Based on popular request this version enables Address Book button on toolbar. It works the similar way like Addresses button in Outlook Express except one important difference - in Outlook Express this button opened Windows Address Book (separate program used for various purposes besides email). In OE Classic, this button simulates Windows Address Book behavior. Windows Address Book (WAB) doesn't exist anymore on recent Windows like Windows Vista or Windows 7.

Although the functionality is not much different from what OE Classic had so far it is now easier to manage contacts for many users. There will be of course more improvements to Address Book in the future.

New Address Book with functionality similar to Windows Address Book (WAB).

New features

• Address Book toolbar icon is now active and opens editor for contacts
• Added Select All in main menu (Edit menu), function based on focused field
• Delete messages now also works for newsgroups message list

Bug fixes

• CTRL+V (paste) now properly works based on focused field in email editor window. Also, Undo/Cut/Copy/Select All have improved too
• Fixed memory leak for all tree controls (especially Newsgroups list window)

Important note to existing users: Due to changes in configuration there won't be a default account set. So you must set it again as some functions require default account. To do this simply open main menu, select Tools / Accounts and click Set As Default once for any email account of your choice and once for any news account. This note doesn't affect new users that are installing OE Classic the first time.

As a token of gratitude for your continuous registrations of full version we decided to purchase a nice looking GUI control pack which we'll be using in this version and versions that will follow. Not only the user interface will now look better but will also be more functional and probably with less bugs as these new controls help a bit automating things we had to code manually before so the program development should also be faster.

New options window with some of the new and better looking GUI controls, compatible with Windows 7 as well as older versions like Windows Vista or Windows XP.

New features

• Some user interface controls updated to new, better looking ones (e.g. attachment icon, from/to/subject lines, options)
• Added options with these categories - Signatures, Newsgroups, Maintenance
• Signature editor, browser and options how to insert signature
• Newsgroups option - number of headers to get in one go. And you can set it to more reasonable (bigger) values than the maximum of only 1000 headers like in Outlook Express or Windows Live Mail.
• Option to empty deleted items on exit
• Option to delete only messages older than specified number of days
• Newsgroup message is struck out when clicked but unavailable on server
• Status bar now also counts unread messages for email and newsgroup folders

Bug fixes

• Due to option changes you need to set default email and news account again
• Fixed some character display issues related to message subject display
• Fixed outbox message sending - inability to send more than one message at a time and sending messages using wrong account

When using encrypted connection to outgoing (SMTP) server, some servers require to start encrypted connection right from the start and some others start connection in unencrypted mode and then require STARTTLS command to mark the beginning of encrypted communication.

Older versions of OE Classic didn't support STARTTLS command properly and could only do the first type of encrypted connection. This release fixes that issue.

This is done in following manner:

• If the checkbox Server requires secure connection (SSL/TLS) in account properties is checked OE Classic will connect using the first method (whole communication when you send emails is encrypted)
• If this box is unchecked it will connect in unencrypted mode, then try to detect if the server supports any methods of encryption and if it does - it will use the most secure available method (STARTTLS first - whole communication is encrypted, if that fails, it tries hashed passwords - it only encrypts username and password but the rest of emails are unencrypted which is still better than no encryption at all, and finally if both of these fail, it uses least secure - unencrypted mode).

So - however you check this checkbox, OE Classic will use most secure mode offered by server you connect to, this checkbox only determines which of the two methods will be used. Note that some servers use 2 ports for connecting and only on one of these ports you can use encrypted communication. Example of this is smtp.live.com - if you connect to port 25 it will only hash passwords (second best method), and on port 587 it will support STARTTLS - obviously, using port 587 is more secure.

Future versions of OE Classic will be able to automatically auto-configure most popular servers with most secure settings.

Here are changes in this version:

New features

• Tries to use the most secure connection available for outgoing servers
• Pro version now has "Pro" in program title bar and in about box
• Some speedups in link detection in plain text messages and view source

Bug fixes

• Outgoing (SMTP) connection to servers requiring STARTTLS fixed (it caused issues with smtp.live.com and some other servers)
• Fixed problem with tall popup menu for copy/move list of folders
• Back to standard popup menu due to bugs and problems with beautified menu

As promised, we are releasing newsreader feature in OE Classic. Newsreader is very much like it used to be in Outlook Express except it's better. It can decode stuff Outlook Express and many other newsreaders couldn't and it does not have useless and downright annoying thumbnail image preview mode like Windows Live Mail but instead it displays images inline - as it should.

