The last time I wrote here, I promised I would give you an update on what I had planned for WinPMail, so that's what I'm going to do now. Before I get onto that, though, I need to spend a few moments talking about a software package I believe may be one of the greatest ever written - an SQL database package called SQLite3. SQLite3 is a small, powerful SQL database system ("SQL" stands for "Structured Query Language", and is the closest thing the software industry has to a truly standard database query language). It is very fast, astonishingly extensive in its support for SQL, is quite possibly one of the most ruthlessly-tested pieces of software in existence, and - most amazingly of all - is completely free. I have fiddled around with SQLite3 for a number of years - I even got as far as using it to write an early version of a replacement for the ancient Pegasus Mail addressbook format, but that was before I really understood SQL and SQLite well enough to do it properly, and although it mainly worked, the result would have been too hard to maintain over time. Last year, I began *really* learning how to work with SQLite3 - how to take advantage of a much wider range of its capabilities than I previously could. A major factor in this was a desire I have had for a long time to improve the privacy and security of Pegasus Mail: SQLite3 allows me to do that because there is a version of SQLite3 called SQLCipher that can create databases encrypted using very strong encryption schemes. My first application of this new-found SQLite knowledge is to revisit my plans to create a really top-flight replacement for the old Pegasus Mail addressbook - a true Contact Manager. In this new system, each contact becomes a well of data - it can have multiple phone numbers, addresses, e-mail addresses with their own specific settings, associates with their own addresses and comments, notes that are editable directly in the user interface, files of any type and any size, pictures that can be viewed directly, even mail messages - a contact can act as a kind of "mini folder", keeping all your correspondence with the contact together in one place. And for those of you who don't need all that richness, all the essentials can be viewed and managed in a single summary page. The back end of this system (that is, the part that actually creates and manages the contacts in the SQLite database) is now working here, with only the user interface left to complete, so this isn't just pipe dreaming - it's a real feature you can expect to see in an upcoming release. After the Contact Manager, I'll be using SQLite3 to create a new folder format that has no practical limits on the number or size of messages it can store, is much more searchable, and, with the addition of SQLCipher, is completely secure. That's a little further down the track, but the work I've already done in the Contact Manager will feed directly into that, making it a faster and rather easier process. So then, that's a snapshot of what's going on behind the scenes here - I find it quite exciting and am enjoying writing it. I am really looking forward to having something complete enough to show you, and hope you'll find it exciting too. Cheers! -- David --