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Stop emailing to the wrong person.

A function to prevent you from accidentally emailing to the wrong person.
  (+1, -9)(+1, -9)
(+1, -9)
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against]

How many of you have actually accidentally sent an email to the wrong person? I suggest that we have an extra step just to prevent this from happening. When you click on the sent button, a window will pop up. The window will have the message "Are you sure you want to email the message to" followed by the name of the addressee, a Yes button, and a No button. If you are very sure that you want to email to that person, you click on the Yes button. So far, I haven't come across any email programs with such function, and it's better to prevent the email from being sent, rather having to recall it back later. It may be too late to recall the email.
raideas, Nov 22 2006

You're not the first to mess up Email_20list_20checker
'cept [madradish] doesn't make mistakes one at a time [lurch, Nov 22 2006]

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       When people do the same function on a computer over and over again small pop-up windows become arbitrary as no-one reads them. They instantly click on yes, or no, depending on what they remember is the correct one to press to skip that particular window. People will still send the wrong email to the wrong girlfriend despite your revolutionary idea, that's called being human. It's a mistake, an error, and unfortunately not something you can fix with a bit of code.   

       However, thinking on't, if you had a photo for all your addressees and they popped up, that might work...
theleopard, Nov 22 2006
  

       Are you sure you want to click the 'Yes' button? YES / NO

Are you sure you want to cancel clicking the 'Yes' button? YES / NO
angel, Nov 22 2006
  

       "Didn't you mean to click the 'No' button just then?" YES/NO
"Would you like to see another confirmation dialog?" YES/NO
hippo, Nov 22 2006
  

       "When you clicked 'No' to cancel clicking the previous 'No' button, did you mean that you want to cancel the 'Yes' before that, or do you want to uncancel the button that cancelled the 'No' click?" YES / NO
angel, Nov 22 2006
  

       ?   

       YES/NO/POSSIBLY
theleopard, Nov 22 2006
  

       Maybe a spam filter could be used for such a purpose. Spam filters "learn" what words in what context you define as spam, and then applies the "knowlege" to incoming mail.   

       So a spam filter could be taught to associate certain words to certain mail addresses, and warn you if it thinks you are sending innappropriate content to someone.   

       It wouldn't be hard to teach a filter that you send your spouse "hugs, kisses, ...etc (I don't know where you draw the line at spicy e-mails)", and you send your coworker stuff like "you worthless bastard, I told you to have that done by today, and now you want one more week, I'll bite your legs off!!!", (or vice versa, depending on your relationship with your spouse/coworkers).   

       So when it detects you trying to send angry mails to your wife, or saucy e-mails to your boss (in case you wouldn't do that intentionally), it warns you about it.   

       Sufficiently "trained", such a filter would save you a lot of (potential) embarassment. And also, if you are sending someone an e-mail you might later regret, a ton of pop-up warnings, prompts, confirmation boxes, "wait XX seconds" countdowns, etc, would give you enough time to reconsider, or just annoy you enough to give up entirely. And that's a good thing.   

       With that in mind, I bun the idea.
Veho, Nov 22 2006
  

       Y'know, if it popped up a picture of the person you were sending the email to, that would probably allow you to catch most mistakes.
phundug, Nov 22 2006
  

       Now that is a really good idea.
theleopard, Nov 22 2006
  

       Well said [theleopard]. Credit where credit's due.
jtp, Nov 22 2006
  

       Why not read the addy you typed in?
Chefboyrbored, Nov 22 2006
  

       ...or even be conscientious enough to check what you are sending, to whom you were sending it, and to check the final outgoing message for errors instead of trying to get a non-sentient device to keep asking if you are sure.
...but I think we all realise this...
gnomethang, Nov 22 2006
  


 

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