MacOS – Mail.app in OS X — IMAP and Archive Mailbox subfolder creation

archiveemailimapmacosmail.app

I am using Mail.app with an IMAP .com email address:

For some reason, at 10.9, Mail changed and now the special "Archive" Mailbox doesn't allow for new subfolders to be added within the "Archive".

It isn't possible to add subfolders via a menu or to drag existing folders into the Archive.

Best Answer

The only workaround I have found to add subfolders to the Archive mailbox is to add a new Mailbox (in Sidebar for the IMAP Account, Right click / New Mailbox…) Choose the account and for the name box enter:

Archive/"Name of the New Folder" (without quotes, remember the slash!)

This will create a new subfolder within Archive. :)

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Anyone know any other way?

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How to back up a complete IMAP account

You can do it with offlineimap. I'm using it for my GMail and Fastmail accounts.

Install Homebrew (you must also install Xcode). With Homebrew, brew install offline-imap.

Create ~/.offlineimaprc config file:

[general]
ui = ttyui
accounts = fastmail
maxsyncaccounts = 4
socktimeout = 60

[Account fastmail]
localrepository = fastmail-local
remoterepository = fastmail-remote

[Repository fastmail-local]
type = Maildir
localfolders = ~/Mail/Fastmail

[Repository fastmail-remote]
type = IMAP
remotehost = mail.messagingengine.com
remoteuser = username
remotepass = password

expunge = no
folderfilter = lambda foldername: foldername not in ['INBOX.Trash']

A big advantage of offlineimap is that it creates the folders you have on your IMAP server.

I'm reading my backup with mutt.

What’s your strategy for archiving emails in Mail.app? Do you archive your Sent & Trashed emails too

I use Mail app's "smart mailboxes" instead of copying and moving the actual messages in Mail. For example, to archive July 2011:

create a new smart mailbox,
name it "Mail Archive July 2011" or whatever,
set the find criteria to "Date Received is in the date range 1 Jul 2011 to 31 Jul 2011",
you will probably want to check the "Include messages from Sent"
Hit okay and in a moment you have a folder contain all of July's email
Right-click the smart mailbox and choose the "Archive" option and save.

After this you have the option of keeping the smart folder or deleting it. Spotlight (in OS 10.6.8) searches the .mbox archives Mail produces, so your archive remains searchable.

Best Answer

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How to back up a complete IMAP account

What’s your strategy for archiving emails in Mail.app? Do you archive your Sent & Trashed emails too

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