On 14 Jun 2018, at 16:25 (-0400), Peter Borsella wrote:
Hello, All,
I currently have hundreds of IMAP folders. Now that I have MailMate
I’m wondering, is it better to create IMAP folders, or, better to
create smart mailboxes every time I need a new collection of emails?
It depends... on so many different variables that it isn't possible to
give a simple answer.
Do you use multiple devices? Are more than one of them Macs running MM?
Are you using an older Mac with limited memory and/or traditional
'spinning rust' storage? How well does your IMAP server handle giant
mailboxes? Do you have any sort of server-side facility for delivering
mail to mailboxes other than INBOX (i.e. Sieve or procmail?)
The downside of using only Smart Mailboxes is that it means the physical
storage of messages on both the server and your Mac (in MM's mirror of
the account's mailbox tree) is in one big bucket. On a server that may
or may not be efficient. On the Mac it is not, because that bucket is a
directory full of many files (one per message) and MacOS is not good at
dealing with such directories. It's not so terrible if your home
directory is on APFS, but for most people that's not the case. This may
be a non-issue on a modern Mac with ample RAM and SSD storage using
APFS, but even then you are left with a single bucket of mail
server-side, which may be inefficient on the server (where it may be
another file-per-message store on a 90's filesystem) and may not work
well with other clients on other devices.
I personally use a hybrid model, but that's because I have 2 Macs and a
phone accessing my primary mail account, which resides on a server I own
and manage and which has been evolved organically for 20+ years.
--
Bill Cole
[email protected] or [email protected]
(AKA @grumpybozo and many *@billmail.scconsult.com addresses)
Currently Seeking Steadier Work: https://linkedin.com/in/billcole
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