Message Folders
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Message Folders

Message Folders are used to organize your email messages. By default, if you have no existing message folders, messages are stored in the folder $KDEHOME/share/apps/kmail/. If you have existing message folders in ~/Mail, these will be used instead. When you first start KMail the inbox, outbox, sent-mail, trash and drafts folders are created. These folders each have special functions:

inbox:

Where KMail by default puts your new messages when you ask it to check your mail.

outbox:

Where messages are put while they are waiting to be delivered. Note that you should not drag and drop messages here to send them, use the Send icon in the composer window instead.

sent-mail:

By default copies of all messages that you have sent are put into this folder.

trash:

By default all messages that you have moved to trash are moved into this folder.

drafts:

Contains messages you started to edit but then saved to this folder instead of sending them.

You may find that the standard folders are fine for your needs; eventually, though, you will probably need folders to help you organize your messages. To create a new folder, select Folder->New Folder...: the folder properties dialog will then prompt you for the necessary information. If you ever need to change the settings for a folder, select the folder you wish to modify in the Folders pane and select Folder->Properties.

To move messages from one folder into another, select the message(s) you want to move and press the M key or select Message->Move To. A list of folders will appear; select the folder from the list that you want to move the messages to. Messages can also be moved by dragging them from the Message list to a folder in the Folder list.

If you want to clear all of the messages out of a folder choose Folder->Move All Messages to Trash. You can use Folder->Delete Folder to remove a folder and all its messages and subfolders.

Folders can be copied or moved by using either drag and drop or the Copy Folder and Move Folder context menu entries. Note that you cannot move the above listed special folders.

Folder Properties

The folder's Properties dialog lets you rename and move a folder and specify all of its properties. Note that most properties are only available for your own folders and not for default folder like inbox etc.. Default folders also cannot be moved or renamed.

General

Rename a folder by changing the entry in the Name: field.

You can make a folder a subfolder of another folder by choosing a new parent folder using the Belongs to selection.

The Folder Icons section lets you choose icons that are different from the default ones in the folder list.

See the Folder Format section for information about the Mailbox format.

With the Identity section you can set the default identity that should be used for new messages if this folder is selected. Replies to messages that were sent directly to you will still default to the message's “To” address if an according identity is found.

With Show Sender/Receiver you can set the visible columns in the header pane. This is useful if you use a folder to save your own sent messages.

Check Ignore new mail in this folder if you do not want to be informed about new mail that arrives in this folder. This is for example useful for the folder where you move all detected spam messages to.

Check Keep replies in this folder if you want replies to messages in this folder to be filed also into this folder rather than into a special sent-mail folder.

For calendar folders you can select who should get reminders for the contained events by using the Generate free/busy and activate alarms for choice box.

In case you don't want to receive reminders for folders shared by someone else, you can block them locally by activating the Block alarms locally checkbox.

Old Message Expiry

Here you can select what should happen with old messages in this folder. If you enable Expire old messages in this folder then KMail will regularly, depending on your choice, either delete old messages or move old messages to another folder. You can also start expiration of old messages manually via Folder->Expire and via File->Expire All Folders

Warning

Messages that are deleted during expiration of old messages cannot be restored, so be careful with this setting.

Mailing List

If you are going to use the folder for a mailing list then you should check Folder holds a mailing list to associate this folder with the mailing list. Next you should click on Detect Automatically. KMail will then try to guess some information about the mailing list from the currently selected message. If KMail could not determine some addresses then you can add the missing information manually. To do this first select the Address type for which you want to add an address. You can choose between:

Post to List

This address is used for sending messages to the mailing list. This is usually an email address.

Subscribe to List

This address is used for subscribing to the mailing list. This can be an email address or the address of a webpage.

Unsubscribe from List

This address is used for unsubscribing from the mailing list. This can be an email address or the address of a webpage.

List Archives

This is the address of the archive of the mailing list. This is usually the address of a webpage.

List Help

This address is used for requesting help for this mailing list. This is usually an email address.

