Phillip Caudell @phill@mastodon.notsobig.co

Hello!

I still need to post an introduction, so here it goes.

I'm Phill, one of those designer/developer types. I quit my VC job a couple of years back to bootstrap my own business, The Not So Big Company (@updates).

I'm working on a fast and modern new mail client called Big Mail. The whole thing is written in Swift and SwiftUI, which has been an experience. 🤓

Launching very soon. In the meantime, enjoy some screenshots!

I moved it into the ToolbarItem when I was recording the iPad promo videos, as it was presenting from the whole view, not the button, and it looked naff.

But now I guess I can't have that without iPhone transitions breaking.

This framework is exhausting.

So I noticed NavigationStack transitions had stopped working in Big Mail...again.

After spending an hour working back through my commits to find what stupid thing is causing it this time, the offender is…

...drumroll please…🥁

✨ Presenting a confirmation dialogue from a ToolbarItem ✨

it's not right but it's okay

me now my meds and the launch excitement have worn off

Despite going to great lengths on this, I know it still won't be for everyone. So you can still use Big Mail without any of the Big Mail Online stuff.

One of the reasons I gave BMO a distinct brand of its own, is so when you're in the app, any feature that uses it will be obvious.

(Plus it was a fun excuse to get nostalgic with MacOS 😅)

The Big Mail app on your device grants Big Mail Online a temporary access token to listen out for new inbox events.

When a new message arrives, Big Mail Online sees only the response "EXISTS".

This is then silently pushed to your device, which wakes up and connects directly to your mail provider to fetch the message.

Not even Apple see the contents, as it's just an empty push notification.

One of the more ambitious aspects of this project was how to bring Big Mail into the cloud: V1 was DOA without push and rapid sync.

But how to do it and still claim to be on-device/privacy centric?

My answer to this is Big Mail Online. A totally optional, private push and sync service.

I had one simple rule developing it: no message data get processed, parsed, or stored, on any server, ever.

Hello (again) !

Big Mail got rebooted.

Except this sequel is better than the original.

It's more Terminator 2 than Batman & Robin.

I'd love to hear what you think!

💌 https://bigmail.app

My website is more responsive than me

What do you do for a living, Phill???

I yank a browser window around and admire how my website breaks in unique and interesting ways each time.

Question:

1. How do I get the media keys on my Mac to work 100% of the time, instead of 65/75%?

2. How I do get Apple Music stations to keep playing past 5 tracks?

me trying to get hyped for Apple’s AR/VR thing

It's hard to believe I started work on Big Mail over two years ago.

I went into it all with a certain naivety (you don't know what you don't know). I've learnt so much since then (mainly how not to do things 😅)

Feeling very grateful to have a second go at it. https://mastodon.notsobig.co/@updates/110456854833379220

email is great i love how everyone puts their own unique spin on formatting things

There is always one 🫵

My last 3 brain cells trying to finish this app