Difference between revisions of "Mail filters"

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Expert Usability Review vs Usability Testing
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If you're subscribing to any of ProgClub's [[mailing lists]] you probably want to setup mail filters so that list traffic gets routed to an appropriate folder. Here we make a suggestion about how to do this. (Note: I'd appreciate it if someone would fill out sections for other email clients).
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__TOC__
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One question we're often asked will be which method is best: usability testing or expert usability reviews? Well, should they were sports cars, expert usability reviews might be a Porsche (fairly decent car and better than no car at a lot of), but usability testing would end up being in a different league, namely Formula 1.  
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== Thunderbird ==
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So, what'utes the difference?
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If you're using the excellent [http://www.mozilla.org/thunderbird/ Thunderbird] email client, you can follow these instructions for creating mail filters.
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- A great expert usability review is when a usability specialist inspects a website to identify potential usability issues
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Firstly, we need a folder structure in the email data store (which might be a Local Folders store, or an IMAP folder store) in which to store our emails. I've created a folder structure that looks like this:
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- Usability testing involves getting people coming from the audience to evaluate your site whilst performing tasks
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[[File:Mail filter thunderbird folders.png]]
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These people're very similar in many ways in that both:  
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Note that the folder structure I have created is:
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- Locate and prioritise usability problems
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* ProgClub
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** announcement
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- Evaluate designs in the context of tasks
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** list
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** programming
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Carry out they will come across the same problems?
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** vcs
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** admin
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The answer depends on how precisely you measure this, on balance no, not reliably. Most of the time, expert usability reviews tend to find high level breaches of design rules and consistency. Usability testing is better at finding issues related to special domain knowledge and task flows.  
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*** bulk
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Had you been to transport out a very expert usability review before conducting usability testing, and compare the two sets of findings, you can observe just how the issues you found in comparison with their real experiences. Did you discover a lot of the problems? Which kinds did you overlook? Which kinds that you thought might always be issues switched out not to always be? This unique will provide you a good feel for exactly how expert usability reviews hold up toward usability testing.
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You may not be subscribing to all of ProgClub's lists, and in that case there's no need to create the folders for the lists you're not interested in.
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Often, expert reviews will:  
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Now that our folders are in place, create the filters by clicking on Tools => Message Filters... You will see a dialogue box that looks something like this:
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- Ignore usability issues that arise during usability testing
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[[File:Mail filter thunderbird 1.png]]
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- Locate some issues that usability testing didn'capital t  
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Make sure that "Filters for:" is set to the appropriate email account.
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- Report false alarms (i.e. not real issues)  
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Click on "New..." to create a new filter. You will fill in the form something like this:
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And that's the problem. Regardless of how good a helpful expert you are if you just count while on an expert usability review you'll come across different types of issues and overlook some potentially serious products.
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[[File:Mail filter thunderbird announcement filter.png]]
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Consider the case of a health website aimed specifically at brand-new mums. The expert usability review found plenty of great issues, but might have missed the main killer one that triggered participants to pass comments like "That'utes just so insensitive!" and "I wouldn'big t use this web site anymore". And just about all because of the seemingly benign bit of banner advertising for a local fitness center placed next to a good post about breasts serving. A reviewer would have difficulty predicting the indignant reaction of brand-new mothers who felt the site was rubbing their nostril in it. In any case there would end up being little potential for them going everywhere near a health club with a newborn.
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Note, that this is for the announcement filter. We've given the filter a name of "ProgClub announcement", we're matching when the Subject contains "[ProgClub announcement]", and we're "Moving Message to" the "annoucement" folder. So, you need to create a filter for each of the lists you are subscribed to, and the following table will help you with the filter details.
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How much overlap perhaps there is between expert usability reviews & usability testing?
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=== Filters ===
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Obviously, there is some overlap in the problems present in both expert usability reviews and usability testing. Research executed by Fu, Salvendy and Turley in 2002 estimated this kind of to end up being around 41%. Not as high since you might expect. Interestingly, expert usability reviews tend to discover far more troubles in comparison with usability testing. But it'utes quality over variety.  
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{|class="wikitable"