Newsreader can decode yEnc posts without any external decoder (like our other software yEnc Decoder - yDecode), it automatically recognizes multipart posts (e.g. messages having "(001/100)" and similar counters in the subject line), and supports 64-bit article indexing. It is worth noting that some newsreaders that don't support 64-bit indexes can cease to function (stop downloading new messages) on some high volume newsgroups like alt.binaries.boneless which already have gone over 32-bit index limit. With 64 bits it is not likely to overflow in decades.

My favorite mini-feature is nickname generator and domain name generator in newsgroups account wizard - you can use it for newsgroups or any other purpose you need.

Here is a quick tour to highlight features we believe are the coolest in this update:

Newsgroup account wizard can generate unique nickname for you. You don't feel like Disco Genius today? Then use it to create your own out of millions of possible combinations. Generated email is "standard" invalid email (note "nospam" and ".invalid" domain) which nobody can spam to and is safe to use in newsgroups (given you don't want anyone to email you).

Newsgroup selection has 2 filters - by group type and by keywords you enter. You can combine them to easily find group you want. You can also see number of groups after filtering (if filters are cleared you see total number of groups) and approximate number of posts so you can determine which groups are more popular than others.

Multiparts are automatically detected and grouped into same group which you can open by clicking "+" icon.

Popup menus are now context sensitive - the items will change depending on folder or item you right-clicked.

Message decoder can now recognize wider variety of message attachments. This example shows delivery status and RFC-822 (returned email) attachments in a failed delivery reply message.

Detailed list of improvements:

New features

• Newsreader with support for yEnc, multiparts and 64-bit article indexing
• Wizard for newsgroup accounts
• Random nickname generator for newsgroups (or any other purpose you like)
• Random domain generator and spam-safe invalid email generator for newsgroups
• Properties for newsgroup accounts
• Newsgroups selection window with account selection, newsgroups count, count of newsgroup posts, newsgroups count after filtering, filter by keyword and type (filters can be combined)
• Improved and beautified most popup menus (right mouse button menus)
• Context sensitive popup menus (item list changes with different folder)
• Internal code refactoring to simplify calls to same functions from different places (e.g. calling "Print" from main menu, toolbar etc.)
• Improved behavior of mouse wheel on some controls
• More options in main menu (Folder, Print, Save Attachments...)
• Added "Empty Deleted Items" right mouse option for "Deleted Items" folder
• Faster refresh of message list, especially for select all (CTRL+A)
• Beautified message display (centered images, cleaner attachments view etc.)
• Icons for messages in email and newsgroups (showing message status, if it is local or remote, which part of multipart it is etc.)
• Outgoing plain text message is now automatically wrapped to 80 columns rather than being based on window width
• Print option enabled from toolbar, main menu, popup menu, keyboard shortcut
• Improved detection of text and image attachments in messages

Bug fixes

• Fixed specific bugs in copy/move messages
• Fixed missing folders in folder list for copy/move
• Fixed a bug causing messages sent from certain mail clients not to display
• Bug fixes in message list refresh and folder list refresh
• Internal improvement of handling disabled options when they are unavailable
• Fixed a bug that could cause transactions to malfunction (in message save)

Great news! After some initial testing, it appears that there are no significant obstacles to add Usenet newsreader (newsgroups reader) functionality into OE Classic.

So, except adding email accounts, you will also be able to add your newsgroups server and newsgroups account.

What we can tell for sure at the moment is that the newsreader will support all newsgroup posting formats/encodings including MIME (which is least common on Usenet, even though widely used for email), UU encoded messages (more common on newsgroups although quite obsolete as encoding) and yEnc encoded posts (most common for binaries groups and posts).

OE Classic won't need any external decoders like Outlook Express, Windows Mail, Windows Live Mail or Mozilla Thunderbird did (they all need our other product - yEnc decoder - yDecode to function properly and to display all messages they couldn't on their own).

At first, the newsreader won't support merging of multipart posts but it will be able to read multipart messages individually. In the following versions you will be able to automatically join multipart posts (messages marked as (01/15), (02/15), (03/15) and similar in the subject line) just as yDecode already does but again, without any external decoder.

We must also say - newsreader will be very easy to use - as easy as it used to be in Outlook Express. It will NOT be messed up as in Windows Live Mail - image attachments will be displayed inline (as they should be) and not as thumbnails and will not require additional mouse clicks to show them in full size (in unnecessary viewer program). If you used Windows Live Mail to read Usenet posts you know what we are talking about.

This and other regular bug-fixes are scheduled to be released in the next version. After that, we plan to do more improvements to the address-book and then some bug-fixes and speedups but more on that later.

