Having trouble getting rid of Gmail Archive and Apple Mail Archive

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Level 2

173 points

Having trouble getting rid of Gmail Archive and Apple Mail Archive

My IMAP mail from google is read via Apple Mail, and it is filling my hard drive (over 100Gb). Most all of it is in the "Archive", which both Apple and Google seem to really really want to keep. If I delete the messages in the Archive at Gmail, they seem to all reappear, and if i delete them from Apple Mail, all **** breaks loose - Mail went from using 63GB of space to 215GB of space.

I don't want any archive!!!!! When I get messages in the inbox, I file them in separate folders according to content, or I delete them. (Of course, "delete" is a joke, it seems that they first got archived). I tried changing the setting so that messages are moved to Trash, and I empty Trash, but then I see "downloading message 10 of 41,658 messages" pop up at the bottom, and mail is full again.

MacBook Air 13", macOS 10.14

Posted on May 6, 2019 2:28 PM

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Answer 1

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BDAqua

Level 10

240,875 points

May 6, 2019 2:43 PM in response to pss

Yes, on gMail there really is no Deleting, but deleting & emptying trash should stop it from showing.

gMail ,doesn't really have folders, just tags, everything is in All Mail, if you move any emails to a "folder other than is listed online...

For instance say a box On My Mac, it gets flagged as Archived by gMail.

Check Mailbox Behaviors for the gMail account, make sure Trash isn't pointing to a Trash ON My Mac.

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Answer 2

Barney-15E

Level 10

113,590 points

May 6, 2019 4:16 PM in response to pss

Goolag likes to keep you messages so that it can harvest your personal information.

Mail maps the "All Mail" label in Gmail to the Archive folder.

You can turn off showing the "All Mail" label in Gmail's Settings > Labels. Uncheck the box to show it in IMAP clients.

Gmail doesn't use folders. It "Labels" messages with multiple labels. When an email enters your account, it is tagged with both "Inbox" and "All Mail." When you delete the message from the Inbox, all Mail can do is send a message to delete the "Inbox" label. The "All Mail" label remains.

There is also a setting in the Forwarding and POP/IMAP section that allows you to actually delete messages that you delete, not keep a copy for posterity (and data harvesting).

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Having trouble getting rid of Gmail Archive and Apple Mail Archive

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