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! Filter name
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Expert usability reviews are good...  
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! Subject contains
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! Move message to
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Expert usability reviews are more common than usability testing mainly because these people're more affordable and quicker to carry out. Typically, it'll only have a number of days and nights to inspect a site and write a report and because you don'capital t need to pay labs nor recruit people, charges are significantly cheaper. Due to this, that they're often preferred to usability testing, certain when time and budget are squeezed.  
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|-
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| ProgClub announcement
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There are anyhow some pitfalls. For a start, a lot depends on the reviewer'utes level of experience. No two usability experts will locate exactly the same issues so the method is actually furthermore available to practitioner variation. The biggest problem nevertheless is simply that they will occasionally ignore the real troubles that cause users to fail tasks. This might be specifically true once the customers seems to have a particular skill set. For illustration, a helpful accountant may always be better placed to diagnose selected types of issues related to online accountancy tasks than a non-accountant reviewer.  
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| [ProgClub announcement]
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| ProgClub/announcement
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...But usability testing is truly da Daddy!
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|-
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| ProgClub list
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Usability testing takes far more time to program and organise and is much more expensive also - recruiting and incentivising people through a audience may be costly. But it's definitely worth the effort! The results provide a truer picture from the real troubles people encounter because that they're derived coming from real consumers in the first place.
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| [ProgClub list]
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| ProgClub/list
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It'ersus inconceivable exactly how sites go stay without checking to determine that that they're actually usable. It'utes like building an automobile but not test driving it. "All right, we've built this kind of great website. Umm, well no, we've not looked at to determine if people can play with it yet. But don'testosterone worry because most the links function and the pages download quickly."
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|-
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| ProgClub programming
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Another plus of usability testing is truly that there'ersus significantly less conjecture and feedback comes straight through the horse'utes mouth. Movies of user sessions in particular, offers a powerful persuasion resource for reluctant stakeholders. It's hard to argue with recordings of people in tears of frustration.  
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| [ProgClub programming]
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| ProgClub/programming
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Use real users and accept no substitute!  
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|-
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| ProgClub vcs
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Both expert usability reviews and usability testing have their time and place. In practice, people often use expert usability reviews early on straighten way up their design in arrangements for usability testing. (Indeed this is critical for accessibility testing, since it's a waste of your time to recruit and test subscribers who can'n even get into your site in the first place.)  
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| [ProgClub vcs]
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| ProgClub/vcs
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Whilst a helpful expert usability review will be better than nothing, it'utes still vital to serve your website in front of people since early since possible way too, prefer to than leaving it also late. Key elements such since site structure and navigation should be assessed with surfers at the original opportunity. Otherwise you risk having your site considerably overhauled at a late stage.  
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|-
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| ProgClub admin
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Ultimately, the key should be to appreciate that expert usability reviews and usability testing are different beasts. The most efficient approach should be to try and integrate both techniques. Remember though, you must test your site with real surfers - accept no substitute!
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| [ProgClub admin]
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http://www.cactusteachers.com/member/9555/
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| ProgClub/admin
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|-
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| Fail2Ban
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| [ProgClub admin] [Fail2Ban]
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| ProgClub/admin/bulk
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|}
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When you're done you will have a set of mail filters that look something like this:
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[[File:Mail filter thunderbird 2.png]]
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== Gmail ==
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For the people who use [http://mail.google.com/ Gmail], they might know that they don't do folders but things called 'labels'. If you're pulling your hair out (like I once did) and screaming 'why?!', check out this [http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=10708 page]. And if you're still not convinced (like I was), follow the rest of this section and you'll soon understand why labels > folders.
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And maybe after giving a week or two.
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 +
Anyway, first let's create these labels:
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* Click the gear icon at the top right corner and choose 'Mail Settings'.
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* Choose the 'Labels' tab. Scroll down till you see the 'Create new label' button. Click it.
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Let's create labels following this structure and order:
 +
* ProgClub
 +
** Announcement
 +
** List
 +
** Programming
 +
** VCS
 +
** Admin
 +
 