We are also preparing some other improvements regarding web site functionality. Stay tuned!

New features

• Contact list mini avatar icons
• Help in main menu opens online help (keyboard shortcut F1)

Bug fixes

• Folder list icons no longer show 2 icons on top of each other on Windows 7
• Contact list no longer opens context menu (right mouse click) on blank areas

The web site has a couple of new pages:

• Online help (see help & contact page)
• License agreement page (see bottom links)
• Privacy statement page

What a funny coincidence isn't it? Here is bug-fixed update to version released 2 days ago.

New features

• Slightly improved URL/email detection in plain text messages

Bug fixes

• Message is now correctly marked as read (only when it was actually opened)
• Clicking email links opens internal editor instead of default email client
• Clicking URLs opens default web browser (if other than Internet Explorer)
• Fixed code that could potentially crash when displaying a message
• Fixed bug in delete messages that could leave some messages undeleted

This version is large OE Classic improvement - therefore larger version increase than usual. It also took more time to develop.

You are advised to upgrade to this version as soon as possible due to disk database changes (which stores all emails and other settings).

IMPORTANT: To correctly upgrade database you must close OE Classic (if it is running) before starting installation! Installation now auto-detects running program and warns you, but this only works for current (and future) versions. If however, you are doing new installation then you may ignore this info.

There are database changes but you don't have to worry about them much as OE Classic provides built-in automatic database upgrade tool compatible with a couple of older versions. This version is still backward compatible with earliest release (1.0a1) but not for much longer (therefore upgrade!).

Please read earlier news item to familiarize yourself with the latest changes in more detail.

Here is a brief list of improvements in this upgrade. Full list would be much longer.

New features

• No longer a beta
• Core functions that operate on disk database(*) responsible for reading, writing, copying, moving and deleting messages, folders and identities are now much faster and much more reliable
• Disk operations are secured by transactions - even if program or system crashes in the middle of write operation, database integrity is preserved
• Internal folder compact and fragmentation calculation support
• Internal identity support
• New and more stable format of database (messages, settings, address book)
• Refined and informative error messages in case of disk operation errors
• Implemented single application instance
• Copy messages support in GUI
• Folder bar is now functional
• Account passwords are now saved in encrypted form
• Simplified installer with automatic upgrade of database
• Due to incompatibility with new identities feature older database formats will be dropped in near future

Bug fixes

• Fixed window centering in dual monitor setup

(*) "Disk database" means - a set of files on your disk that store all emails, accounts and other settings.

Download basic version on download page. Pro version users can download update on registered user page.

If you still use older version you should upgrade it to the current one (1.01) as new releases may not support older email database format. This will upgrade stored messages and ensure smooth transition to the next version which is scheduled to be released soon.

Email message storage is the core of OE Classic and depending on how your messages are stored and organized affects the speed, upgrade ability and protection of database against corruption. Therefore, the whole next release is dedicated to message storage alone. It is major improvement to the program as whole user interface depends on underlying disk operations.

Here are some of the improvements that are coming:

• Identities support - Identities are like accounts - they hold complete program settings, messages and contacts. When you create a new identity, it is like you installed the program from scratch with all the settings reset to initial state. You may also share contacts among identities. Identities are protected with password and you can use them to easily separate tasks you do with the program - for example, you may separate work email from home email, you may create different profiles for different users, etc.
• All disk operations are faster - Much faster copying/moving messages from folder to folder (copy alone isn't even supported in current version), compacting folders (based on fragmentation), memory cache for frequently accessed disk files, etc.
• Transaction based saves - Transactions protect saves by storing changes that are about to be done to the folder system. If anything happens while messages (or other data) are saved or moved around, which even includes program crashing or powering off the system in the middle of write-operation, the database integrity will be kept. On the very next start, OE Classic will figure out what was messed up and restore all folders to last good state by cleaning up corrupted parts. And even if the corruption occurs, program still has mechanisms to restore database to working condition.
• Backups - In addition to transactions, messages will also be automatically backed up ensuring even more security and redundancy.
• (Almost) No limitations - Outlook Express had a limit of 2 gigabytes per folder. Some users had issues with that because when you reached this limit you could corrupt folders easily. Sure, we have a limit too, but it is measured in exabytes (that's millions of terabytes). With currently largest consumer disks of about 3 terabytes and the way how email and newsgroups are digested, this is no limit to worry about for a number of decades.

If you expect secure storage of your important messages, OE Classic most certainly does it!