In many applications, holding the Option key causes the
File > Close Window command to change to
Close All Windows, but for some reason Mail doesn't do it.
What does work in Mail is holding down the Option key while clicking the red close button at the top left of any window. Problem is... it will actually close
all windows... 🙂
Just type ⌘1 (Command-1) afterwards to open the Message Viewer window again. This is actually the command shortcut for selecting the Inbox mailbox (
Mailbox > Go To > In), but it also opens the Message Viewer window
if there are no message windows open -- yes, interestingly enough, ⌘1 doesn't work and beeps at you when the frontmost window is a message window, regardless of whether the Message Viewer window is open or not...
...and, yet more interesting, ⌘1 works again if you open Preferences in front of the message window that caused that command to beep before, but only if the Message Viewer is closed. On the other hand, if the Message Viewer is open, then typing ⌘1 does nothing when Preferences is the frontmost window, it does not even beep, although the menu title does blink as if Mail had actually executed the command (but it hasn't)...
...and don't worry if the last paragraph above just doesn't make sense to you, it can safely be ignored... 🙂
iMac G5 17" (iSight) Mac OS X (10.4.4)
