Mail not sorting folders alphabetically

Question

Level 1

23 points

Mail not sorting folders alphabetically

I have just imported thousands of folders, I needed them sorted Alphabetically to find the duplicates etc.

I looked at the old thread Mail Not Sorting new Folders Added Alphbetically and it makes sense, but as I have painfully lost a lot of email in the past due to disabling or deleting an account I want to make sure I am not going to make another mistake.

My accounts were POP and IMAP and all the folders are stored "On My Mac" so if I disable and close then reopen and enable, as per instructions in the thread will I lose my email?

Please dont guess as I have NO backup of all this mail including software registrations etc.

Thanks :-)

macOS Sierra (10.12.4)

Posted on Apr 8, 2017 9:23 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Megabite47 Author

Level 1

23 points

Apr 12, 2017 3:34 AM in response to tygb

I am glad yours does that, sadly mine however does not. I saw an old post suggesting I create a mailbox and dump all the folders into it and they would automatically sort alphabetically and thats what I tried sadly it did not work. I finally decided to do it manually and created a mailbox for each letter of the alphabet and breaking them up like this has made the task at least into manageable chunks, but while I have been doing this I have been muttering about how ridiculous it is that this not a feature or even automatic! So if anyone reads this thread later in hopes of a solution all I can say is LOTS of coffee.

Reply

Answer 2

Megabite47 Author

Level 1

23 points

Apr 10, 2017 8:41 PM in response to Eric Root

Hi Eric,

Thanks for the reply, I decided to do a time machine back up before attempting it, which I did. I disabled my gmail account closed the app then opened and re-enabled. Good news is I didnt lose anything, bad news is that it didnt reorder the 'on my mac' folders. Any ideas on how to reorder these as I suspect once they are 'on my mac' they are no longer fully associated with the gmail account. I only disabled the gmail account I have 4 email addresses and two are POP so I was wary of disabling them but the folders I am trying to sort did originate from the gmail address. I appear to have exagerated the number of folders there are only 852 but thats more than enough to take forever to sort. Thanks for any help.

Reply

Answer 3

Barney-15E

Level 10

122,324 points

Apr 11, 2017 5:43 AM in response to Megabite47

Once they are "On My Mac" they have no association with Gmail (or any other account) at all. On My Mac is local mailbox that knows nothing of the origin of the messages it holds.

I would imagine the only way to have them sort would be to delete the Envelop Index files, but I'm not sure that would cause them to be loaded in alphabetical order. It may just be that the email servers send them to Mail in alpha order, so they get loaded in alpha order. The local mailboxes may or may not get loaded in alpha order.

Reply

Answer 4

Megabite47 Author

Level 1

23 points

Apr 11, 2017 5:45 AM in response to Barney-15E

I have been searching the communities and have another idea to try... if I find a solution I will post what worked ... this potential solution has been running for about 8 hours I am beginning to think manually may have been easier LOL

Reply

Answer 5

tygb

Level 9

65,010 points

Apr 11, 2017 7:21 AM in response to Megabite47

By creating new mail box and giving different names , the mail box will automatically set up alphabetically in On my Mac .You don't have to do it manually .

Reply

Answer 6

Eric Root

Level 10

685,257 points

Apr 9, 2017 8:18 AM in response to Megabite47

I just tested it and you shouldn't lose anything, but since you have no backup, you have no way of covering an oops.

Reply