[DM-MUG] Mail Archiving

[Darcy Baston]

I've just tried a bunch of things with Mail and discovered this:

1-If you make a folder in Mail, you can right click on it and choose  
'archive', which creates an archive that seems to only be accessible  
when you re-import it into Mail.

2-If you make a folder on your desktop, you can drag and drop single  
email messages which will be saved in a document format that Mail can  
open like regular files. Opening a message opens the message in a  
window as if you clicked twice on a message in Mail. I tried dragging  
and dropping a group of messages but Mail won't create multiple  
documents. It doesn't complete the drag and drop at all when multiple  
items are selected.

3-If you're using IMAP, navigate to ~/Library/Mail/accountname/ and  
make a backup of "mailboxname.imapmbox" which is a folder containing a  
subfolder called "messages" which contains individual email messages  
that can be opened singly.

Normally I do step #3. I make a mailbox/folder within Mail, give it a  
name that suggests it's a backup, make a Stuffit archive of  
the .imapmbox file in ~/Library/Mail/accountname, copy it to an  
archival drive, then delete the backup folder within Mail.

Darcy


On Feb 28, 2008, at 4:51 PM, Stuart Thiessen wrote:

> What do people recommend for mail archiving that can be viewed  
> easily? Admittedly, I am an email packrat, but I have also had  
> people say, "Do you still have the email for ...?" Often, I do. I  
> have noticed that Mail gets more and more sluggish with the number  
> of emails I have. So pruning obviously unneeded emails is one  
> obvious thing, but I would also like (for example) in January to be  
> able to archive all 2007 emails and pull them out of the Mail  
> application but still be able to read them (and any relevant  
> attachments) if someone asks about something that happened in 2007.
>
> What are my choices?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Stuart Thiessen
> _______________________________________________
> DMMUG mailing list
> Use this Address to send mail to the list:
> DMMUG at dmmug.org
> Use this page to modify subscription options:
> http://cialug.org/mailman/listinfo/dmmug