Q1090 Are there any special things I need to know to get AirMail to work with the new Windows Vista operating system?
A1090 First, a comment on upgrading to Windows Vista: If your new computer came with Windows Vista then that's great. If you are contemplating upgrading your computer to Windows Vista then make sure that is what you want to do. Windows-XP is robust and reliable; if yours is not then something has been compromised. And upgrading a compromised system results in a compromised system with fancy new drapes. But if you have a fast processor and at least a gigabyte of memory, then go for it.
The next question is an upgrade-installation or a clean install. Generally we prefer a clean install, but only if the computer manufacturer supports Win-Vista for your computer, and provides driver updates. For example, upgrading our three-year-old IBM Thinkpad was a piece of cake-- do a clean install for Win-Vista, go to the Lenovo website support/downloads page and install the system-update file for Windows Vista. We were impressed, but your mileage will vary.
There are a couple of issues when running Airmail under Windows Vista, mostly related to new Vista security features. The short answer is that Airmail works fine under Win-Vista when run as an administrator. A new security feature of Windows Vista is "User Account Control" (UAC). Remember, if you can do anything useful with your computer, it is not sufficiently secure. "User Account Control" is a watchdog service that does two things: warns you if you are trying to do something useful, e.g. run a program. And, if a program attempts to write into protected areas (e.g. the "program files" folder), a virtual copy of the file or folder is created instead for that user. The result, for Airmail, is severe schizophrenia, and release-notes that just keep reappearing. Here's how to fix it:
First, install Airmail as usual: Download the file from the website and save it in a "downloads" folder, then open that folder and open the downloaded file. Airmail will go through the install steps, and Windows may show a "not installed properly" warning when finished-- click "Yes this installed normally" and continue.
Once installed, before running Airmail, right-click the Airmail desktop icon and select "properties", click the "Compatibility" tab, and check "Run as administrator". This allows Airmail to write into its own folders (otherwise prohibited). For Airmail versions prior to 3.3.090 also check "Run this program in compatibility mode" and select Windows-XP SP2 (this will enable com-port descriptions).
You will continue to get warnings from UAC about an "unknown program" each time you
start Airmail, and you may want to disable UAC. You can disable UAC in Control panel:
open "User Accounts" and turn "User Account Control" off.
Help file: Vista does not include the program to display the traditional help files, "Winhlp32.exe". This may be available for download, alternately it can be copied from Windows-XP C:\Windows folder. To do this you will first need to set the permissions for the C:\Windows folder to allow Administrators full access, and to do this you will need to first take ownership (right-click the Windows folder, select properties, then Security tab, Advanced button, Owner tab, Edit button). Then copy the complete (277KB) Winhlp32.exe from Win-XP over the 9KB "stub" Winhlp32.exe on Win-Vista.
The propagation program installs OK and runs properly under Airmail. It will not likely run correctly under its own desktop icon without some fiddling similar to the above.
Upcoming versions of Airmail will move the user-folders into Win-Vista's user-space, while maintaining the basic hardware settings in a common file. This will avoid issues with UAC as well as permitting separate "personalities" if desired. The Help file will also be converted to HTML format. The goal is for Airmail to run smoothly under Vista's highest security settings but this will take some effort.
[from Jim Corenman, author of AirMail; February 1, 2007]