
Tray.io - powerful email assistant - vacipr
http://tray.io/
======
mmahemoff
Their pitch stole the show on a recent TWIST.
<http://youtu.be/W_6h8XWfUO8?t=57m23s>

I was recently asking people for a way to translate emails into SMSs, so I
could route my system alerts (from various places) to a single email and
ensure I always get by SMS. It's a surprisingly hard problem right now, which
Tray looks like it would solve elegantly if they get SMS right.

~~~
bryanh
You could use <http://zapier.com> for that:

    
    
      1) set up a Zapier mailbox as the trigger, send direct or forward to.
      2) set up an SMS (or Gtalk or whatever) action.
    

We let you set up filters which you can use to control flow or routing. I even
set up an easy template for this:
[https://zapier.com/zapbook/mailbox/sms/2424/inbound-
mailbox-...](https://zapier.com/zapbook/mailbox/sms/2424/inbound-mailbox-sms/)

------
mbq
For those who don't like 3rd parties looking into mail and only have IMAP
access to mail server, there is something called imapfilter. Basically, it
acts as a headless e-mail client with Lua interface.

------
barik
This reminds me a lot of the server-side procmail [0] and Sieve filters [1].
Perhaps this was even the inspiration for such a project, who knows?

But tray.io looks like it can handle far more advanced rules (or at least
those somewhat comparable to procmail, and without having to do a bunch of
manual scripting!), but in a more user-friendly, graphical way. And if it can
automatically generate machine-learned rule suggestions based on user
behavior, that would be even more fantastic.

The only major downside is that you have to be willing to let a third-party
have access to your e-mail (and I know that when I've written server-side
procmail scripts that have misbehaved, I've managed to unintentionally lose
e-mail at least once or twice in my lifetime; of course, I didn't know that I
had even lost the mail, since the server silently discarded it due to my
malformed rules).

[0] <http://www.procmail.org/> [1] <http://wiki.dovecot.org/LDA/Sieve>

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d0de
How does the authentication work with email providers? Does the application
access email through POP or IMAP? Does it have arbitrary access to my email
account?

I fear I'll never benefit from apps like this as my email account is the
skeleton key to my online identity. I'm not sure I could trust any other human
being with the password.

~~~
adotify
At the moment the private alpha is just Gmail, because gmail provides OAuth
Authentication, a much more secure/elegant way than requesting a users IMAP
credentials.

Work is being done on supporting other email providers, which will obviously
require storing the users credentials in a secure way & there is also a white
label/internally hosted version in the works for the enterprise that mmahemoff
mentioned..

Security for email is definitely our biggest issue so far, but we want to make
sure we have it nailed before we go public...

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mattrepl
I'm not sure how they compare, but a friend of mine's company does something
similar: <http://www.awayfind.com>

They provide similar filters and suggest filters from your communication
behavior. E.g., you consistently respond to Peter Norvig quickly, perhaps you
want an alert.

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wwkeyboard
I'm I the only person who is reluctant to add a service hosted by a startup to
your email process? What kind of plans do you have for when they
close/exit/pivot/whatever were calling it these days? How is this not going to
be another Sparrow or Fluent?

~~~
mcrittenden
Off topic, but what do you mean about Fluent? I though it was chugging along,
and I've been waiting on an invite.

~~~
Soliah
You'll be waiting forever then[1].

[1] [http://fluentmail.tumblr.com/post/28767857337/fluent-is-
clos...](http://fluentmail.tumblr.com/post/28767857337/fluent-is-closing)

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lsiebert
Interesting. I'd love if this integrated with SpringPad (which I prefer over
Evernote), either by formatting for their e-mails or preferably through their
API. IFTTT does neither.

If this allowed anonymous analytics in order to discover and suggest useful
rules, either at the personal level or in aggregate over all users, that would
be awesome. Likewise if you can publish, clone and fork useful rules then
modify them for one's account. The less a user has to come up with their own
rules, the better.

And there are things that IFTTT doesn't do for e-mail that this might do. And
there are API's that IFTTT doesn't support (the big one for me is springpad).

As for time sensitive, this could potentially learn what you respond to
immediately upon viewing, and what you wait on or don't view, (and even
analyze that as a function of day, time, sender, etc.) If it had permissions
to analyze e-mail texts and had enough users, it could use machine learning to
learn what phrases were likely to prompt immediate action, IE "By tomorrow
morning" vs. "By Tuesday morning" on a Wednesday.

As for non Oauth accounts, A browser plugin that stored your credentials
locally could still be possible. I seem to recall reading about somebody
working on a clever way to do this involving passing session information using
a proxy and encryption or something like that, but my memory isn't great.

