New Plusnet Webmail platform goes live

[#1]

Those of you familiar with our Webmail platform may have noticed this morning that it's had a bit of a facelift. We've been running an open trial of the new service since late last year and have been really happy with the results so today we've decided to remove the 'beta' label and make the service the default Webmail offering. The old Webmail platform will run in parallel with the new service for a few months but will eventually be decommissioned. Until then, you can access it by clicking the 'basic webmail' button on the login page or by browsing to webmail.plus.net/squirrelmail When you first log into the new Webmail platform, any address book entries from the old platform should be automatically carried across. We've seen a few examples today where this hasn't (or has only partially) happened though so if you find yourself in this position then please refer to the information I've posted over on our discussion forums. If you've not yet had chance to familiarise yourself with the new Webmail platform then have a read of my post from December last year that showcases some of the basics. Feel free to let us know what you think by leaving a comment below ...

[#2]

Re the CTRL+ thing - it only seems to work if you click on the folders part of the interface first - if you click on the preview or message sections it doesn't work (for me at least).

[#3]

Of course,as in webmail and PN forums CTRL click does absolutely nothing for Apple users, should be a linky box instead. Is it not feasible to keep the older version of PlusNet webmail, as there is a definite split from posters ?

[#4]

tried to send email ,despite entering address,was asked for one recipient,why?

[#5]

Bob Just a couple of questions / pointers a) There doesn’t appear to be an option to access the Metronet SM server (webmail.plus.net/squirrelmail) b) What is the maximum capacity of each mail account, and is this larger than that currently available on the old webmail? c) There may have been plenty of notification / discussion the new webmail on the PlusNet site, but I don’t recall anything for us Metronet folks d) Finally, my contact list has also failed to migrate across (helpdesk ticket already raised on the Metronet portal) Other than that, I have quite pleased with the new webmail layout Regards

[#6]

Absolute rubbish! Bring back the old email. This is a disaster. I will have to change.

[#7]

Generally I like the new system, which I find faster, and I've not had any trouble adapting to the different ways of doing things. However one thing is driving me mad ! Several times I have been logged out with 'Your Session is Invalid or has Expired', then when I log in again I get 'Service not currently available' Error 500. I then go back a page and hey presto I'm logged in again. Tonight it happened right in the middle of sending an email with an attachment, and I lost half the e mail and had to do the attachment again. Very annoying. Is it just me, and/or is it something that can be changed ?

[#8]

Generally I am happy with the new system - I am a Force 9 Webmail user. However I have created folders which I cannot delete even though they are empty. Have tried clicking subscribed and unsubscribe. Can you help? Also some of my contacts were missing. Also I miss the facility enabling me to send the same e-mail to multiple addressees. How do I send an e-mail to several addressees? Many thanks. Karen Berry

[#9]

If it ain't broke, don't fix it, springs to mind. Just how was this beta tested ?

[#10]

The new webmail is great. I found the old one too basic for my requirements and ended up mostly using Yahoo by diverting my messages there. The new one does everything I need it to do, and was fairly easy to figure out. I read the initial comments on this page and I'm not sure why people seem to be having so many problems, it seemed pretty simple and straightforward to me. Thanks for the upgrade, it will make a big difference to me. Also glad to see you can now use it from elsewhere without captchas, that is a lot more sensible for a web-based service.

[#11]

