"Push" E-mail

[itsabouttime]

I just wanted to touch on this topic because I think it's an important feature of the iPhone, and I think many don't understand it.
For those of us who currently use Blackberry's, we get true push e-mail. What this means is that the moment an e-mail is sent from the sender, it immediately appears on your phone, in fact, it usually only takes a couple of seconds for the e-mail to arrive on the device.
However, not all smart phones have this feature even though they have e-mail capabilities. Most smart phones must be configured to regularly go "check" for a new e-mail at intervals pre-set by you, and this means it must constantly connect to the internet, check for any new messages, then download the message, then disconnect from the internet. As you can imagine, this is a battery killer.
As Steve Jobs mentioned, the iPhone will have free true push e-mail for those who use Yahoo as their e-mail supplier, this is great news to you if you choose to use it, and as a current Blackberry user I am really excited I won't have to give up this great feature once I switch to the iPhone.
Hope this helps anyone interested.

 

[wot_fan]

To add to what @itsabouttime has said, windows mobile devices also are capable of push email. AFAIK, they must be configured to access a MS exchange server to take advantage of this feature. In addition to push email they also can sync contacts, calendar events and to do items over the air with an exchange server. This can come in extremely handy if you are away from you PC when your device needs to be hard reset. Once you configure the server info in your phone all of your email, contacts, calendar and to do items reappear. If you have a WM device and are interested in this feature there are several companies (I use 4smartphone) that offer this service.

It will be nice to get push email for free with the iPhone. I currently pay about $84 per year for this feature. I hope the pust IMAP from yahoo works as well as what I have now.

 

[Cantwait4iPhone]

Yeah, I got most of that. What I am wondering, though, is if there is any way to make it so AOL will automatically forward your email to a new Yahoo! mail account, so that you can get the free push email on iPhone, without having to go through and tell everyone your new Yahoo! mail address. Anybody?

 

[BoxKrait]

AOL? Come on now..
My questions are; what happens when you get the iPhone, but don't get a data plan?
Does the phone check for new e-mails once it gets a Wi-Fi connection?
How does yahoo know when your phone is connected through the internet?
Does the iPhone tell yahoo that it's connected everytime it reestablishes connection?
Or what?

 

[Cantwait4iPhone]

AOL? Come on now..
My questions are; what happens when you get the iPhone, but don't get a data plan?
Does the phone check for new e-mails once it gets a Wi-Fi connection?
How does yahoo know when your phone is connected through the internet?
Does the iPhone tell yahoo that it's connected everytime it reestablishes connection?
Or what?

I was just using it as an example. As for the other questions, though, I am of no help at this point. Sorry. I can look into it later, though.


P.S. Get the data plan

 

[wot_fan]

Yeah, I got most of that. What I am wondering, though, is if there is any way to make it so AOL will automatically forward your email to a new Yahoo! mail account, so that you can get the free push email on iPhone, without having to go through and tell everyone your new Yahoo! mail address. Anybody?

Most ISP's email accounts can be configured to automatically forward email. I can't say about AOL (yuck!) though. You may want to tell all your friends and family to use your yahoo mail account anyway. When you change ISPs you will lose your AOL mail account. The nice thing about a gmail or yahoo email account is that you can keep it forever regardless of who your ISP is.

AOL? Come on now..
My questions are; what happens when you get the iPhone, but don't get a data plan?
Does the phone check for new e-mails once it gets a Wi-Fi connection?
How does yahoo know when your phone is connected through the internet?
Does the iPhone tell yahoo that it's connected everytime it reestablishes connection?
Or what?

I would not be surprised if the iPhone requires a data plan. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if it required an unlimited data plan. I guess we will have to wait and see on this one though.

If you don't have a data plan, my guess is that you will have to configure your iPhone to only check for email when you manually tell it.

 

[Cantwait4iPhone]

Most ISP's email accounts can be configured to automatically forward email. I can't say about AOL (yuck!) though. You may want to tell all your friends and family to use your yahoo mail account anyway. When you change ISPs you will lose your AOL mail account. The nice thing about a gmail or yahoo email account is that you can keep it forever regardless of who your ISP is.

I would not be surprised if the iPhone requires a data plan. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if it required an unlimited data plan. I guess we will have to wait and see on this one though.

If you don't have a data plan, my guess is that you will have to configure your iPhone to only check for email when you manually tell it.

Again, I was just using AOL as an example. For people that don't do a lot of email, though (I am a moderate user), it might not be necessary to have push email. Some, I would think, will just use Safari to access online mailboxes. I will certainly look into it, though, to see if push email will work well for me.

Good point. If they don't force us to buy the data plans, I am sure there will be some big incentive. I still have found nothing on rates or Yahoo! mail, though. Besides, you might as well chip in for the data plan when you buy the iPhone. Many more features, and, besides, you're already paying $600 . What's another $20-50 a month gonna do to ya?