 +
Of course you may not follow all the mailing lists. But you should have at least have the labels 'ProgClub' and 'Announcement'. Not all labels need to be nested, so you do not need to check the 'Next label under:' box to create a label. So to nest 'Announcement' under 'ProgClub', set it to look like this:
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[[File:Mail_filter_gmail_1_ver2.png‎]]
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After you've created your labels, you should see them at the left side of the screen. If you cannot see them, they may be hidden. Select 'Show in label list' and then 'Show all'; do the same with 'Show in message list'.
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Now, filters. We'll be creating a filter for the emails coming from the announcement mailing list.
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Choose the 'Filters' tab and then 'Create a new filter'. At the top, you should see this:
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 +
[[File:Mail_filter_gmail_2_ver2.png‎]]
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 +
Let's make the announcement filter apply the label, 'ProgClub/Announcement' onto the appropriate emails. In the 'Includes the words' box, type 'list:"announcement.progclub.org"' (minus the single quotation marks [']) and then choose 'Create filter with this search'. In the background, Gmail has automatically done a test search of all your mail to see which mail fits the criteria of your filter in-progress.
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You should now see something similar to this:
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[[File:Mail_filter_gmail_3_ver2.png‎]]
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* Check 'Skip the Inbox (Archive it)' - this will make the email not appear in the Inbox, making it seem like it has 'sorted into a folder' but can still be easily searched; you do not need to torture yourself by going through every folder in existence (like some email clients that I will not name). If you fear that doing this will not alert you of new mail, do not fear; a number will appear beside the label if there is new mail. See, labels are harmless!
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* Check 'Apply the label:' and select 'Announcement'.
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* [Optional] Check 'Also apply filter to n conversations.' - this will archive and apply the label 'ProgClub/Announcement' to past emails (or 'conversations' as Gmail likes to call them) so even if you were late to the game in creating filters, do not fret!
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* Click 'Create Filter'.  
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Congratulations, you've created your first filter on Gmail. If you're subscribed to other mailing lists, the filter criteria are shown in the following table.
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=== Filters ===
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{|class="wikitable"
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!
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! Includes the words
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! Apply the label
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|-
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| List filter
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| list:(list.progclub.org)
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| List
 +
|-
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| Announcement filter
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| list:(announcement.progclub.org)
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| Announcement
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|-
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| Programming filter
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| list:(programming.progclub.org)
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| Programming
 +
|-
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| VCS filter
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| list:(vcs.progclub.org)
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| VCS
 +
|-
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| Admin filter
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| list:(admin.progclub.org)
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| Admin
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|}

Latest revision as of 15:05, 11 December 2017

If you're subscribing to any of ProgClub's mailing lists you probably want to setup mail filters so that list traffic gets routed to an appropriate folder. Here we make a suggestion about how to do this. (Note: I'd appreciate it if someone would fill out sections for other email clients).

Thunderbird

If you're using the excellent Thunderbird email client, you can follow these instructions for creating mail filters.

Firstly, we need a folder structure in the email data store (which might be a Local Folders store, or an IMAP folder store) in which to store our emails. I've created a folder structure that looks like this:

Mail filter thunderbird folders.png

Note that the folder structure I have created is:

  • ProgClub
    • announcement
    • list
    • programming
    • vcs
    • admin
      • bulk

You may not be subscribing to all of ProgClub's lists, and in that case there's no need to create the folders for the lists you're not interested in.

Now that our folders are in place, create the filters by clicking on Tools => Message Filters... You will see a dialogue box that looks something like this:

Mail filter thunderbird 1.png

Make sure that "Filters for:" is set to the appropriate email account.

