I do agree with this in principle, but it can't really be solved with just mail clients. If this would happen on for example, desktop mail client, the rules would only run when it's running. So if...
I do agree with this in principle, but it can't really be solved with just mail clients.
If this would happen on for example, desktop mail client, the rules would only run when it's running. So if I'm reading my mail on mobile, the rules might not have triggered yet.
So it needs to happen on the server, and there needs to be a server<->client standard for setting the rules, which I don't think exist, or at least not it's not widespread. Outlook and Gmail have their own systems, but you can't configure them from custom clients as far as I know. Can somebody correct me here?
This one thing where Apple’s email clients work really well. I have rules that I can configure on the macOS version of the client, and then, on all my iOS/iPadOS/macOS devices where I am logged in...
This one thing where Apple’s email clients work really well. I have rules that I can configure on the macOS version of the client, and then, on all my iOS/iPadOS/macOS devices where I am logged in with my iCloud account and have my mail accounts configured, the rules are synced across devices (via iCloud) and run locally. I suppose you could accomplish something similar if you could find another email client that runs local rules and would allow you to sync those rules via some other cloud syncing service like Dropbox or let clients fetch the rules from an API.
I use Apple’s Mail.app client on macOS and it has had rule-based filters like this since forever. (And if you use the Mail app on iOS, all your rules come with you, even if you can’t configure...
I use Apple’s Mail.app client on macOS and it has had rule-based filters like this since forever. (And if you use the Mail app on iOS, all your rules come with you, even if you can’t configure them in the iOS app.) I use Mail.app’s rules mostly for colorizing emails/threads for my different accounts so I can see them at a glance in my unified inbox, or for sorting things into folders (JIRA updates, GitHub notifications, etc.), but rules are not as zero-friction to create as this post envisions they should be. The real issue with creating good rules is that humans are prone to believe that some things are simple until they sit down and try to formalize the supposedly simple thing. Sometimes what you think is simple turns out to be trivial. Oftentimes it’s not actually so simple. And Apple’s mail clients do offer a nice ‘unsubscribe me from this list’ option right at the top of messages (though it seems they are using some content/metadata detection to decide which messages to present this option on).
Overall, I agree that email clients should do at least as much as Apple’s email clients to give users automated control over incoming email. I have tried a few times to move to other clients only to miss Mail.app’s rules.
I do agree with this in principle, but it can't really be solved with just mail clients.
If this would happen on for example, desktop mail client, the rules would only run when it's running. So if I'm reading my mail on mobile, the rules might not have triggered yet.
So it needs to happen on the server, and there needs to be a server<->client standard for setting the rules, which I don't think exist, or at least not it's not widespread. Outlook and Gmail have their own systems, but you can't configure them from custom clients as far as I know. Can somebody correct me here?
This one thing where Apple’s email clients work really well. I have rules that I can configure on the macOS version of the client, and then, on all my iOS/iPadOS/macOS devices where I am logged in with my iCloud account and have my mail accounts configured, the rules are synced across devices (via iCloud) and run locally. I suppose you could accomplish something similar if you could find another email client that runs local rules and would allow you to sync those rules via some other cloud syncing service like Dropbox or let clients fetch the rules from an API.
I tend to read email via an ssh screen session of mutt, running on the same server as the MTA (postfix).
I use Apple’s Mail.app client on macOS and it has had rule-based filters like this since forever. (And if you use the Mail app on iOS, all your rules come with you, even if you can’t configure them in the iOS app.) I use Mail.app’s rules mostly for colorizing emails/threads for my different accounts so I can see them at a glance in my unified inbox, or for sorting things into folders (JIRA updates, GitHub notifications, etc.), but rules are not as zero-friction to create as this post envisions they should be. The real issue with creating good rules is that humans are prone to believe that some things are simple until they sit down and try to formalize the supposedly simple thing. Sometimes what you think is simple turns out to be trivial. Oftentimes it’s not actually so simple. And Apple’s mail clients do offer a nice ‘unsubscribe me from this list’ option right at the top of messages (though it seems they are using some content/metadata detection to decide which messages to present this option on).
Overall, I agree that email clients should do at least as much as Apple’s email clients to give users automated control over incoming email. I have tried a few times to move to other clients only to miss Mail.app’s rules.