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For those of you that use the mail app
- Thread starter Weerez935
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I have 100% of my incoming mail forwarded to a Gmail account that I strictly use for archiving. Hence... if you wanted to follow suit... you might create a new email account called Archive.Weerez935@gmail.com. I only forward the email... I do not automatically delete it from my inbox.
Then... as I read email... I am ruthless about deleting anything and everything that I do not need. I keep an incredibly small amount of emails around... usually less than 5 or so. At this moment, my email account only has 2 emails in it. I can delete ruthlessly because I know that I can log into my gmail archive account... and search for any email that I have ever received (10's of thousands)... and have the results in milliseconds.
So... lets say I just ordered something new from the Apple store. I would immediately get an order confirmation... so I would leave it my inbox. The following day... I might get an email that they are processing my order... so I will then delete the original order confirmation and leaved the lastest. The next day I might get an email that it shipped... so I delete all prior emails and just keep the shipping confirmation. Finally, once the item arrives at my door... I delete the last email.
But doing this... my email inbox is almost always near empty. If I need to scroll to see more emails... I know that I am out of control... so I go on a deleting rampage.
Occasionally, I will create folders for specific reasons. For example, I create folders for my upcoming travel. As I make airline, hotel, rental car reservations, I put them into the folder for that specific trip. Because my email uses IMAP protocol... I always have them with me on my iPhone, iPad or MBA during my trip. When the trip is complete... I trash the entire folder.
Having a nearly empty mailbox is a very "free-like" experience. That lack of clutter just feels great. At the same time... I have access to any email I ever received.
/Jim
Just changed mine from att to yahoo. This made a huge difference now it syncs right, is imap and pushes rather than fetch.
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I will try this tooI have 100% of my incoming mail forwarded to a Gmail account that I strictly use for archiving. Hence... if you wanted to follow suit... you might create a new email account called Archive.Weerez935@gmail.com. I only forward the email... I do not automatically delete it from my inbox.
Then... as I read email... I am ruthless about deleting anything and everything that I do not need. I keep an incredibly small amount of emails around... usually less than 5 or so. At this moment, my email account only has 2 emails in it. I can delete ruthlessly because I know that I can log into my gmail archive account... and search for any email that I have ever received (10's of thousands)... and have the results in milliseconds.
So... lets say I just ordered something new from the Apple store. I would immediately get an order confirmation... so I would leave it my inbox. The following day... I might get an email that they are processing my order... so I will then delete the original order confirmation and leaved the lastest. The next day I might get an email that it shipped... so I delete all prior emails and just keep the shipping confirmation. Finally, once the item arrives at my door... I delete the last email.
But doing this... my email inbox is almost always near empty. If I need to scroll to see more emails... I know that I am out of control... so I go on a deleting rampage.
Occasionally, I will create folders for specific reasons. For example, I create folders for my upcoming travel. As I make airline, hotel, rental car reservations, I put them into the folder for that specific trip. Because my email uses IMAP protocol... I always have them with me on my iPhone, iPad or MBA during my trip. When the trip is complete... I trash the entire folder.
Having a nearly empty mailbox is a very "free-like" experience. That lack of clutter just feels great. At the same time... I have access to any email I ever received.
/Jim
Indeed. If IMAP is available, use it.
I have numerous IMAP folders defined for friend correspondence, travel, support calls, purchases etc. If you are using a Mac, you have the added benefit of defining rules so that incoming emails get directed to the appropriate folder. Makes it easier to find stuff.
Is your MBA your only computer? If so, then I think yes... the rules will run as your MBA loads the emails. However... if you had another computer on 24/7 (ex: iMac)... then it would execute the rules.
I do not personally use rules heavily... so I may be mistaken.
/Jim
Appstorm created an article with a suggested workflow setup. I took some of their ideas and find that it makes Mail better. Check it out; even if you don't copy their setup exactly, it shows some of what's possible for organization and workflow.
I have rules on iCloud that sorts my incoming email into various folders. I'm on a number of mailing lists and it puts those emails into their respective folders. That keeps the inbox manageable.
If there are emails I want to maintain a record of I put them into a folder for later filing into my paperless filing system. Sometimes I move them there directly but if I'm reading mail on my iPad, like now, I just save them to a folder.
I maintain about a dozen mailboxes in iCloud and many more on my MBP for archives.
If my inbox gets more than 20 read emails I know I need to do some filing.
If there are emails I want to maintain a record of I put them into a folder for later filing into my paperless filing system. Sometimes I move them there directly but if I'm reading mail on my iPad, like now, I just save them to a folder.
I maintain about a dozen mailboxes in iCloud and many more on my MBP for archives.
If my inbox gets more than 20 read emails I know I need to do some filing.