Click on "New..." to create a new filter. You will fill in the form something like this:

Mail filter thunderbird announcement filter.png

Note, that this is for the announcement filter. We've given the filter a name of "ProgClub announcement", we're matching when the Subject contains "[ProgClub announcement]", and we're "Moving Message to" the "annoucement" folder. So, you need to create a filter for each of the lists you are subscribed to, and the following table will help you with the filter details.

Filters

Filter name Subject contains Move message to
ProgClub announcement [ProgClub announcement] ProgClub/announcement
ProgClub list [ProgClub list] ProgClub/list
ProgClub programming [ProgClub programming] ProgClub/programming
ProgClub vcs [ProgClub vcs] ProgClub/vcs
ProgClub admin [ProgClub admin] ProgClub/admin
Fail2Ban [ProgClub admin] [Fail2Ban] ProgClub/admin/bulk

When you're done you will have a set of mail filters that look something like this:

Mail filter thunderbird 2.png

Gmail

For the people who use Gmail, they might know that they don't do folders but things called 'labels'. If you're pulling your hair out (like I once did) and screaming 'why?!', check out this page. And if you're still not convinced (like I was), follow the rest of this section and you'll soon understand why labels > folders.

And maybe after giving a week or two.

Anyway, first let's create these labels:

  • Click the gear icon at the top right corner and choose 'Mail Settings'.
  • Choose the 'Labels' tab. Scroll down till you see the 'Create new label' button. Click it.

Let's create labels following this structure and order:

  • ProgClub
    • Announcement
    • List
    • Programming
    • VCS
    • Admin

Of course you may not follow all the mailing lists. But you should have at least have the labels 'ProgClub' and 'Announcement'. Not all labels need to be nested, so you do not need to check the 'Next label under:' box to create a label. So to nest 'Announcement' under 'ProgClub', set it to look like this:

Mail filter gmail 1 ver2.png

After you've created your labels, you should see them at the left side of the screen. If you cannot see them, they may be hidden. Select 'Show in label list' and then 'Show all'; do the same with 'Show in message list'.

Now, filters. We'll be creating a filter for the emails coming from the announcement mailing list.

Choose the 'Filters' tab and then 'Create a new filter'. At the top, you should see this:

Mail filter gmail 2 ver2.png

Let's make the announcement filter apply the label, 'ProgClub/Announcement' onto the appropriate emails. In the 'Includes the words' box, type 'list:"announcement.progclub.org"' (minus the single quotation marks [']) and then choose 'Create filter with this search'. In the background, Gmail has automatically done a test search of all your mail to see which mail fits the criteria of your filter in-progress.

You should now see something similar to this:

Mail filter gmail 3 ver2.png

  • Check 'Skip the Inbox (Archive it)' - this will make the email not appear in the Inbox, making it seem like it has 'sorted into a folder' but can still be easily searched; you do not need to torture yourself by going through every folder in existence (like some email clients that I will not name). If you fear that doing this will not alert you of new mail, do not fear; a number will appear beside the label if there is new mail. See, labels are harmless!
  • Check 'Apply the label:' and select 'Announcement'.
  • [Optional] Check 'Also apply filter to n conversations.' - this will archive and apply the label 'ProgClub/Announcement' to past emails (or 'conversations' as Gmail likes to call them) so even if you were late to the game in creating filters, do not fret!
  • Click 'Create Filter'.

Congratulations, you've created your first filter on Gmail. If you're subscribed to other mailing lists, the filter criteria are shown in the following table.

Filters

Includes the words Apply the label
List filter list:(list.progclub.org) List
Announcement filter list:(announcement.progclub.org) Announcement
Programming filter list:(programming.progclub.org) Programming
VCS filter list:(vcs.progclub.org) VCS
Admin filter list:(admin.progclub.org) Admin
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