Kontact
Encyclopedia
KMail supports folders, filtering, viewing HTML
mail, and international character sets. It can handle IMAP, IMAP IDLE
, dIMAP, POP3, and local mailboxes for incoming mail. It can send mail via SMTP or sendmail
. It can forward HTML mail as an attachment but it cannot forward mail inline.
These modular filters can be combined with text filters to detect (for example) e-mail which has been flagged by SpamAssassin by looking for the special headers it added.
KMail allows manual filtering of spam directly on the mail server, a very interesting feature for dial-up users. Emails that exceed some threshold size (standard is 50 kb, but it may be set to any value) are not automatically copied to the local computer. With "get, decide later, delete" options, KMail lists them but does not download the whole message, which allows the deletion of spam and over-sized messages without wasting time.
KMail supports the OpenPGP standard and can automatically encrypt, decrypt, sign, and verify signatures of email messages and its attachments via either the inline or OpenPGP/MIME method of signing/encryption. KMail depends on GnuPG for this functionality. As a visual aid, KMail will colour verified email messages green for trusted signatures; yellow for untrusted signatures; red for invalid signatures; and blue for encrypted messages.
KMail also supports S/MIME
messages as well as Chiasmus, a proprietary cryptographic system created by the German Federal Office for Information Security
(BSI).
.
to organizing the addresses and contact information of family, friends, business partners, etc. It integrates with KDE, allowing interoperability with other KDE programs, including the e-mail client KMail – allowing one-click access to composing an e-mail – and the instant messenger Kopete
– showing the online status of and easy access to instant messaging contacts. It can be synchronized with other software or device using Kitchensync and OpenSync.
A contact may be classified into customizable categories, such as Family, Business, or Customer. Many of the fields can have multiple entries, for example, if the contact has several e-mail addresses. A contact's fields are separated into four tabs and one tab for custom fields.
of the KDE
desktop environment
. It has the ability to manage calendars, journals, and a to do list.
feed aggregator. It supports both RSS
and Atom
. Feeds can be sorted into categories. Akregator will aggregate all feeds in a particular category into a single list of new entries so that, for example, all news in the category "Politics" can be shown in one list. It has an incremental search feature for the titles of all the entries in its database.
Akregator can be configured to fetch feeds within regular intervals. The user can also manually request to fetch all feeds, individual ones, or those in a selected category. It supports feed icons and embeds KHTML
as an internal, tabbed web browser
. Any external browser can also be called.
Akregator is part of KDE
since the 3.4 release, and it is distributed with the kdepim module.
news client
program for the KDE
desktop environment
.
It supports multiple NNTP
servers, message threads, scoring, X-Face
headers (reading and posting), and international character sets.
for storing its data, when in the past every Kontact component implemented the storage technologies itself. Akonadi is currently mostly developed by the KDE PIM team, but its design is done in an agnostic way and thus not depending on KDE technologies.
The first KDE 4 release of Kontact was officially shipped with KDE 4.1. That release did not use Akonadi. Since then the Kontact components have been gradually migrating towards Akonadi. The first stable version of KDE PIM using Akonadi
has been released together with KDE 4.6.4 in June 2011.
HTML
HyperText Markup Language is the predominant markup language for web pages. HTML elements are the basic building-blocks of webpages....
mail, and international character sets. It can handle IMAP, IMAP IDLE
IMAP IDLE
In e-mail technology, IDLE is an IMAP feature described in RFC 2177 that allows a client to indicate to the server that it is ready to accept real-time notifications.- Significance :...
, dIMAP, POP3, and local mailboxes for incoming mail. It can send mail via SMTP or sendmail
Sendmail
Sendmail is a general purpose internetwork email routing facility that supports many kinds of mail-transfer and -delivery methods, including the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol used for email transport over the Internet....
. It can forward HTML mail as an attachment but it cannot forward mail inline.
Spam and filtering
KMail uses two special filters to provide a modular access to spam-filtering programs:- Send this e-mail to a program allows any program to be specified, and when that KMail filter is activated, the program will be run and supplied with the contents of the e-mail as its standard input.
- Pipe this e-mail through a program not only sends the e-mail to a specified program, but replaces the e-mail with the output of that program. This allows the use of systems such as SpamAssassinSpamAssassinSpamAssassin is a computer program released under the Apache License 2.0 used for e-mail spam filtering based on content-matching rules. It is now part of the Apache Foundation....
which can add their own headers to a piece of e-mail.