@PlusComUK, I may be wrong but it looks to me like Tesco Webmail is built using Horde. This is one of the Webmail applications we looked at but we ended up opting for Roundcube instead as it was more suited to our email platform/requirements - http://www.horde.org/apps/webmail @joanbridson, you can still show a whole page of emails and mark them to be deleted. Under 'Settings' > 'User Interface' you can choose how many emails to display on each page. To highlight multiple emails all you need to do is hold Control on your keyboard and then left-click to select each message (exactly as you would using a standalone email application liuke Outlook). @ericsharp, you can still access the old platform whilst you get used to the new system. @Cliff, as @Dan the Van has said, you left-click the message you want to delete and then either: - Drag it to the 'Deleted Items' folder - Press the delete key on the keyboard - Press the red Ø icon Alternatively you can right-click the message and then left-click 'Delete' from the context menu. @tuxian, I can see how having the ability to add a sort column based on the recipient address would be helpful. I wonder if there's a plugin that would achieve this? (had a quick look and couldn't find anything). Regarding the SSL aspect of things, there's still nothing definitive on the roadmap I'm afraid :( @auto98, odd. Another option would be to use the Windows magnifier I guess (assuming you're using Windows of course). That's enabled via the Windows key and +/- @PlusComUK, If memory serves me correctly, the CTRL click equiveilient when using a MAC is to use the Apple key rather than CTRL. @jimandeileen, I'm not sure I know what you mean? @davidwd, in answer to your questions: a) Sorry for not making this clear. If I'm completely honest I overlooked this when writing the above article. Due to the differentiation between the Plusnet and Metronet SquirrelMail installs, it's only the Plusnet one that's still available. b) We suggest against exceeding more than 1GB of stored mail on the platform. This hasn't changed. The mail storage platform used by both the old and new platforms is the same. c) The discussion forums are open to Metronet customers and we welcome them there. You'll notice there's a Metronet logo towards the bottom-right of the Community Site. The platform was open to Metronet customers during the Beta trials. d) I'll see if I can get somebody to take a look ... @D McDaid, perhaps you can elaborate on why you think the new platform is 'rubbish'? It may well be that you're overlooking a feature it's actually capable of supporting. @Kate, How long had your session been idle before you got the message. Were you composing a long email when it happened. It sounds a little like this - http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,103128.0.html @PlusComUK, the platform was tested amongst 100 or so closed trialists who had access to the Roundcube forum on the Community Site to provide feedback (the forum was hidden back then). We opened up access to everybody late last year and have been running both services in parallel for some time now. The platform was also tested by members of staff and our Quality Assurance Team/Network Engineers.

[#12]

@karenberry, I'll arrange for your contacts to be reimported over the next day or two which should hopefully sort out the missing contacts. Not sure about the folder thing. You should be able to click the icon bottom-left, select 'Manage Folders', highlight the folder in question and then click icon bottom-left again and then 'Delete'. Is that not working? You can send mail to multiple addresses by either creating a contact group and using that, or by browsing to your address book, holding down the Control key on your keyboard and then left-clicking the addresses you want to send to before clicking 'Compose mail to ...'

[#13]

Whilst testing the platform, were any Apple users involved, then possibly the correct Apple keys (in brackets) may have also been included ? "CTRL click equivalent when using a MAC is to use the Apple key rather than CTRL" Thanks for reminding me of a substitution I haven't used in years.

[#14]

When you log into webmail from the Member Centre and then log out, in the old (basic) version you had the option to return to the Member Centre but can't see that in the new version!

[#15]

Paul Thank you for timely response. Just a couple of concerns since my last post: Around midday I altered some personal server setting and added a new contact (although my Metronet contracts have not been migrated yet). This evening I find that the server settings I entered have changed (default settings?) and the contact I added has gone missing. Regards David

[#16]

Thanks for your response Bob. The session had not been idle long when I was logged out. Less than a minute probably - I was only checking the (not very long) e mail for typos before sending and it happened at exactly the same moment I clicked on 'send'. Today it happened again just after I clicked send, but this time the e mail went ok. And this time the session had not been idle at all. I haven't been able to get into your link presumably because I'm not registered on the Forum. If there's some good advice there perhaps I should ......! Apart from this hiccup, I really like the new system.

[#17]

If you are going to make changes, why not forewarn people? You've changed the logon address so it took me time and trouble to find the new one. Why annoy your customers unnecessarily? I though Plusnet was better than most ISPs now I wonder. And why has the 'Remember Me' box in the Login screen been removed? Again why make more work for your customers?

[#18]

I love the new set-up but do not find it easy to move e-mails to folders. Should be less cumbersome.

[#19]

This website is crap, why dont they just leave things as they were, plusnet could have had the decency to let there members have a voice and decide. they just presume that everything is ok well its not. bring back the old webmail.

[#20]

Time for a Poll ?

