Automatically mark messages as read in Trash

I have found out a suitable answer to my own question. Here is what works for me.

1. Make a script to mark all items in trash as read

- Open Script Editor

- Copy next text in the editor

on run {}

tell application "Mail"

set read status of every message of mailbox "Deleted Items" of account "MyAccount" to true

end tell

end run

- Change "Deleted Items" into the name of your trash folder (keep the quotes). If you don't know the exact name, check below under PS1.

- Change "MyAccount" into the name of your account (keep the quotes). If you don't know the exact name, check below under PS2.

- Test by making sure that you have at least one unread mail in Trash, press run in Script Editor and verify that all mails in Trash are now marked read

- Save the file as a script file (extension scpt) in a location where it does not bother you.

2. Make a launch daemon to schedule the execution of the script

- Open Text Editor

- Copy next text in the editor

<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">

<plist version="1.0">

<dict>

<key>Label</key>

<string>com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread</string>

<key>ProgramArguments</key>

<array>

<string>osascWooooWript</string>

<string>/Users/username/MarkDeletedItemsAsRead.scpt</string>

</array>

<key>StartInterval</key>

<integer>180</integer>

</dict>

</plist>

- Delete WooooW from the above text (I had to include it to be able to post this here).

- Change the label value (which is currently com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread). If you own a website, it is a good idea to refer to your domain (instead of apple.com).

- Change the script location to where you have saved the script (which is currently /Users/usrename/MarkDeletedItemsAsRead.scpt)

- Change the interval if desired (it is now set to 180 seconds, which is 3 minutes)

- Save the file to a temporary location. Use the label as name (not sure if this is required, but I guess it is a good practice) and plist as extension (in my case the file name will be: com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread.plist ).

3. Activate the launch deamon

- Open Terminal

- Copy the plist file to /Library/LaunchDaemons, for example:

sudo cp /Users/username/com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread.plist /Library/LaunchDaemons/

- Change the permission properties of the file as follows (makes it a file owned by your admin user that cannot be changed by other users):

sudo chown root:wheel /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread.plist

sudo chmod o-w /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread.plist

- Launch the deamon (see PS3 to find out how to test if it works):

sudo launchctl load /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread.plist

- Optional: Delete the original plist file if it works (I advise to keep it for a while though for testing, see PS3 below)

- Do not delete the plist file in /Library/LaunchDaemons

- Do not delete the scpt file

Good luck!

Jan Claes

PS1 If you don't know the exact name of your trash folder:

- comment the set-intstruction in your script (by preceding the line with two dashes)

- select an email in your trash (in the Mail app)

- put the command "selection" (without quotes) within the tell-block

- press run

- the name is after mailbox

- your script will look like this

on run {}

tell application "Mail"

--set read status of every message of mailbox "Deleted Items" of account "MyAccount" to true

selection

end tell

end run

- and the output will look like this

{messageid 45452 of mailbox "Trash" of accountid "E7533424-41C1-4AC2-66D6-344C0DB8C2AC" of application "Mail"}

PS2 If you don't know your account name:

- go to Mail

- go to settings (Cmd-,)

- go to Accounts

- check name in overview on the left

PS3 How to test your daemon:

- mark at least one file in Trash as unread

- change the time interval in the original plist file (in my case in /Users/username/MarkDeletedItemsAsRead.scpt) to 10 seconds (instead of 180)

- unload the daemon

sudo launchctl unload /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread.plist

- replace the plist file with the altered one and reset the permissions

sudo cp /Users/username/com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread.plist /Library/LaunchDaemons/

sudo chown root:wheel /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread.plist

sudo chmod o-w /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread.plist

- load the daemon

sudo launchctl load /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.markdeleteditemsasread.plist

- wait for ten seconds

- verify that the mail is marked read

- don't forget to repeat these steps to set the timer again to 180 seconds!

Thanks John.

Actually I was referring to automatically mark all mails in the Trash folder as read (to get rid of the annoying bubble displaying the number of unread messages). I posted the question simply to be able to post the answer here for others to discover, but I got delayed because my reply was blocked (see note about deleting WoooW in my answer) ;-)