OS X Lion will usher in a new look for the Mac’s native email client, with the company promising even better organization of email threads into what it calls “conversations.”
The new Mail will automatically group messages from the same conversation — even if the subject changes along the way. Clicking a “conversation” in the inbox will reveal a streamlined feed of individual messages in chronological order, which can be easily filed or deleted individually or by an entire conversation.
Users of Mail in iOS will already be familiar with the functionality, which is presumably being brought to the desktop with improved file coordination on the developer side.
The main layout is getting a revamp as well, displaying messages in the inbox alongside a full-height preview of the selected message, which ought to get tongues wagging.
Finally, while Apple promises a “powerful new way to search” even the largest inboxes, details on that feature are slight at the moment; the input field appears to remain an oblong oval with a magnifying glass icon.
Lonnie Lazar is a writer-musician-web designer-attorney. He writes about Apple for Cult of Mac and Mac|Life, and about VoIP and telecommunications for Voxilla. Follow Lonnie on Twitter @LonnieLazar, join the Cult of Mac on Facebook, and find Lonnie’s photos on Flickr.
