Syphir - Advanced Gmail Rules and iPhone Push Service

Syphir adds some smart filtering options to Gmail — figuring the likelihood you will need to reply, for instance, or a message's age — and can take smart action, too, such as delaying mail, alerting your iPhone or applying labels.
It's really a pity Syphir only works with Gmail. Other IMAP accounts could profit from its filtering magic, too, as could Syphir from even more intelligent action.

New Gmail message alerts pushed to your iPhone are great, are they not? They are great, you mean, if it's an email on which you need to take immediate action?

Wish Gmail could figure out whether a new email is important and alert you only then (and not while you're out sailing, skiing and swimming)? Wish Gmail could detect chain letters and archive them silently? Wish Gmail could delay alerts, while we're at it, from social networks?

With Syphir, Gmail can do all that and then some.

Syphir works with your Gmail (or Google Apps) account like an email program using IMAP. Unlike an email program, it does not need your password; you log in directly via Gmail, granting Syphir access. Like any respectable email program, Syphir can act on new mail and old applying filters.

You can have Syphir filter mail from certain senders, of course, and with particular phrases in subject or body; you can restrict your matches to certain labels and recipients; Syphir can also, however, act on messages that arrive at particular hours, mass mails to some 8 or 10 recipients or emails that are a few days old and still unanswered, for example.

Speaking of replies, Syphir keeps an eye on what kind of emails you answer. Based on characteristics so deduced (certain senders, for instance), Syphir determines how likely you are to answer new mail — and can act on messages you sure want to treat to a reply.

For such important emails — or all others determined by your rules, of course —, Syphir can alert you via an optional iPhone app (the only alert option, though). Other standard actions include labeling and archiving, deleting mail and marking it read, of course; a more interesting action has Syphir delay the delivery of messages to your Gmail inbox. Delayed mail does show up in a special label immediately if you're curious.

If you're not quite sure what Syphir could do for you, a few slick sample rules serve as ready-made recipes that you can use for your Gmail inbox right away — or adapt to your taste, of course. Options for effective automation abound.

Syphir so full of potential, users of MobileMe, AOL and other IMAP accounts could profit from its filtering. The filtering itself could also profit, of course, from one more criterion or two, and a few more actions, too. How about labeling on past actions, for example, or creating a useful draft automatically for those emails identified to need replying?