Mac Mail: How to prevent emails from saving to computer?

[sgrrsh26]

Can't I just access the emails from the server instead of having them all saved into my library>>email folder? What a disaster..

 

[miles01110]

What kind of e-mail account do you have?

 

[sgrrsh26]

Gmail, work, yahoo...
as soon as it retrieves new mail it downloads them to my computer

 

[miles01110]

Gmail, work, yahoo...
as soon as it retrieves new mail it downloads them to my computer

Ok, that doesn't answer my question. Is it POP or IMAP?

 

[sgrrsh26]

Pop

 

[miles01110]

POP works by holding e-mails on the server until you want to read them, at which time the message is downloaded to your machine. This behavior is identical regardless of mail client, because it is determined by the protocol.

If you want different behavior, you need to either switch your existing accounts to IMAP accounts or get new IMAP-enabled accounts. GMail and your work e-mail will probably let you switch. With Yahoo you're stuck with POP unless you pay for their premium e-mail service.

 

[sgrrsh26]

what are these .emlx files? they all correspond to emails which have been retrieved by the client, all saved into the mail folder.. that means they were saved to my computer no?

 

[miles01110]

what are these .emlx files? they all correspond to emails which have been retrieved by the client, all saved into the mail folder.. that means they were saved to my computer no?

Correct. They are retrieved (downloaded) to your machine by the local client (Mail) because that's what the POP protocol tells it to do.

 

[sgrrsh26]

alright so its an issue with gmail's settings then.
thanks a lot