are really just web gmail wrappers.

I've been curious about Airmail, but I'm tiring of OSX, to the point that I'm leaning towards switching back to Linux.

I've been a user of Airmail for a couple years and it's great. That said, they just had a security breach on macOS so I've stopped using it on that platform. https://appleinsider.com/articles/18/08/22/exploit-in-airmai...

I think I'll go back but I'm not sure.

That article is from August 22 - I just checked in the MAS and the most recent Airmail update was the 25th and the changes specifically mention a URL security fix, so they may have addressed this already.

I've also used Airmail on and off for years and quite like it, on both Mac and iOS. Mail.app isn't bad, but I've used labels heavily for years, including multiple labels on emails, and Mail doesn't seem to handle that scenario very well.

I'm a fan of Spark. It's not perfect, but it's the best of the apps I've tried.

Have you tried mailplaneapp.com?

That looks really nice. If I end up staying with OSX, I'll give it a try. Thanks!

No. Can’t recommend it enough, to be honest. Their dev team/CS is also extremely responsive (I generally hear from Lars). Honestly, it’s the only way I can handle using gmail regularly.

I can no longer edit but the first part got cut, instead the "No" can just be removed, to clarify.

I read it as a think-o'ed "No problem." anyway.

Have you tried Firefox's multi-account containers? They might be more convenient than using multiple browsers.

I have. Unfortunately, I run my screen at a scaled resolution, so Firefox routinely pegs a full core redrawing itself, and burns my battery like it was punctured.

Until that's fixed, I can't use it as my primary browser. This saddens me, because I otherwise love it.

EDIT: This is actually more reason for me to switch back to Linux; FF doesn't have this bug there.

I heard rumours this might be fixed in FF64 or FF65. It's certainly very needed!

Huh, I also run scaled and haven't noticed that. Is it possible it's an add-on causing the extreme cpu usage?

Something like this came up the other day. Perhaps setting "gfx.compositor.glcontext.opaque" to true in about:config as suggested by pcwalton might help you until this bug is properly fixed?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17934764

It seems to have mitigated the issue some, but it hasn't eliminated it. I had somehow inferred from the web of related issues in the FF bug tracker that I'd need to use a nightly build for this to be effective.

Thanks!

It's totally OK not to like Mail.app, of course, but I'll still posit that you choose to use Gmail in your browser. You don't have to. You do have alternatives, but prefer your current multi-browser workflow.

Again, that's perfectly alright! Just remember that if you reach the point that you can't stand it anymore, you do have other options available to you.

> My standing solution is to use one browser to log into big-G services, another to log into FB, and a third for everything else.

Check out Firefox container tabs.[1] You can isolate sites within one browser and save the associations between containers and tabs.

I use container tabs along with multiple Firefox profiles (for different combinations of browser extensions).

[1] https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/containers

I do the same - I use Safari for Google services (since Apple is unlikely to collude with Google), I use Chrome to browse Facebook (since Google is unlikely to collude with Facebook), and I use Firefox for actually browsing the web.

Excuse me?

Sorry, which part was confusing?

Why not use Firefox for Facebook as well? If your worry is Facebook tracking you across the web, you can use Firefox Containers to give Facebook it's own container when you're browsing facebook.com.

I'd never heard of "Firefox Containers" before - thanks, I'll look into it.

Sounds like you've made your choice. A bad employer at a job you like is more important than software ethics. No need for my input here. But it is your choice.

This is the cheapest kind of hand-wavy, recriminatory internet "discourse". It's shallow, content-free, and leaves you feeling like the good guy for talking shit about other people's choices, which you've examined on exactly one axis.

I'm glad for you that you've found such a clear moral compass, but the world is, in my experience, rather subtle and complex.

I didn't mean to come across as "talking shit". I think almost all people (myself included) would prioritize their job over software ethics if forced into that situation.

But, what do you use for personal email? To avoid these kinds of issues I've been running my own mailserver for about 5 years.

Self-hosted.

The gmail address listed on my HN profile is for listing on public profiles.

> A bad employer at a job you like is more important than software ethics.

Using gmail doesn't automatically make them a bad employer. That is incredibly shallow and naive.

This mentality does nothing to help "software ethics" since it forces people to make an extremely unrealistic choice. I wouldn't expect anybody to quit their job over their employer using gmail. You're just pitting more people against the idea of standing up for software ethics by making it about extremes.

It is akin to telling someone, after an oil spill, that they don't care about the planet since they didn't immediately sell their car to quit buying gas.

At least you can stop using Chrome, right?

Advice on a good mail service? I've got one foot in the door of really increasing my privacy online but one is still stuck behind with Google products.

Protonmail or fastmail are both decent.

Or cock.li, countermail.com, scryptmail.com, tutanota.com or vfemail.net.

I think cockmail would reflect poorly on my professional image, and I'm not really confident my friends would be able to take me seriously with that domain, but sure.

Indeed, but for some purposes, maybe? Also, they offer airmail.cc (innocuous) and tfwno.gf (not entirely obvious).

Seconding Fastmail if you want a good mail provider. They also provide calandars, contacts, notes and file storage in the package, but obviously can't match the level of integration that Google products have with everything.

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