All in all, I wish them luck.

~~~
waldr
Thank you - I'll get springpad on our list. We are working on analytics
currently, I'd love to hear of any other API's you'd like to see hooked up
please feel free to email me: rich (at) tray.io

------
Swizec
I usually check email in the evening before going to bed. It's working
marvelously since I can take an hour out of my day to handle everybody -
really solves the problem of forgetting to respond to people.

The only problem are time-sensitive emails. For those I still need to
periodically check my inbox to see if something urgent's come up.

If there's a way to tell Tray "If time-sensitive email, send me a tweet", that
would be superbly magnificent. The landing page doesn't seem to indicate this.

~~~
adotify
we are working with our current alpha users to find the right sort of rules
that help them with their email.

The idea would be that you could setup custom rules based on the people who
email you, or other web services you use, for example if a hot lead in sales
force emailed you while your in a meeting, then forward it via SMS.

Being able to pickout a "time sensistive" email would really depend on what
you consider time sensitive, but im sure we could provide something that would
help.. email dom at tray.io and we can talk more about how tray could help fix
your issue..?

~~~
lessnonymous
Is there any intention to add machine learning to the system so it can realise
I never read email from particular people, but that something from a
particular user I'm all over it?

~~~
domlewis1
yes, there is going to be machine learning and analytics processing..
Eventually rules would be suggested to you, and some rules would take
advantage of all the information that has been learned about your account

------
16s
I would have serious privacy concerns about this. You are basically allowing a
3rd-party to read your email.

~~~
moe
_You are basically allowing a 3rd-party to read your email._

4th party. Most of their target audience is probably on GMail and has no
privacy concerns to begin with.

~~~
16s
Fair point. I don't disagree. It just bothers me to see how what little
privacy we have left continues to erode.

~~~
davidhollander
I don't see an architectural alternative for such services yet. You'd need a
client side app sandbox which allows servers to schedule routines to run
locally on secret data, without leaking back data which the server can
decrypt. It would also need to be cross-platform and have the same user
accessibility as the web browser.

~~~
moe
_You'd need a client side app sandbox [...]_

Or you could use, you know, a native client. It may increasingly become a
foreign concept to the "facebook generation" but your computer is still fully
capable of running a mail client on its own.

Of course you don't get to sell SaaS-subscriptions when you implement tray.io
as a procmail GUI...

~~~
davidhollander
A native client without a user data sandbox doesn't solve the problem of
networked applications leaking private data and spying on the user at all. The
code needs to be open source, versioned, vetted, and only obtained via a
trusted repository for every application the user wants to run each time it is
updated. The user is no longer instantly able to access the latest version of
the application by simply typing in a URI.

~~~
moe
I meant it tongue-in-cheek when I said "facebook generation", but it seems we
really have a generational gap here.

 _The code needs to be open source, versioned, vetted, and only obtained via a
trusted repository_

<http://www.procmail.org> <http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/>
<http://www.mutt.org/>

_The user is no longer instantly able to access the latest version of the
application by simply typing in a URI._

Yes, that actually bothers me a lot. Can you imagine the crazy effort that I
go through every time I update my mail-client?

It takes the better part of 5 minutes every time (I'm not exaggerating here)
and last year I had to do it twice!

~~~
davidhollander
Would you be comfortable explaining to relatives, aquantainces, and the
elderly in a casual conversation:

How to install, use, and maintain linux. How to install, use, and maintain
their own mail server and spam filters. How PGP works. How to setup and use
thunderbird+enigimail or mutt.

Compared to visiting a URI, would doing so be more technically demanding or
less technically demanding for users who have not specialized in computing? Is
the proportion of society which inevitably chooses not to specialize in a
computing inherently more deserving or inherently less deserving of the
benefits of encryption and privacy?

I think the gap in our perspective is most likely attributable to A) how
widespread we wish to see encryption used by the general public in the future,
or B) our expectations of the of the technical stamina of the general public
when confronted with unfamiliar tasks, rather than generational effects.

~~~
moe
Nobody talked about encryption. Nobody talked about "elderly acquaintances".

The conversation was about a product aimed squarely at GMail "Power-Users" who
willfully run all their e-mail through one or more third partys.

And besides, you don't need to linux to run a mail program.

------
JoelMarsh
What is the typical number of rules someone has to write if they get, say, 100
emails per day from any combination of 1000 contacts?

If you have 100 common contacts (as opposed to the other 900 who email once
and a while) and I need, say, a rule or two for each to cover the basics...
and a rule or two to cover groups of people (because one-to-one emails are the
exception in business not the rule)... isn't that hundreds and hundreds of
rules?

Not having seen the alpha, that feels like an insurmountable first threshold,
UX-wise.

Also, just out of curiosity, other than general ease-of-use (which seems much
nicer in your 3 examples), how is this better than typical filters (which I
don't use)?

~~~
waldr
It really depends on how you manage your inbox, one of the drivers behind us
building Tray was the customisation it offers. The triggers that define the
rules can cover as many or as few contacts as you wish ie 'anyone I have a
meeting with in the next 48 hrs' can be a trigger, or simply based on email
content, pre-defined contact groups etc. In most cases this is a handful of
rules.

Email rules that are setup within the client or service restrict filtering to
contact, folder, content (in some cases). We can react to data that's outside
of your inbox, anything from your relationship to the contact based on another
web service, to accessing, storing, and sharing with services you use
regularly. Beyond this triggers such as time, email load (driven from
analytics), location can all come into play. We are really just getting
started with the possibilities, a way to interact with custom web apps would
be great for developers/companies that use bespoke tools.