[#21]

A professionally designed, intuitive webmail facility. A major step forward, consolidating a most valuable service of an ISP that I always feel is designed especially for me! Well done, yet again! Regards

[#22]

"- Regarding the menu placement, perhaps you can provide a screengrab? What resolution are you using? It would need to be 1024x768 mimumum." Screen size 1920 x 1080 Screen grab here: http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,103934.msg885618.html#msg885618

[#23]

Quick update folks regarding some of the issues raised here ... Regarding the inability to save usernames/passwords, have a read of my latest post here - http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,100755.msg885664.html#msg885664 The maximum allowed file size for attachments has now been increased from 5Mb to 7Mb. Thanks to Graham for bringing that to our attention. I'm surprised it was missed during the beta trials. Kate, we've increased the session timeout so please let me now if you continue encountering problems. If you do then it would be helpful to know what web browser you're using and whether or not you're using any specific Internet secuirty applications or plugins. Those who reported missing address book entries should now have had these imported. We identified an issue where Metronet address books weren't being migrated correctly. We fixed around 300 accounts this morning that had this problem (David, I think it might be this work that also led to the oddities you noticed yesterday). @Andy we haven't changed the login address, you should be using the same credentials you've always used? We also gave customers warning. We opened the platform up for testing last December and I posted a planned maintenance announcement in advance of the work taking place. You might want to consider subscribing to our Community Site RSS feed or Service Status announcements if you don't want to miss information like this in the future. Sorry if it came as a surprise. http://community.plus.net/blog/2011/12/01/roundcube-launch/ http://usertools.plus.net/status/archive/1333644098.htm @e amore, do you realise that you can bulk select and 'drag and drop' emails into folders like you would with a dedicated email application? You just need to hold control and left click the messages you want to move before dragging the selection into the folder of your choice. @mark, I'm sorry you don't like it but rest assured we did engage customers whilst we were beta trialling the service. Please also be mindful that the previous Webmail iteration was only ever intended as a temporary solution when we were forced to retire it's predecessor several years back. @PlusComUK, thanks for the screengrab. I'll reply over on the forum thread.

[#24]

The new one is much better, slicker and faster. I was constantly being thrown off the other one which was slow and clunky. Had been using the new one in test and really liked it! VERY happy to see it introduced. Don't go back, please or I'll have to stick to Outlook from now on... 🙂

[#25]

@The maximum allowed file size for attachments has now been increased from 5Mb to 7Mb. Thanks to Graham for bringing that to our attention. I'm surprised it was missed during the beta trials. Thanks Bob As a Rights Of Way officer for a local council, I have to send quite large pdfs of maps etc.,the 5mb was a little restrictive. Regarding my other question about transferring the added information from the SM address book. I did manage to cut and paste it into the new system without spending too much time. I think the new system works OK, but then you can't please everyone a hundred percent of the time! Thanks for your help Graham Rains.

[#26]

Paul Contact migration seems to be ok now – thank you. Something you mentioned earlier: “b) We suggest against exceeding more than 1GB of stored mail on the platform. This hasn't changed. The mail storage platform used by both the old and new platforms is the same” By my calculation I have approximately 52Mb of stored messages and I still have to cull some of them occasionally to able to receive new messages. So my questions are a) Is this the normal stored mail size limit for the Metronet servers? b) What does the compact function do in the webmail server settings? c) Would the compact function allow more storage capacity in my particular case? Is there a problem with exporting contacts has I get a message – something about “not being able to connect to the Metronet server” – I am trying to do a backup as a precaution? Regards David

[#27]

hi,I think the new webmail system is a definite improvement on squirrel mail.A few questions that i have come across;How do you create groups and transport addresses into the new groups;how can font sizes be changed,text made bold and underlined;when sending an e mail to numerous addresses how can pages in address book be changed to get at additional addresses without losing the addresses already highlighted with Ctrl key pressed.

[#28]

