I have read that it is possible that only a few mailing clients are able to sort by sender, subject line or date and then with ease bulk select those results and do a batch delete.
I will be speaking with a group about managing multiple mailboxes using a single client to centralize them all and also to maintain them to manageable levels. I plan to include ideas which meet the criteria above - which some of them have specially requested
What solutions come to mind?
Thank you. Neil
Postbox is your friend. It’s paid ($30 lifetime), but absolutely stellar and packed, packed with features. What you’re looking for is in the Focus Pane. Lots of predefined filters and you can roll your own rather easily.
Apple mail out the box does just fine. What’s critical for me are a robust set of sorting rules and Spam Sieve. I have 25 separate email accounts for various purposes and generally run to about 300 messages a day between them. I use all POP mail except where it’s not allowed. POP forces me to be deliberate in managing email so I never get sucked into the email trap as I have to be at the one machine where all my mail is located. My rules sort the messages sufficiently. Most get sorted into the ads and news inbox where I can mass delete them by sender if not needed.I have a single reference folder that I periodically clear out as an mbox file by year for archival purposes. But I try to keep about 3-5 years of messages available at the same time.
Depending on your email provider you might find that webmail may offer the most options for bulk management of email.
In addition to: To, From, Subject, and Date some providers can search by the words present or missing from the body of an email and/or the presence and type of an attachment, as well as other factors.
I use Apple mail rules to sort my incoming mail so it’s easier to handle. I don’t use email as a filing system. I only keep messages for short periods for projects or events underway. For long term record keeping I save them as a PDF and save in my filing system. Much easier to backup and recover.