Apple released a new Beta version of its webmail service in MobileMe. I’ve been trying it and I think it’s a bit better than the old one, but not perfect.
The interface is different, cleaner and somehow better looking than the original Mail application for MacOS X. I don’t like the blue bar, though. It looks like KDE 3 and it’s awful. Everything below that bar is fine.
As for functionality, it’s still as good as the old one. Drag-and-drop works perfectly and it really feels like using the native Mail application in MacOS X. The autocomplete feature is still there, grabbing names and e-mail addresses directly from Contacts. For news, you may have noticed the new button on the top bar, on the right of the Delete button, which is the single-click archive feature. You also noticed that the new window layout, which is much better than the classic Mail’s 3-pane arrangement. There’s also a compact view, which displays only the message list and the message contents, much like the iPad Mail app. Another new feature is the message formatting toolbar on the composition window. And the really useful addition is the option of synchronizing mail rules/filters.
All-in-all, it isn’t a drastic upgrade, but it surely makes the service better, so it’s very nice. I personally never use webmail since the invention of the smartphone, but for those who do, it’s a very good upgrade. Let’s see if there are more new features to come before the service is officially launched.