David, a) Sorry, I seem to be making a habit of overlooking Metronet customers! Metronet mailboxes have a hard quota of 50Mb if I remember correctly. I'll see if I can get this increased. b) I suspect it 'expunges' deleted messages which is an IMAP function (Roundcube accesses the mail collection servers over IMAP). c) Yes, if you've recently deleted/moved any messages. I'm not aware of a problem exporting messages. I've just tried and managed to save a .vcf of my address book to my desktop using the latest build of Firefox. Michael, To create a group ----------------- - Click 'Address Book' - Highlight 'Personal Addresses' on the left and then click the '+' bottom-left - Enter a name for the group and press Enter To assign addresses to a group ------------------------------ - Click 'Address Book' - Highlight 'Personal Addresses' - Select the addresses to add to the group (using CTRL-click where necessary) and then drag the selection to the group you want to add to in the left-hand navigation pane Changing font size/styling -------------------------- The font size for inbound messages can't be changed via the Webmail interface but you might be able to use your browser zoom (CTRL and +/- keys on your keyboard) to increase/decrease the size of text. You can alter the font/size/styling of outbound messages using the TinyMCE editor however you'll need to make sure you're composing the message in HTML format (see the drop-down at the bottom-right of the mail composition window or alternatively navigate to Settings > Composing Messages > Compose HTML messages and choose 'Always' from the drop-down. Regarding the selection of addresses from the Address Book prior to sending an email, I would suggest always selecting multiple recipients from the 'Personal Addresses' group or alternatively use the autocomplete feature of the email composition window itself.

[#29]

Paul The export of contacts is working ok if I go to webmail via the Plusnet login, https://webmail.plus.net/ apparently if I go via the Metronet login https://webmail.metronet.co.uk/ contact export doesn’t work. Regards

[#30]

I was initially pleased to see a spell checker, but I've turned it off, because (a) it picks up the silliest things as mistakes, including email addresses, & (b) I can't see how to make it accept some of the things it doesn't like.

[#31]

Hi Stella, you need to left-click the underlined selection to accept words etc.

[#32]

No more log outs recently - it's all been working great. I usually use Firefox, but have noted your suggestions. Thanks for your help Bob, it's appreciated.

[#33]

I have just started to be requested to log in twice. Although my first attempt is word and character perfect, the message 'Invalid request no data saved' comes up and I have to repeat the pass word before being able to log in. This happens every time, so it's not caused by a typing error. What is the reason for this?

[#34]

Hi, I was not pleased with the changes appearing out of the blue. The first I knew about it was when I clicked on my link I had set up and it didn't work as the login location appeared to have moved. I then had to reset any links, shortcuts and favorites that I had set up. My email onon my phone continued to work until the middle of this week when it suddenly stopped and I have not got it working yet! This was not clever when I was away on a course all week and this was the only connection that I had to my Mail. I have come back to some urgent messages that needed sorting. From what I can tell the mail details do not seem to have changed server names and ports etc seem to be the same but it will not work. I have a Galaxy Ace - can you advise what I need to do to get it reconnected! thanks

[#35]

Its crap and not tested properly. Often I select an email from the list and the one displayed in the preview window is the next one in the list, the indexing is wrong. The html signatures will not work properly

[#36]

As I mentioned in a forum post, the new site doesn't work well with Android 4 (confirmed by another user) also there seems no obvious way of syncing the address book. The address on the new site is a few weeks out of date compared to the squirrel mail site. There doesn't seem to have been enough testing done before releasing it to the world. For now I'll be keeping to squirrel mail

[#37]

Hi Bob, I was initially impressed by the sharper, more focused look of the new webmail platform, however, became frustrated at the apparent reduction in functionality, it was only when I viewed previous customer comments that I found answers to certain questions. I would respectfully suggest that a pre-launch summary of the key functionality differences, such as how to delete multiple e-mails without reading them (spam,phishing)), would have negated much of the negative response from customers.

[#38]

Bob Following on from my previous message. Through experimentation I have found that I can only export contacts when I login to webmail via the Plusnet portal (if I go via Metronet, exporting contacts is not possible). I can only seem to be able to export one contact at a time – is this correct or am I missing something? Do you thing it will be possible to get the Metronet 50Mb limited raised? Regards David

[#39]

Could we please have a link from the webmail log in page to go back to the main plusnet page, instead of having to use the browser back button. Thank you Kathryn

[#40]

Kathryn - If you click on the 'plusnet' logo above the log in box, that will take you back to the main page.

[#41]

i prefer new mail , runs must faster with a folder full of emails .. as i never clear mine out ... Matt

[#42]

Well I've just used your new Webmail site and I think it is so much better, fresher and more up to date than the old one. Also, if you are an Outlook user or the like, your new site is very intuitive and easy to use. Sorry folks that don't like it but it is so much better than many others. Well done Plusnet. Keep up the excellent work. And, by the way, thanks.

