Outlook does not delete but displays deleted messages asstrike-trough

[Bill Kearney]

> Thunderbird seems to be
> configured by default to _move_ the message to the Deleted Items-folder
> and thus they vanish from whatever folder they were.

No they don't 'move'.  They're simply marked as deleted, just as Outlook
does, but they remain in the original folder.  Try it, delete one in tbird
and then connect to the very same mailbox using something like pine.  You'll
see the message is still there, just marked for deletion.

The problem with this is wasted space.  The user thinks the message is gone
but it's still there taking up disk space and potentially reducing their
quota.  Leaving them with strikeouts at least introduces the user to the
concept of 'purging their own trash'.  I've found running schedule deletion
tasks to be a VERY BAD IDEA.  Users have all sorts of stupid notions about
what being 'in the trash' means.  Like they want me to go climb into the
dumpster to go get the message they put in the trash 3 months ago...  By the
time you set a 'wide enough' window of time for automatic deletion you run
out of disk space.

Bottom line, I've found it's better to use strike-through marking and have
the client do the purging.  Some clients offer a feature to do it on leaving
the application or folder, prompted by a dialog box.  Works well for most
users, especially the ones that want to delete it, "but not really".  Ugh,
users....

> A few users of ours moved over to Thunderbird because of this MS
> 'feature'.

I think outlook's utterly crappy handling of IMAP is a more powerful
motivator.  Outlook Express, on the other hand, does a fine job of
supporting IMAP.  But the regular "Outlook 2003" and past versions have had
absolutely crappy IMAP handling.  Such that it makes it almost impossible to
use OL2003 against an IMAP server.  I long since gave up on it for IMAP
access.

-Bill Kearney