 

[joe]

Again, I was just using AOL as an example. For people that don't do a lot of email, though (I am a moderate user), it might not be necessary to have push email. Some, I would think, will just use Safari to access online mailboxes. I will certainly look into it, though, to see if push email will work well for me.

I was under the impression that the iPhone's Mail app would let you check any non-push pop/imap mailboxes. This should include any email address you have, including AOL. This would be a much better option than using webmail.

 

[ebrunn]

Ill probably forward my mail from my gmail to my yahoo push account

 

[Bootlessjam]

I plan to make a Yahoo email account for my iPhone, but keep my gmail account for my computer, since I don't want ALL my mail to go on my phone.

If anyone uses hotmail (EVERYONE I know does) then you'll have to access it via the web since they don't offer POP3 or IMAP, the main reason I switched to gmail.

 

[MadDog31]

I run my e-mail a little differently. I currently have my own domain name set up and only use the domain name for e-mail, no Web sites (even though I can...just don't have time). On my registrar's site, I have it configured so my firstname@firstnamelastname.com e-mail is automatically forwarded to my gmail account. Not only does that save me from having to have 2 Web accounts, but I can configure it to forward to any service I'd like.

Yeah it's like $10 for the domain but it's a small price to pay for convenience. I can also use it to control spam as I can give people I know my domain e-mail, and I can use my direct gmail addy as my addy to register on sites. So I'll be able to pop (mostly) legit e-mails over to a "secret" Yahoo account that will be pushed off to the iPhone and any spammy forum messages or anything else that seeps through will go straight to my gmail account w/o bothering me.

Just another thought in this discussion.

MadDog31

 

[Hondamaker]

I would not be surprised if the iPhone requires a data plan. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if it required an unlimited data plan. I guess we will have to wait and see on this one though.

If you don't have a data plan, my guess is that you will have to configure your iPhone to only check for email when you manually tell it.

iPhone will not require a data plan. It's internet connection will connect like a notebook with wi-fi, which is free wherever you can get a connection (hotel, foodcourt, cafe, home or other hotspot), or you can use cingular (AT&T) EDGE, which would cost per use or with their data plan.

 

[wot_fan]

iPhone will not require a data plan.

How do you know this? AFAIK, AT&T hasn't made any announcements regarding the data plans available for the iPhone. There has been a lot of speculation, but nothing official. I would love to know for sure though since an expensive data plan is the only thing that could keep me from getting an iPhone.

 

[wjp09]

Im thinking that they will not require one. They may offer a discount if you get one say over 40 a month but I don't know. Thats all my opinion on what they should do.

 

[Hondamaker]

How do you know this? AFAIK, AT&T hasn't made any announcements regarding the data plans available for the iPhone. There has been a lot of speculation, but nothing official. I would love to know for sure though since an expensive data plan is the only thing that could keep me from getting an iPhone.

Sure, you can purchase their data plan, but cingular's EDGE is not known for it's speed, plus it's expensive IMO, so why not shoot for wi-fi, it's fast and it's everywhere nowadays.

 

[Napoleon Dynamite]

Thanks for this very useful topic, I've just a question about it: "push" e-mail means "it's not necessary an internet connection to download your email messages", or not?

Thanks

 

[ColsTiger]

Thanks for this very useful topic, I've just a question about it: "push" e-mail means "it's not necessary an internet connection to download your email messages", or not?

Thanks

It means it "pushes" the email directly to the phone without the user having to select it to download the email to the phone. It will push the email whenever their is an internet connection (either phone network (EDGE) or a wifi connection). IT will be similar to working on your desktop or laptop computer with your email software opened. When a new email comes in you usually some sort of audible alert to tell you, then you can check the email immediately. I'm sure the iPhone will work the same way.

 

[Napoleon Dynamite]

It means it "pushes" the email directly to the phone without the user having to select it to download the email to the phone. It will push the email whenever their is an internet connection (either phone network (EDGE) or a wifi connection). IT will be similar to working on your desktop or laptop computer with your email software opened. When a new email comes in you usually some sort of audible alert to tell you, then you can check the email immediately. I'm sure the iPhone will work the same way.

Oh, I imagined...

But is it so boring to set email accounts on most common smartphones? I thought that smartphones'email were configured pretty much like desktop class email software

 

[ColsTiger]

Oh, I imagined...

But is it so boring to set email accounts on most common smartphones? I thought that smartphones'email were configured pretty much like desktop class email software

And I think with the iPhone it will be very similar to the way your desktop email is configured.

 

[Napoleon Dynamite]

And I think with the iPhone it will be very similar to the way your desktop email is configured.

There's no doubt