[#43]

@Graham, not familiar with that one. Is it still happening? @Maria, apologies if you felt you had insufficient warning. We recognised that some people were going to be in this position which is why we set up redirects and links back to the old platform. Your inability to access mail on your phone will be absolutely nothing to do with our Webmail platform (assuming yoy weren't accessing Webmail from your phone of course. I can't really advice on what you need to do to fix the problem without a little more information I'm afraid, especially give the variation that exists between email applications on Android handsets. @paulID, the software uses IMAP so indexing shouldn't really present much of a problem. It may be due to a browser/server caching setting somewhere however I've not had much luck replicating it. You could always disable the message preview? After all, it wasn't available when using the old platform. If you've any idea how I can replicate the issue then I'll happily look into it. I've been using Roundcube with another provider for over a year now and I've never noticed this happening. I've also had a look for reports of similar problems from other Roundcube users but haven't been able to find anything - http://trac.roundcube.net/ Why won't the HTML signatures work? What problem are you having with them? @paulgul, if you add an address to SquirrelMail then it *will not* sync up with Roundcube. It hasn't been designed to do that. The only address book synchronisation that occurs happens the *first time* you log into the new platform. We've carried out months of testing, including opening the platform up to customers before we made the decision to switch the default offering. Regarding Android 4, the site isn't likely to work too well on a mobile browser, it would be much more efficient to set up access to your account using IMAP and either the stock Android mail client or a third party alternative. @Steven, we've altered the Help & Support content on our website now and I'll look at getting this linked to from the Webmail login page - http://www.plus.net/support/email/webmail-roundcube.shtml We'll add a bit about selecting multiple items. Anythign else you think ould be handy? @davidwd, I'll see if I can get the 50Mb limit raised. Not sure about the contact thing though. I can export contacts irrespective of the method I use to access Webmail (via the direct URL or the Metronet Site itself) and opening the .vcf in a text editor shows all the entries to be there :\ @16vmini @Namyp, thanks for the positive feedback!

[#44]

All well and good but what about enabling port 587 for outgoing mail? So would not have to go near webmail and can stick with desktop program when out and about. Many wifi places are now blocking port 25 to send. James

[#45]

James, it's in the pipeline. It's actually already enabled on the relay.free-online.net and relay.force9.net VIPs (you'll not be able to use your Plusnet login credentials with these).

[#46]

what a major improvement over the old Squirrel mail system - much more user friendly shame that I now use Gmail for most of personal mail

[#47]

For what it's worth, I prefer the new webmail. Having been with PN for many years now, I remember the move to the previous "temporary" solution following a security issue with its predecessor, and never liked the "temporary" version.

[#48]

Hi Just an observation The spellchecker seems pretty poor, cannot cope with some reasonably simple words. David

[#49]

I'm surprised at the amount of negative feedback. I've loved the new webmail from the moment I found the "beta" version. For me, it's always updated much quicker than the old version and it's much slicker, with the drag-n-drop functionality, etc. Flagging messages or marking unread is instant on a point-and-click. The type-ahead on entering addresses is really quick, too. Some of the negatives look like they are because people haven't got used to it yet. For example, it _is_ possible to move and delete multiple messages. I've stopped using Outlook in favour of Plusnet webmail. Thanks.

[#50]

Hi Where has all the additional information gone that was in the old address book 'other info' box (where I kept addresses, landline numbers etc) - none of this seems to have transferred across into the new address book? Surely this could have been added to the new 'Notes' box? How can I retrieve this? Apart from the above issue I prefer the new look over the old. cheers Lee

[#51]

Baffled at the usability comments to be honest. I've used dozens of different mail systems since the mid 1990s. I tried Squirrel out for a while, and found it totally counterintuitive because (like the first GMAIL) it seemed to ignored most of the standard ways of doing stuff. The new one took me 3 seconds to adapt to because it works basically the same way every other major mail system - Yahoo Mail, Outlook Web Access, Hotmail etc - has worked for years. Multiple message select and delete for example (hold CTRL to select individual messages, hold SHIFT to select a consecutive range, then press DEL to delete) is the same as every other standard webmail setup I've ever used, plus Windows Explorer has worked the exact same way for a good 17 years...