After selecting the appropriate Address type you enter the email address or the address of the webpage and then click on Add. With Remove you can remove addresses.

If all addresses have been added then you can execute an action, e.g. go to the list archives, by selecting the appropriate Address type and then clicking on Invoke Handler. If there is an email address and an address of a webpage for the desired action then you will have to select the Preferred handler prior to clicking on Invoke Handler. Select KMail; if you want to send a message to the email address and select Browser if you want to go to the webpage.

Alternatively to invoking the handler for Post to List you can send a new message to the mailing list via Message->New Message to Mailing-List... or by clicking with the middle mousebutton on the folder in the folder list.

Access Control tab (IMAP only)

Here you can manage the access control lists (ACLs) of IMAP folders.

The currently active ACL is shown in the list. It consists of pairs of User Ids and the Permissions granted to users identified by that User Id. [1] ACLs are settable per-folder.

Note

As with everything else when using disconnected IMAP, you need to sync with the server for the changes to be transferred to the server.

IMAP ACLs define a lot of fine-grained permissions that you can grant or deny other users. For the sake of clarity, KMail will present them as the following five categories that you can choose from (see Table 3.1, “ ACL Rights Summary ” for the details if you already know IMAP ACLs).

None

Grants the users identified by User Id no rights at all. This is also the default for users not explicitly (or implicitly, as a group) listed in the ACL. These users will not see this folder in the list of IMAP folders presented to them by their mail clients.

Read

Grants the users identified by User Id reading rights for this folder. This also includes the ability for their mail clients to mark mails as read and store this information on the server.[2]

These users will see this folder in the list of IMAP folders presented to them by their mail clients.

Use this to create a shared folder that others can read, but not modify.

If you were the editor of a company's news letter, you could create a folder for the purpose of distributing the news letter, grant everyone reading rights, and save the letter to this folder instead of sending it out by email to a catch-all address.

Append

(also known as Post)

Grants the users identified by User Id reading (see above) and posting rights for this folder.

Use this to create a shared folder that others can read and post messages to, but can not otherwise modify.

If you wanted to create a company-wide discussion forum, instead of using a web-based form or a separate company-private usenet server, you could create a bunch of folders (one per topic), and grant everyone reading and posting rights. Instead of posting to an NNTP server or writing their messages into a web form, people would just write emails and store them in the folder suiting the topic of the message.

Write

Grants the users identified by User Id reading, posting (see above), and writing rights for this folder.

The right to write to a folder includes deleting of messages, creating subfolders, and storing other attributes than read/unread on the server (e.g. answered).

Use this to create a shared folder that everyone has (almost, see All ) the same rights for.

In the Append example, you could assign write rights to a group of people acting as moderators, which would then be able to remove off-topic posts, and create sub-topic-folders for high-traffic folders.

All

Grants the users identified by User Id reading, posting, writing (see above), as well as administration rights, i.e. the right to modify the ACL of this folder.

This is the default set of rights for the owner of a folder.

Table 3.1, “ ACL Rights Summary ” summarizes the IMAP ACL rights associated with each permission level.

Table 3.1.  ACL Rights Summary

ACL right None Read Append Write All
Lookup xxxx
Read xxxx
Store Seen xxxx
Insert  xxx
Post  xxx
Write Flags   xx
Create   xx
Delete   xx
Administer    x

Folder Format

A message folder can be either in mbox or in maildir format. mbox saves all messages of a folder to one file, whereas maildir saves each message to its own file. maildir, which is the default format, can be considered more robust, but it can be slower on some file systems. If you are unsure, choose maildir.

Note that there is currently no feature in KMail that allows you to convert between both formats automatically, but you can just move all messages from an old mbox folder to a new maildir folder or vice-versa.



[1] Note that a single User Id might refer to more than one user. Depending on the IMAP server and its configuration, there may be User Ids that correspond to groups of users, anonymous users, or any user. Consult the manual of your specific IMAP server implementation for more information.

[2] Every user has its own list of read mail, so none of your unread mails will suddenly be marked as read just because someone else has already read them.

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