I'll add my 5 cents.
What i tried to make mail-notification work.

System info:

!# uname -a
Linux horned 2.6.28-13-generic #44-Ubuntu SMP Tue Jun 2 07:55:09 UTC 2009 x86_64 GNU/Linux

!# evolution --version
GNOME evolution 2.26.1

Then i installed on deps for mail-notification

!# sudo aptitude install gettext libdbus-glib-1-dev libgconf2-dev libgtk2.0-dev libgnomeui-dev libgnomevfs2-dev libglade2-dev libnotify-dev libgmime2-dev evolution-dev

Running ./jb configure

checking for ngettext(), dgettext(), bind_textdomain_codeset() in libc... yes
checking for msgfmt... /usr/bin/msgfmt
checking for perl... /usr/bin/perl
checking for XML::Parser... yes
checking for gconftool-2... /usr/bin/gconftool-2
checking for scrollkeeper-preinstall... /usr/bin/scrollkeeper-preinstall
checking for scrollkeeper-update... /usr/bin/scrollkeeper-update
checking for scrollkeeper-config... /usr/bin/scrollkeeper-config
checking for the OMF directory... /usr/share/omf
checking for the ScrollKeeper database directory... /var/lib/rarian
checking for dbus-binding-tool... /usr/bin/dbus-binding-tool
checking for gob2... not found
checking the C compiler dependency style... GCC
checking for the GNU C library... yes
checking for pkg-config... /usr/bin/pkg-config
checking for GNOME... yes
checking for D-Bus... yes
checking for GMime... yes
checking for GNOME Keyring... yes
checking the host system type... x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu
checking if the DNS resolver is reentrant... yes
checking the host CPU endianness... little-endian
checking for Cyrus SASL >= 2.0... no
WARNING: disabling option "sasl" since Cyrus SASL was not found
checking for OpenSSL >= 0.9.6... yes
checking whether OpenSSL supports multi-threading... yes
checking for Evolution... yes
checking for the Evolution plugin directory... /usr/lib/evolution/2.26/plugins
checking for timegm() in libc... yes

Mail Notification 5.4 was configured successfully.
The following variables are in effect:

  Compiler options:

    cc:                      cc
    cflags:                  -O2
    cppflags:                
    ldflags:                 
    libs:                    
    cc-dependency-tracking:  yes

  Installation options:

    destdir:                 
    prefix:                  /usr
    bindir:                  $prefix/bin
    libdir:                  $prefix/lib
    libexecdir:              $prefix/libexec
    datadir:                 $prefix/share
    sysconfdir:              $prefix/etc
    localstatedir:           $prefix/var
    data-mode:               0644
    data-owner:              
    data-group:              
    program-mode:            0755
    program-owner:           
    program-group:           
    library-mode:            0644
    library-owner:           
    library-group:           
    gconf-config-source:     xml:merged:/etc/gconf/gconf.xml.defaults
    gconf-schemas-dir:       $datadir/gconf/schemas
    install-gconf-schemas:   yes
    help-dir:                $datadir/gnome/help
    omf-dir:                 /usr/share/omf
    scrollkeeper-dir:        /var/lib/rarian
    evolution-plugin-dir:    /usr/lib/evolution/2.26/plugins

  External programs:

    msgfmt:                  /usr/bin/msgfmt
    perl:                    /usr/bin/perl
    gconftool-2:             /usr/bin/gconftool-2
    scrollkeeper-preinstall: /usr/bin/scrollkeeper-preinstall
    scrollkeeper-update:     /usr/bin/scrollkeeper-update
    dbus-binding-tool:       /usr/bin/dbus-binding-tool
    gob2:                    

  Mailbox backends:

    evolution:               yes
    gmail:                   yes
    hotmail:                 yes
    imap:                    yes
    maildir:                 yes
    mbox:                    yes
    mh:                      yes
    mozilla:                 yes
    pop3:                    yes
    sylpheed:                yes
    yahoo:                   yes

  IMAP and POP3 features:

    ipv6:                    yes
    sasl:                    no
    ssl:                     yes

Type "./jb build" to build Mail Notification 5.4.

Then i built it.

!# ./jb build

And installed.

!# sudo ./jb install

Running evolution

!# evolution

** (evolution:28759): DEBUG: mailto URL command: evolution %s
** (evolution:28759): DEBUG: mailto URL program: evolution
** (evolution:28759): DEBUG: EI: SHELL STARTUP
** (evolution:28759): DEBUG: EI: mail_read_notify
** (evolution:28759): DEBUG: MAIL SERVER: Count changed: 0

Now it's time for the most interesting part.

Starting mail-notify.

!# mail-notification

The Mail Notification Properties is opend.

Mailbox List -> Add -> Mailbox type: Evolution 
and i see my Gmail IMAP folders. I choose Incoming adn click Add. And... Bingo... 

Mail-Notification icon is blinking with message that it "Unable to connect to Evolution" and Evoultion crashed in console with 

Segmentation fault

message.

And if i try to run Evoultion again i get

** (evolution:28849): DEBUG: mailto URL command: evolution %s
** (evolution:28849): DEBUG: mailto URL program: evolution
** (evolution:28849): DEBUG: EI: SHELL STARTUP
Segmentation fault

That's all. 

P.S.
Sorry, if my message is too long or my english is bad.