One thing I did like about Entourage when I used to use it was the pop-up window that notified me of each new e-mail that came into my Inbox. In the window, I would be shown the subject line, who sent it, and have a brief bit of the body to read. If I clicked it, up opened the entire message in its own Entourage mail window.

Well, unfortunately, Apple’s NeXT OS borrowed Mail.app is showing its age with missing features such as this handy window. Some at the Growl project answered with GrowlMail, but Leopard quickly took care of that with constant crashes. It was so bad, in fact, Apple’s 10.5.2 update disables the plug-in all together. (There is a GrowlMail beta out that fixes this issue.) But it still wasn’t quite as good as Entourage’s window.

Another plug-in did all the things that Entourage did and more. Way more. Mail.appetizer was that plug-in but it hadn’t been updated in such a long time, many started to wonder if the author, Stefan Schüßler, was still around. Guess what? Stefan just emailed SvenOnTech a link to Mail.appetizer 1.3 Beta 1 and it’s Leopard compatible, baby!

Mail.appetizer allows you to customize many aspects of the pop-up window including just how many levels of quotation it displays. You can turn up or down the transparency, disable, enable or customize header information, and resize the actual pop-up window to your liking. The window will also display a users picture if it exists in your Address Book entry as well.

When a message comes in, up will pop the window with the header information, a picture, and the body. On the bottom of the window you’ll be able to choose to close the window (before it does so automatically if enabled), delete the message, view it, or ignore it. Other dandy features allow you to mark a message read, un-read, and even move to the next message all with a click of a mouse button. Nice.

So what does such a great little plug-in cost you? Nothing. Nada. It’s free. Can you believe it?

Thus far, I’ve had no issue with Mail.appetizer and I’m happy as can be. Why don’t you drop Stefan a line and thank him for such a great plug-in while you’re downloading this magnificent Mail.app plug in?