Change display of Sender in Mail.app?

[DVDSP]

Using Mail it annoys me that some of the Senders names are shown while other Senders email addresses are shown. Is there a way to get it so that either one or the other is shown? It especially bugs me since most of the people I get email from are already in Address Book and Mail will show if they are online (through AIM/iChat/etc) but I won't change the displayed name.

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance,

 

[MisterMe]

Using Mail it annoys me that some of the Senders names are shown while other Senders email addresses are shown. Is there a way to get it so that either one or the other is shown? It especially bugs me since most of the people I get email from are already in Address Book and Mail will show if they are online (through AIM/iChat/etc) but I won't change the displayed name.

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance,

It constantly amazes me the things that some people find to annoy themselves. At any rate, you are mixing up some things. Click Mail > Preferences.... Then click the Viewing tab. The first checkbox is Show online buddy status. This has nothing to do with whether or not a sender's real name will be displayed, per se. The fourth checkbox is Use Smart Addresses. With this turned checked, Mail displays the real names of senders in your Address Book.

 

[DVDSP]

At any rate, you are mixing up some things. Click Mail > Preferences.... Then click the Viewing tab. The first checkbox is Show online buddy status. This has nothing to do with whether or not a sender's real name will be displayed, per se.

Nope, I'm not mixing things up, just pointing out that Mail HAS the ability to "know" who is who in regard to Address Book.

The fourth checkbox is Use Smart Addresses. With this turned checked, Mail displays the real names of senders in your Address Book.

I have that check box enabled but all AOL addresses (among a few others) always show up as that address and not the person's name as I have designated it in Address Book.

Thanks for you help,

 

[maxterpiece]

This info probably doesn't help you, but they reason why you get some emails with names and some just email addresses is because of the senders' settings. If they are using an app like mail.app they have the opportunity to configure a "send from name". They actually have that capability in most webmail as well, but it is often left unconfigured. If you look at the "sender" names in mail and compare them to the names in your address book you will find that some of them are slightly different - IE you might have typed your buddy's name into your addressbook as Johnny Qbert, but he may have setup his mail program to display his name as Johnny "Heartbreaker" Qbert.

I haven't had AOL in I guess almost a decade, but I've used other people's AOL and I know AOL is still not really into following standards on the web. I'm guessing that when you use AOL webmail it automatically configures the from name as a person's email address, therefore overriding Mail from checking your addressbook to see the name that YOU have matching that address. In other words, mail is getting an email that is actually telling it that, not only is this email from jqbert@aol.com, but Johnny wants his NAME to also be displayed as jqbert@aol.com.