Unified inbox w/multiple accounts on Mac, Web & iPhone?

[badlydrawnboy]

I have 4 different email accounts I use regularly: Gmail, MM, a blog and a professional domain.

Ideally, I'd like them all forwarded to a single inbox. I'd then like to be able to send a reply from whatever address the email was sent to.

This works perfectly on my Mac with Mail.app, and on the web with MM. The broken link in the chain is the iPhone. Unless I'm missing something, it's not possible to send emails from different addresses through MobileMe on the iPhone.

If this were possible, my email life would be complete. (Other than the minor niggle of not being able to assign default signatures to the various email addresses listed on the MobileMe account in Mail.app).

I'm hoping there might be some way to do this that I've just overlooked.

 

[229665]

Hi there,
you're use of terminology is a little confused, but I think what you're trying to say is this:

1) You want to be able to send emails from any account on your iPhone, irrespective of which account received the email.

This is easily solved, however required that you have iOS4 installed on your iPhone. It won't work with iOs3. (http://www.apple.com/iphone/features/mail.html)

if you have version 4 installed, you get to look at your inboxes separately, or merged.

Depending on the model of iPhone you have, you may or may not be able to upgrade. When it's connected to your computer, go to iTunes and when it's selected in "devices" in the sidebar, what's the Software Version (in the main panel) say? Does clicking on "Check for update" tell you there's an update available?

2) You're having problems getting email signatures assigned correctly to your different email accounts in mail.app

this, too, is very straight forward.
- Just go to Mail -> Preferences -> Signatures
..you'll see all your signatures, and can create more if necessary.
Just make sure that they're assigned to the correct email accounts (you can drag a signature to an account)

let me know if you need more help

All the best

 

[badlydrawnboy]

Thanks for your reply.

No, as I said in the original message, the idea is to have a single unified inbox - not multiple accounts.

I currently forward my email from 4 other domains to my MobileMe account. MobileMe now allows sending mail from different accounts from within Mail.app and through the MobileMe interface.

So, let's say someone sends an email to me@otherdomain.com. It forwards to me@mac.com. But in Mail.app and MobileMe on the web, if I hit "reply" to that email, it will automatically be sent from the "me@otherdomain.com" address rather than my MobileMe address. This is a feature Gmail has had for a long time, but MobileMe only recently got.

The problem is that this doesn't work on the iPhone. If I reply to that same email from "me@otherdomain.com" on the iPhone, it will be sent from my "me@mac.com" address. This is not desirable because when someone sends an email to "me@otheromain.com", I want the reply to also come from that address.

I could obviously achieve my purpose by setting up multiple accounts in Mail.app and on the iPhone, as you have. But I don't want to because that defeats the purpose of having a single, unified inbox. There are several advantages to a unified inbox, including simplicity, not having to check multiple webmail accounts when traveling, etc.

 

[229665]

Ok, I understand now. I had thought your reference to a 'unified Inbox' was the combined virtual inbox which mail.app builds (and the iOS version 4 introduces to iPhones) to show incoming mail from all your accounts. You use it to describe that you route all your mail accounts into one Inbox. It's clear now!

Out of interest, did you a) manually add the SMTP server settings etc (for the additional accounts from which your want to send mail) to the MobileMe web client? And if so, b) did these settings sync automatically to your computer? I assume a) you did, and b) they didn't.

At the moment, it seems you'll have to add the additional accounts to your iPhone like I have, if you want to be able to send mail from them. If you're going to do this, however, ensure that you automatically archive or delete mail sent to your additional accounts, as soon as it's forwarded to MobileMe, and then you'll have no doubling up of messages. Then, when a mail arrives which you want to reply to, you will be able to select the account from which you want it to go. This is basically how mine works: all mail except MobileMe routes through GMail, yet all mail accounts are configured so I can send directly through them on my iPod touch.

As you've realised, it's a shame these settings aren't synced between mail.app, web client, and iPhone yet. Let's hope it's on Apple's to do list.

 

[badlydrawnboy]

Out of interest, did you a) manually add the SMTP server settings etc (for the additional accounts from which your want to send mail) to the MobileMe web client? And if so, b) did these settings sync automatically to your computer? I assume a) you did, and b) they didn't.

I did add all of the external addresses as "send from external address" in MobileMe preferences on the web. I also added the addresses (separated by a comma) in the Mail.app preferences for my MobileMe account, in the "From" email address field.

At the moment, it seems you'll have to add the additional accounts to your iPhone like I have, if you want to be able to send mail from them. If you're going to do this, however, ensure that you automatically archive or delete mail sent to your additional accounts, as soon as it's forwarded to MobileMe, and then you'll have no doubling up of messages. Then, when a mail arrives which you want to reply to, you will be able to select the account from which you want it to go. This is basically how mine works: all mail except MobileMe routes through GMail, yet all mail accounts are configured so I can send directly through them on my iPod touch.

This is a good idea. I set it up like this but was getting duplicates. Don't know why I didn't think of just having my server delete the emails after forwarding. Are you having your accounts forward to Gmail first, and then forward from Gmail to MobileMe? If I do that, will I get the spam filtering of Gmail?

 

[badlydrawnboy]

Actually, an even more important question is, if I forward me@otherdomain.com to my Gmail account, and then have all of my Gmail forwarded to MobileMe, will the "sent to" address still show up as "me@otherdomain.com"?

 

[229665]

Actually, an even more important question is, if I forward me@otherdomain.com to my Gmail account, and then have all of my Gmail forwarded to MobileMe, will the "sent to" address still show up as "me@otherdomain.com"?

Actually, not sure. You'll have to try it.

Regarding your previous questions:

This is a good idea. I set it up like this but was getting duplicates. Don't know why I didn't think of just having my server delete the emails after forwarding. Are you having your accounts forward to Gmail first, and then forward from Gmail to MobileMe? If I do that, will I get the spam filtering of Gmail?

No, all email except MobileMe goes to Gmail, because spam filtering is good. But then I don't forward it on to MobileMe afterwards. I may in time. This is a personal choice though, as until very recently MobileMe's web client wasn't actually very good. It's getting better, and maybe with this coming Wednesday's announcement, it'll get much better soon.