Hi Andrea. Just to be clear, I don't want to disable the autocomplete functionality -- I think it's valuable just like you do. Instead, let's fix 2 issues:

 

My suggestion is to just use Contacts (which the user keeps updated) for autocomplete. That solves both of these issues. Thanks!

Another suggestion: Can you PLEASE enable the ability to export to CSV from the autocomplete list? I have hundreds of emails sitting in my autocomplete list and the only option is to delete them! Is there an easy way to export these emails?

We also have this on our wish list.

To ours customers is a must have functionality!

Politely request that this thread with 13 votes be changed from "Declined" to "Under Consideration" as it will fix several issues with functionality, like the ability to export to .CSV (see above). And it will make SmarterMail easier to use as it will work like most other email programs. Thanks!

The problem with moving it to only contacts is that it will not autofill any of the e-mails of your corporate e-mail, unless you secretly go and make all the e-mails of your co-workers as contacts as well. It might be better to suggest contact list and global address list instead of just contact list.

Hi Matthew Shepard!

The competitors (Kerio Connect, Mailenable, IceWarp, Eschange Online, ecc..) already work like you told, so this is what we want!
No one ask for "ONLY CONTACTS".
What we ask for is "ALSO CONTACTS".

Robert, great! Thanks for changing this from Declined to Planned.

 

Robert, thanks for requesting my input. Here are the answers:

 

1)  Get rid of the auto-complete list entirely.  I'm not aware of any other email system that has a completely separate list for just auto-complete. Why should SmarterMail?  Essentially, these are contacts, so put them in the Contacts where they belong.

 

See this 14-vote thread from 3 years ago for more ideas:

 

You would need a process for upgrading existing users. Just move the auto-complete list into Contacts, but make it a separate group so it's easy to find, manage, and delete. See this 24-vote thread for ideas on how to implement groups under Contacts (note, it's #3 on the list for all-time votes)

 

2) The current way the list is populated doesn't seem right. It should not scan Sent Items and pull in email addresses that were used 10 years ago and no longer valid.  Also, you mentioned auto-complete is populated during indexing: when a new mail is received?  Is that really how it works? I don't think users want auto-complete for all the newsletters and spam they get.

 

Do like most other email programs and add someone to Contacts when you 1) reply and 2) the person is not already in Contacts or GAL. Put them in a separate group ("Collected") like Thunderbird does.

 

Let me know if you want me to come out to Phoenix for a week and work with the design team, I'd be glad to do it (it's cold here in the north).  Maybe we could make some arrangement, like free upgrades for life or something.  :)

I would like to add my two cents to this topic. Regardless of what changes will be made in 17 our users are concerned with the current method of removing users from the auto-complete list in 16. Individually deleting user by user while composing a message is a little unintuitive considering the prior method was to provide a list that could much more easily be traversed and cleared.

 

Maybe providing the full list to remove users from is not the direction you want to take, but having the ability to purge these lists of old or unwanted accounts is absolutely necessary. 

 

This may not be an urgent addition, but from previous posts and from what kevind has shown this is a feature that a majority of the community wants changed or improved, and not just in 17.

For anyone following this thread, I saw this in today's v17 beta release notes:

Hopefully this allows you to turn off using Sent Items in autocomplete for all the reasons listed above!

In Build 6911 (Dec 3, 2018), we added an account setting that allows users to choose whether to include sent items in autocomplete. This setting can be propagated to all users on a domain and managed by the users themselves. The other items in the autocomplete list are pulled from the user's contact list and the Global Address List (GAL), including aliases and mailing lists, if they're included in the GAL.

Addresses pulled in from a user's Sent Items folder can be deleted by clicking the X to the right of the entry. To delete other addresses from the list, you will need to do so from their respective locations within SmarterMail. That is, delete the contact, alias, mailing list, etc.

Andrea,

Looks like this new account setting you referenced got eliminated in build 7459. :(

Please mark this thread as no longer completed. Hopefully under consideration?

Thanks,

Kevin

This thread is marked as Completed, but it's not because SM still uses Sent Items for AutoComplete list. Please change it to Under Consideration. 