~~~
JoelMarsh
I can't decide whether to focus on the interesting aspects/potential of your
tool, or the fact that you circumvented the concern I presented, but thanks
for the answer nonetheless.

The ease of this tool is inversely related to the need for it. i.e. — the more
complex/high volume your inbox, the more you suffer while trying to set it up.

Maybe it would be worth implementing some "starter rules" or a "wizard" that
allows the first-timer to leverage many basic rules at once, immediately.

It's the Pinterest approach, if you will. :) "Pick 5 things you like" and then
they auto-follow 50 people based on your choices. Voilá! Good first
experience.

Remember that features ≠ power ≠ satisfaction.

I apologize for the unsolicited suggestions; you hit my area of interest right
in the middle. ;) Good luck with everything and congrats on getting to the
alpha in the first place!

------
eranation
I'd add type="email" to your input to make it easier to sign up on mobiles.

~~~
waldr
Great heads up - we'll do this. Thank you

~~~
ninetax
Actually, it might be just me, but I find this incredibly annoying. I use
swift-text on android and while usually when I start typing my email address I
get a suggestion for my long email address, but when type=email I don't get a
suggestion, just a little @ key at the bottom. Might not be this way for all
keyboards though. Just a thought.

Edit: Oh and great job on the app! I think this is an awesome idea and if some
of the privacy and longevity concerns were addressed, I would use it all the
time!

------
twitchhiker
Have been trying it out for a month or so. Love it to bits.

~~~
FusionX
Is it possible for me to join in during the private beta?

~~~
waldr
Sure signup to the landing page, we are releasing invites in batches.

~~~
FusionX
already done, can't wait to try it, this looks pretty useful. good luck :)

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lukedeering
Great startup from the SpringBoard program! Recently we interviewed Tray.io
co-founder Dom Lewis <http://howtowriteabusinessplan.com/2012/07/tray-
interview/>

Check it out! During the interview Dom talks about startingup, their pivot and
shares advice to aspiring entrepreneurs.

Job lads!

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damian2000
This probably sounds negative but isn't this just adding needless complexity
to something that's simple? I've tried rules in mail clients before, but in
the end the best filter is myself scanning the from and subject columns.

~~~
domlewis1
This may be overkill for some people, but if everyone could just easily scan
from and subject columns then there wouldn't be a global email epidemic that
lots of people are trying to solve. Tray is trying to allow you to define how
you use your inbox, rather than assuming that your like the next 100 people...

------
jdbradford
I love the ability to notify people that if they reduce the email length I am
more likely to respond quickly. Awesome work. Keep coding.

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SwaroopH
IFTTT for email.

Tray is awesome. Met these guys in London on their demo through our
accelerator exchange program.

~~~
perssontm
Really great idea, integration to non-oauth email providers seems like a
hurdle though. Requiring full credentials is a less good idea.

If they add post-read-filtering of the inbox it would handle some sorting
after the work is finished as well. For example, filter all mail from X
flagged with label done to that customers folder.

~~~
waldr
We've just added some google labels support, so we'll be able to handle this
in the not to distant future. There isn't enough time in the day to code fast
enough :)

~~~
perssontm
Sounds really neat, I've solved it for my own personal needs with some
imapfilter scripts, but the thought crossed my mind to make a service out of
it. The reason not to was the tricky part of needing customers imap
credentials and store them safely.

Integrating to tightly with gmail would perhaps make it harder to support
other imap platforms, since gmail can do more in some areas.

Good luck with your project!

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ihavebeenseen
Please figure how to do this for exchange. Then proceed to take over world.

~~~
adparadox
Some later versions of Exchange have a SOAP API
([http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/exchange/dd877045(v=...](http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/exchange/dd877045\(v=exchg.140\).aspx)). I wrote this npm module to
grab a user's current emails: <https://npmjs.org/package/exchanger>.

~~~
mike-cardwell
Would probably be better to use IMAP for this. Then it will work for Exchange
systems, GMail, and nearly every other mail system out there.

~~~
adparadox
Unfortunately, I don't think IMAP isn't enabled by default in Exchange. And,
at least at my work, enabling it isn't an option.

~~~
mike-cardwell
Why isn't it an option? If you work in the sort of environment that wont
enable IMAP, you probably also work in the sort of environment that doesn't
want you giving up access to your mailbox to a random third party.

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thoufeeq
Nice service, of course... Waiting for the launch of the stable version.

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DiabloD3
Isn't this just IFTTT for email?

~~~
iamdave
Seems that way. Is that a bad thing?

