This post's subtitle could be "Why Gmail rocks". If you're already a Gmail user, you probably already understand Gmail's unique way of grouping messages from the same conversation together and presenting them in one unified view. If that's the case, this article is probably not of much interest to you. But if you've never tried Gmail, and have never understood why your friends keep saying it's the best thing since sliced bread, hopefully we can help you out (and provide some alternatives if Gmail is not an option for you).
Grouping threads
Virtually all email clients have a view that presents a list of messages. The traditional way to handle this (and the way virtually all email clients and webmail interfaces do it) is to treat each individual message separately. The onus is on the user to keep various conversations (threads, in email parlance) straight in their head. This works fine when you receive only 20 or 30 emails in a day, but when you get up above 60 or 70, this model starts to fall apart. It completely fails when you get up into hundreds of messages per day or more.
The unique feature that Gmail brings to the table is the ability to intelligently group messages from a common email thread together, so that in your list of messages you will only see one entry per thread. Right off the bat this will take an inbox with 70 actual messages in it, and make it appear as if there are only 20 or 30, since you're only seeing one row per thread.
Back in August I did a pair of articles outlining software that can be used to support Getting Things Done functionality using online software, and offline-capable software. My offline article focused on Outlook and the various add-ins that are available for it. Of the ones I commented on, ClearContext generated the most attention by far.
Lucky for us ClearContext fans, today they've released version 3.0 of their fantastic Outlook plugin, which they're referring to as an Automated Personal Assistant. As a long time user of the product, I agree that when used correctly it really does act as a personal assistant, sorting and tagging your email to make sure that your attention goes to the messages that matter first. It also lets you very easily turn emails into appointments or actionable tasks with literally just the click of a mouse. ClearContext Inbox Management System is now also compatible with Outlook 2007, which has been in wide beta release for a few months now. I can tell you, the combination of Outlook 2007 and ClearContext can't be beat. I've got no financial interest in the company - I'm just a user who loves how much better Outlook is to use with ClearContext installed.
While there are a great number of ways to put a Getting Things Done system into action on a Windows PC, I'd like to compare and contrast the benefits of using native Windows software like Outlook (arguably the most popular personal information management software on Windows) and handheld computers (in this case a Pocket PC) versus using online web-based software. Today's post will focus on the "offline" native Windows and Pocket PC software.
It’s a problem that has hit many people I know, and until now there has not been a good solution for it.
What I’m talking about is the fact that in Outlook you are limited to 32kb worth of rules if you are connected to an Exchange
server, at which point you receive an unceremonious error message stating that there is no more room. For
literally years, I assumed this was a misconfiguration of the Exchange server I was connected to, as I couldn’t
fathom Outlook failing to save rules after a paltry 14 or 15. I was wrong. Luckily, there are a few solutions to
consider.
The first is the one I’ve been using for over a year now, and loving. Clear Context Information Management System is an Outlook add-on that is not
intended to be a fix to the problem I describe above, but a wonderful side effect of buying in to their system is that
you become much less reliant on Outlook’s built-in rules system. Clear Context deserves an entire post of its
own, which I will do here soon, but for now just keep in mind that if your Outlook rules are driving you crazy, Clear
Context could be the answer (and then some).
If you’re not looking to completely reconsider your inbox and how you interact with it, consider Auto-Mate for Outlook, which is a separate rule system from
the built-in Outlook one, with all the same flexibility and configurability and a whole host of added features, like
scheduling rules to run periodically and filing mail automatically after the fact.
Auto-Mate is available in Standard and Pro versions, and Clear Context is currently running a public beta program
for version 2 of their wonderful product.
This post's subtitle could be "Why Gmail rocks". If you're already a Gmail user, you probably already understand Gmail's unique way of grouping messages from the same conversation together and presenting them in one unified view. If that's the case, this article is probably not of much interest to you. But if you've never tried Gmail, and have never understood why your friends keep saying it's the best thing since sliced bread, hopefully we can help you out (and provide some alternatives if Gmail is not an option for you). 
It’s a problem that has hit many people I know, and until now there has not been a good solution for it.
What I’m talking about is the fact that in Outlook you are 
If you’re not looking to completely reconsider your inbox and how you interact with it, consider 