Is there any way to delete it or disable it? There are so many old, random, one-time-use, obsolete email addresses in Sent Items, especially if you have been using SmarterMail for many years.

Do any other email programs use Sent Items for AutoComplete?  Most use Contacts.

Thanks!

Agree, this is NOT COMPLETED... the setting is not present in the current build.

Thanks.

Build 6911 (Dec 3, 2018) had an account setting that allowed users to choose whether to include Sent Items in auto-complete. The setting could be propagated to all users on a domain and managed by the users themselves. Not sure why it was removed...

Maybe do a thumbs up here if you'd like that setting restored?

Please open this thread again...  auto-complete should be way smarter than it is.  

In summary

a) Use the contact list, and if it helps, the sent to contacts but prioritizing the contact list.

b) List the most used contacts at the top of the list 

BUMP

This thread is marked as Completed again but it is not complete. SM still uses Sent Items for AutoComplete when composing a message.

A feature to disable using Sent Items for autocomplete would be nice. There can be many old and obsolete email addresses in Sent Items that can cause confusion and make sending a message more difficult.

Hello, 

I will submit a new feature request for this functionality. So far this has been addressed twice, once where it was added, and again where it was removed. 

Thanks, Tony!  Wonder why the feature would get added, then removed 2 years later. 

Hi Tony, just following up to request this thread not be marked as Completed.  Thanks.

Thanks for switching this request to Under Consideration.

18 votes, so hoping it makes the "Planned" list.

I saw that someone recently asked about improving auto-complete:

So just bumping this thread (now at 20 votes) as it has a lot of good ideas for improving the functionality.

+1 (again...)

Seeing a lot of Auto-Complete discussion, so bumping this old thread with 23 votes.

SmarterMail could work like other email programs and use Contacts for auto-complete instead of a separate list. Then the user could easily manage the people that show up in auto-complete.

New Idea: Add a checkbox for each contact, so the user could uncheck contacts they don't want to see in auto-complete.

 

We recently moved and merged 2 domains to our servers. a .com and a ,org.  The .org is now the NEW standard for the organization, but they have 5 years of emails in their "sent items" folder, including staff that all previously had .com accounts - and a bunch of those staff over 5 years has changed.

Today I got a request / instructions to "Remove all of the .com domains from the auto complete and instead make it that only the .org accounts show up for the staff."  

I made this cool video on how to edit the contact list, search for all of the domain.com and change them to domain.org -

yea, wasted my time making that COOL video since it had no impact on the autocomplete of the "to:" email field.

What do i tell our new customer ? sorry, you are stuck with all of the .com showing up in autocomplete ?

I see the old responses of use contacts and dont use contacts, and such. How about a compromise, where the autocomplete is a completely separate list, and you can put a check box for it to use either or both of the contacts and sent items. and as you send an email it can ask if you want the address added to autocomplete if they are not already there. So for many people I would assume the normal stats would be use the contact list as part of autocomplete, and only add names from sent items when i tell it to.

+1 (again)

I disagree with limiting auto-complete to just Contacts.  I much prefer auto-complete to all Sent addresses.  

What SM currently misses is that Sent addresses should be listed in the order of sent frequency.

If listed by sent frequency then addresses in Contacts will generally automatically be on top of the auto-complete list as they usually are important enough to be in Contacts AND the user will have quick access to addresses they sometimes send to but who are not important enough to be in contacts.  It is a pain to find that one email address you send to once or twice per year but who really isn't important enough to be in Contacts.

This would mimic how Outlook handles auto-complete which I think works well and is how most users are used to interacting with the feature.

+1  Good to have some discussion on this 8-year old idea with 25 votes!

Many SmarterMail servers have been running for 10+ years, so Sent Items are full of outdated addresses. Since 90% of your messages are to people in your Contacts, just make that the AutoComplete. Simple and easy to update if needed.

Maybe add a feature that every month or so, SmarterMail prompt you with new people it finds in Sent Items and asks you if you want to add to Contacts.

Another advantage of having in Contacts is that it can be used for spam scoring and trusted senders.