FastMail.FM News October 12, 2003
This newsletter is being sent to you if your Communications Frequency (click Options and then Account Preferences to see this) is set to at least Informative.
This newsletter contains information on some great new features at FastMail.FM -- you can safely ignore this newsletter and your account will still work fine, however you may miss out on the benefits of these new features. The topics covered today are:
Four new domains are now available, which you can use for aliases or your primary username:
- fastmail.us
- fastmail.com.au
- fmail.co.uk
- fastmail.cn
If you wish to add an email address in one of these domains, click 'Options' and then 'Aliases' (requires at least a 'Member' level account).
We have now released a new spam protection system. The new system protects Full and Enhanced users from around 99.5% of spam, with many great new features, including:
- One click to setup spam filters using the recommended settings, or complete customisability for advanced users
- An improved rules and black list database to catch more spam than ever
- Address book white-listing allows you to ensure that emails from people you know are never classified as spam
- Subject line rewriting allows you to instantly see the spam score of suspect emails
- Now using the latest spam protection system (SpamAssassin 2.60)
If you are a Full or Enhanced subscriber, click 'Options' and then 'Spam/Virus Protection' to access these new features (and click Help on this screen for more information). If you are not yet a Full or Enhanced subscriber, now is a great time to upgrade to use these new features! Just click Options, and then Upgrade, once you have logged in.
We have now released the new compose screen. The new compose screen includes many improvements including:
- A much cleaner layout, while adding more power and quicker access to common features (eg one click Format/Spell Check/Save Draft)
- An intelligent "quick list" that stays filled with your most commonly used addresses automatically; this makes addressing your e-mail even faster than before! If you click on the "addresses" link at the top of the screen, you can select addresses which you want to always appear in the quick list
- Instant address expansion. Nicknames and partial names in your quick list are automatically expanded when you leave the To/Cc/Bcc field. This avoids the need to click 'Check Names' in many cases
- Ability to quickly insert a note from your notepad into any email you compose. To use this feature, click the "notepad" link at the top of the screen, and check the "is quick note" checkbox for any notes which you wish to have access to on the compose screen.
- A "beginner mode" which provides a simple interface for new users. To gain access to all of the advanced features of the compose screen (such as selecting a custom signature, or to save the message to a custom folder), click the "Advanced screen" link on the screen
The power outage which hit the northeast of the United States in September showed the need for FastMail.FM to look at ways of improving reliability in the face of major infrastructure problems. As a result of a rigorous investigation, the following changes were identified:
- Move to a new $12 million data centre, which includes dual redundant diesel generators and cooling systems. We are looking to complete this move by the end of the year. In the meantime, all of the emergency equipment in the existing data centre has been carefully tested.
- Create an additional set of database backups on a backup server in Texas, to complement our existing off-site tape backups. This project has now been completed, and allows nearly instantaneous restores in the case of database corruption. This is a substantial improvement over the lengthy process required to complete database restores under our old system.
These changes are in addition to our existing architecture, which includes:
- Automated checks every two minutes of all aspects of hardware and software on all servers, including an "intelligent agent" which logs into the web interface, sends itself an e-mail, and ensures that it receives an e-mail within 30 seconds. Over 100 checks are completed every two minutes of every subsystem. If any unexpected conditions are observed, two engineers are automatically paged and phoned immediately.
- Backup servers in Norway and Texas provide monitoring, mail queuing, and backup network services in the case of any problems on the primary servers
- Every piece of email and user data is stored on two separate hard disks at a time, so that if one disk fails the data is still available with no delay (this is in addition to the separate server backups described in the next point)
- If you accidentally delete one or more messages, we can restore it from a backup on a separate server, which is taken every night, and stored for an extra week even after you delete a message! A $25 fee per folder applies for this restore service (or $50 to restore all folders)
Thanks to the generosity and creativity of many FastMail.FM users, there are now many more stylesheets to choose from! Click "Options" and then "Account Preferences", and then pick a stylesheet. The new ones are after "USA" in the list. With the new FastMail.FM country domains (like 'fastmail.us') and the new "flag series" of stylesheets, you can really show your patriotism!
To preview all stylesheets, have a look at the FastMail.FM stylesheet gallery. Many thanks to hard-working FastMailer Lisa for developing and hosting this gallery.
Thanks also to Kurian for his thoroughness in testing all the contributed stylesheets so carefully, and a special mention to stylesheet-artist Dave, who has had an amazing 23 stylesheets chosen as official FastMail.FM selections!
Finally, a big FastMail.FM welcome to Richard and Sam, our two new programmers. Richard has already been with us for a few weeks, and is the guru behind the great new spam protection. Sam starts with us this week. We look forward to great things from both of them!
Thanks for reading. If you want to chat to FastMail.FM staff and other users about any issues in this newsletter, please drop by the FastMail.FM Forum hosted by EmailDiscussions.com. Remember, if you don't want to receive these updates, click Options, then Account Preferences, and change your Communications Frequency. If want to terminate your FastMail.FM account for some reason, click Options, and then Cancel account.
Thanks as always for using FastMail.FM!
Jeremy and Rob
FastMail.FM Webmasters