50000 message limit (soft) and nagging

markhd · 17 Dec 2008, 01:05 AM

I'd like to complain about Fastmail's limit of 50,000 messages. It's only a "soft limit": once you go over that limit, they nag you with a small banner in the upper left corner of the old web mail interface, and a large banner in the new web mail interface (which occupies ~10% of valuable vertical screen real estate). It says:

This folder contains more than 50000 messages. We recommend that for best performance you try and keep your mail folders to under 50000 messages. Either permanently delete messages you don't need, or create other folders to file messages into.
To delete messages older than a particular date, you can use the "Purge messages" screen available from the "Folders" screen.

My impression is that this limit has not changed in some time (years?). II believe it should steadily increase as time marches on, as the business grows older, as customers stay on for longer, and especially as capacity grows and becomes more affordable. Furthermore, the nag should be less obnoxious -- how about a way to turn off the warning, at least for a period of time? Alternatively, let users pay to upgrade to increase the soft limit. It's kind of gross to pay for a nag to go away, but usually FM charges reasonable prices, usually nonrecurring, for capacity increases. Since it's more ignorable on the old webmail interface, it's also one good reason I'll avoid the new webmail interface for now.

Merovingian · 17 Dec 2008, 09:34 AM

50,000 messages in what amount of time?

Is that 50,000 messages sent, received, in your inbox? Sorry, I'm just not aware of this limit.

David · 17 Dec 2008, 09:55 AM

It's a suggested maximum number of messages per folder (nothing to do with sent or received)

stanwood · 17 Dec 2008, 10:07 AM

I think the problem is with indexing such a large folder. To figure out how to sort it so they can show you the first n messages.

On the beta interface you can search across folders. So that's no longer a good reason to avoid filing away the old stuff.

markhd · 18 Dec 2008, 02:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stanwood

I think the problem is with indexing such a large folder. To figure out how to sort it so they can show you the first n messages.

On the beta interface you can search across folders. So that's no longer a good reason to avoid filing away the old stuff.

It doesn't matter, I do not want to use subfolders -- and I'm not interested in using except for occasional testing the new webmail interface, so I'm not going to cut over if I don't have to -- but I happen to run across this limit. There's not likely a good reason in 2009 for a limit (soft) that's from some years ago. Unless the number 50000 corresponds in some indexing algorithm to something as slow to scale as word size (32, 64), I really think it ought to get incremented. For what it's worth, I'm satisfied with the performance at around 60,000 messages currently. Furthermore, the nag should be less obnoxious. Let me click it away, permanently or "remind me later" or something. If it's such a serious issue, then charge more for it, and/or make it a hard limit. But don't take up a large swath of my screen with it. I suspect most users don't complain because they happen for a variety of possible reasons to never have used webmail AND had more than 50000 messages in one folder.

17 Dec 2008, 01:05 AM	#1
markhd Junior Member Join Date: Dec 2007 Posts: 17	50000 message limit (soft) and nagging I'd like to complain about Fastmail's limit of 50,000 messages. It's only a "soft limit": once you go over that limit, they nag you with a small banner in the upper left corner of the old web mail interface, and a large banner in the new web mail interface (which occupies ~10% of valuable vertical screen real estate). It says: This folder contains more than 50000 messages. We recommend that for best performance you try and keep your mail folders to under 50000 messages. Either permanently delete messages you don't need, or create other folders to file messages into. To delete messages older than a particular date, you can use the "Purge messages" screen available from the "Folders" screen. My impression is that this limit has not changed in some time (years?). II believe it should steadily increase as time marches on, as the business grows older, as customers stay on for longer, and especially as capacity grows and becomes more affordable. Furthermore, the nag should be less obnoxious -- how about a way to turn off the warning, at least for a period of time? Alternatively, let users pay to upgrade to increase the soft limit. It's kind of gross to pay for a nag to go away, but usually FM charges reasonable prices, usually nonrecurring, for capacity increases. Since it's more ignorable on the old webmail interface, it's also one good reason I'll avoid the new webmail interface for now.

17 Dec 2008, 09:34 AM	#2
Merovingian Master of the @ Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: U.S.A. Posts: 1,583	50,000 messages in what amount of time? Is that 50,000 messages sent, received, in your inbox? Sorry, I'm just not aware of this limit.

17 Dec 2008, 09:55 AM	#3
David Ultimate Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Canada. Posts: 10,355	It's a suggested maximum number of messages per folder (nothing to do with sent or received)

17 Dec 2008, 10:07 AM	#4
stanwood Member Join Date: May 2008 Posts: 84	I think the problem is with indexing such a large folder. To figure out how to sort it so they can show you the first n messages. On the beta interface you can search across folders. So that's no longer a good reason to avoid filing away the old stuff.