MIT N1 Preview

A preview of N1, the open source extensible email client.

Transcript

2. A sneak peek at an extensible mail client N1 Evan Morikawa | evan@nylas.com | @e0m
3. Why build a mail client?
4. Email is massive
5. ~200B Emails / day (Radicati Group April 2014) ~45B WhatsApp + FB (TechCrunch. Jan 2015) ~30B WeChat (Speculative. Equivalent DAU to WhatsApp) ~40B iMessage (Tim Cook 2014) ~0.5B Tweets (Twitter 2015) ~0.7B Snapchat (Verge 2014) ~0.01B Slack (FacstCompany, Feb 2015)
6. Email is the “Database of your life”
7. Email has hundreds of uses
8. Email has hundreds of uses and old, inflexible interfaces
9. Email is very valuable, but creating new email experiences is very hard.
10. N1 Screenshot
11. Sidebar Screenshot
12. Composer Templates Screenshot
13. N1 Screenshot
16. <MessageList />
17. MessageStore <MessageList /> Dispatcher
18. <TranslationWidget /> Re: ReactConf Europe To: ben@nylas.com
19. Component regions in red
20. Sidebar Screenshot
21. Next week, we’re launching N1. Hack away! Lots of docs, sample code, etc.
22. Next week, we’re open-sourcing N1. GPL v3 (Free for personal use)
23. @e0m evan@nylas.com
24. @e0m evan@nylas.com
25. Nylas API Platform • REST APIs for email, contacts, and calendar • Gmail, Exchange, iCloud, Yahoo, and hundreds more. • Powers email integration in CRMs, mobile apps, etc. Making email easy.
26. N1 Mail Client • Clean, minimal foundation with “must-have” features • Robust APIs for dealing with threads, messages, etc. • Cross-platform: Mac, Windows, Linux • Easy to extend with modern technologies Making email easy. Nylas API Platform
27. Why Electron? • Mac, Windows, Linux support • Great APIs for desktop integration • Support for C/C++ code via native modules • Atom = open-source sample code and tooling • Large numbers of developers know JavaScript, HTML, CSS, can write extensions easily!
28. Challenges 1. NodeJS is single-threaded 
 2. Windows live in separate processes
 3. Platform-specific styling an exercise to the reader
29. Party on the Main Thread • BrowserWindows render and run JavaScript on the same thread. • All work is created equal. Great for a web server, not so great for a desktop app. • (Web Workers don’t get NodeJS integration)
30. Party on the Main Thread • Animations • Transitions • Scrolling • User interaction • Applying mailbox changes • Running spellcheck • Downloading attachments • Running mail rules
31. Party on the Main Thread
32. Windows are process-isolated • No shared memory between windows • Messaging between windows requires hops through the parent application process • Major conceptual barrier to multi-window app development
33. Multi-window Flux Architecture Application Process Task Store ActionBridge QueueTask: Send Draft QueueTask: Send Draft ActionBridge DraftStore JSON via IPC
34. 1. JavaScript is single-threaded 
 
 2. Windows live in separate processes
 
 3. Platform-specific styling an exercise to the reader Move CPU-intensive tasks to a worker window Bridge Flux stores and actions across windows Fine-tune CSS to match platform standards