These modular filters can be combined with text filters to detect (for example) e-mail which has been flagged by SpamAssassin by looking for the special headers it added.
KMail allows manual filtering of spam directly on the mail server, a very interesting feature for dial-up users. Emails that exceed some threshold size (standard is 50 kb, but it may be set to any value) are not automatically copied to the local computer. With "get, decide later, delete" options, KMail lists them but does not download the whole message, which allows the deletion of spam and over-sized messages without wasting time.
Cryptographic support
KMail also supports S/MIME
S/MIME
S/MIME is a standard for public key encryption and signing of MIME data. S/MIME is on an IETF standards track and defined in a number of documents, most importantly RFCs. S/MIME was originally developed by RSA Data Security Inc...
messages as well as Chiasmus, a proprietary cryptographic system created by the German Federal Office for Information Security
Federal Office for Information Security
The Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik is the German government agency in charge of managing computer and communication security for the German government...
(BSI).
Address Book
KAddressBook is an address book software application made for the K Desktop EnvironmentKDE
KDE is an international free software community producing an integrated set of cross-platform applications designed to run on Linux, FreeBSD, Microsoft Windows, Solaris and Mac OS X systems...
.
Description
KAddressBook is a graphical interfaceGui
Gui or guee is a generic term to refer to grilled dishes in Korean cuisine. These most commonly have meat or fish as their primary ingredient, but may in some cases also comprise grilled vegetables or other vegetarian ingredients. The term derives from the verb, "gupda" in Korean, which literally...
to organizing the addresses and contact information of family, friends, business partners, etc. It integrates with KDE, allowing interoperability with other KDE programs, including the e-mail client KMail – allowing one-click access to composing an e-mail – and the instant messenger Kopete
Kopete
Kopete is a multi-protocol, free software instant messaging client. Although it can run in numerous environments, it was designed for and integrates with the KDE desktop environment...
– showing the online status of and easy access to instant messaging contacts. It can be synchronized with other software or device using Kitchensync and OpenSync.
A contact may be classified into customizable categories, such as Family, Business, or Customer. Many of the fields can have multiple entries, for example, if the contact has several e-mail addresses. A contact's fields are separated into four tabs and one tab for custom fields.
Features
- Exports and imports cards to and from vCardVCardvCard is a file format standard for electronic business cards. vCards are often attached to e-mail messages, but can be exchanged in other ways, such as on the World Wide Web or Instant Messaging...
format. - Uses DBUS to interface with other applications.
- Interoperable with KMail and KopeteKopeteKopete is a multi-protocol, free software instant messaging client. Although it can run in numerous environments, it was designed for and integrates with the KDE desktop environment...
, as well as Kontact. - Customize fields and categories.
- Automatic formatting of names.
- Filter ability, to search for addresses.
- Capability to query an LDAPLightweight Directory Access ProtocolThe Lightweight Directory Access Protocol is an application protocol for accessing and maintaining distributed directory information services over an Internet Protocol network...
database containing person information.
Organizer
KOrganizer is the personal organizerPersonal organizer
A personal organizer, day planner, personal analog assistant, or personal planner is a small book/binder, designed to be portable, usually containing a diary, calendar, address book, and other sections usually including blank paper. It may also include pages with useful information, such as maps,...
of the KDE
KDE
KDE is an international free software community producing an integrated set of cross-platform applications designed to run on Linux, FreeBSD, Microsoft Windows, Solaris and Mac OS X systems...
desktop environment
Desktop environment
In graphical computing, a desktop environment commonly refers to a style of graphical user interface derived from the desktop metaphor that is seen on most modern personal computers. These GUIs help the user in easily accessing, configuring, and modifying many important and frequently accessed...
. It has the ability to manage calendars, journals, and a to do list.
News Feed Aggregator
Akregator is an open sourceOpen source
The term open source describes practices in production and development that promote access to the end product's source materials. Some consider open source a philosophy, others consider it a pragmatic methodology...
feed aggregator. It supports both RSS
RSS
-Mathematics:* Root-sum-square, the square root of the sum of the squares of the elements of a data set* Residual sum of squares in statistics-Technology:* RSS , "Really Simple Syndication" or "Rich Site Summary", a family of web feed formats...
and Atom
Atom (standard)
The name Atom applies to a pair of related standards. The Atom Syndication Format is an XML language used for web feeds, while the Atom Publishing Protocol is a simple HTTP-based protocol for creating and updating web resources.Web feeds allow software programs to check for updates published on a...
. Feeds can be sorted into categories. Akregator will aggregate all feeds in a particular category into a single list of new entries so that, for example, all news in the category "Politics" can be shown in one list. It has an incremental search feature for the titles of all the entries in its database.
Akregator can be configured to fetch feeds within regular intervals. The user can also manually request to fetch all feeds, individual ones, or those in a selected category. It supports feed icons and embeds KHTML
KHTML
KHTML is the HTML layout engine developed by the KDE project. It is the engine used by the Konqueror web browser. A forked version of KHTML called WebKit is used by several web browsers, among them Safari and Google Chrome...
as an internal, tabbed web browser
Web browser
A web browser is a software application for retrieving, presenting, and traversing information resources on the World Wide Web. An information resource is identified by a Uniform Resource Identifier and may be a web page, image, video, or other piece of content...
. Any external browser can also be called.
Akregator is part of KDE
KDE
KDE is an international free software community producing an integrated set of cross-platform applications designed to run on Linux, FreeBSD, Microsoft Windows, Solaris and Mac OS X systems...
since the 3.4 release, and it is distributed with the kdepim module.
Usenet News Client
KNode is a freeFree software
Free software, software libre or libre software is software that can be used, studied, and modified without restriction, and which can be copied and redistributed in modified or unmodified form either without restriction, or with restrictions that only ensure that further recipients can also do...
news client
News client
A newsreader is an application program that reads articles on Usenet . Newsreaders act as clients which connect to a news server, via the Network News Transfer Protocol , to download articles and post new articles...
program for the KDE
KDE
KDE is an international free software community producing an integrated set of cross-platform applications designed to run on Linux, FreeBSD, Microsoft Windows, Solaris and Mac OS X systems...
desktop environment
Desktop environment
In graphical computing, a desktop environment commonly refers to a style of graphical user interface derived from the desktop metaphor that is seen on most modern personal computers. These GUIs help the user in easily accessing, configuring, and modifying many important and frequently accessed...
.
It supports multiple NNTP
Network News Transfer Protocol
The Network News Transfer Protocol is an Internet application protocol used for transporting Usenet news articles between news servers and for reading and posting articles by end user client applications...
servers, message threads, scoring, X-Face
X-Face
An X-Face is a small bitmap image which is added to a Usenet posting or e-mail message, typically showing a picture of the author's face. The image data is included in the posting as encoded text, and attached with an 'X-Face' header. It was devised by .It is one of the outgrowths of the Vismon...
headers (reading and posting), and international character sets.
Storage back-end
Along with the KDE 4 life cycle, Kontact moves to AkonadiAkonadi
Akonadi is a storage service for personal information management data and metadata named after the oracle goddess of justice in Ghana. It is one of the “pillars” behind the KDE SC 4 project, although it is designed to be used in any desktop environment...
for storing its data, when in the past every Kontact component implemented the storage technologies itself. Akonadi is currently mostly developed by the KDE PIM team, but its design is done in an agnostic way and thus not depending on KDE technologies.
The first KDE 4 release of Kontact was officially shipped with KDE 4.1. That release did not use Akonadi. Since then the Kontact components have been gradually migrating towards Akonadi. The first stable version of KDE PIM using Akonadi
Akonadi
Akonadi is a storage service for personal information management data and metadata named after the oracle goddess of justice in Ghana. It is one of the “pillars” behind the KDE SC 4 project, although it is designed to be used in any desktop environment...
has been released together with KDE 4.6.4 in June 2011.
See also
- Address BookAddress BookAddress Book is an address book for Apple's Mac OS X. It features various syncing features and integrates into the rest of the OS.-Features:*Exports and imports cards to and from vCard 3.0 format....
- List of applications with iCalendar support
- List of personal information managers
- David VignoniDavid VignoniDavid Vignoni is a graphical artist who specialises in icon design.Vignoni is the creator of the Nuvola icon set, which have been used in many projects including script.aculo.us and Prototype JavaScript Framework. He has designed icons for several web sites, including , , and...
: the designer of older icons.