Tips for Mail

Apple's Mail + MailTags, Act-On is a wonderful solution for mail. Here is my usage.

1. Stop Folders. People is used to put emails into different mailboxes. This is a traditional way for organization. Gmail changes the way. Use one folder for all emails (and never delete emails) and SEARCH to organize your emails. To maintain a clear inbox, you Archive mails to All Mail box.

2. Stop Archive. You can also Archive in the Apple's Mail. With Act-On, you can use keyboard shortcut. Looks like a good solution. But wait a second. You will move every email into another mailbox. One hit for one email. Not a big deal. But why not treat your inbox as Archive?

Here is my solution. I will create a smart box , Current Message, using rule: Date Received in 2 days. (You can configure rules to exclude certain emails (junk, newsletter).) My default mailbox will be this one. I read new message in this mail box only.

3. Cost + Priority. For the explanation, it is better to draw a coordinate with cost as x-axis and priority as y-axis (Picture is coming soon) . Several critical values of cost is: 5 minutes, 1 hour, days. For Priority: Urgent, High, Mid, Low. I will sort my emails as the following class:

1. P=Urgent, C <= 10 min
2. P>=High, 10 min < = C < = hours OR P <= Mid, C < = 10 min
3. P <= Low, C < = 10 min OR P >= Mid, 10 min < = C < = hours
4. Others.

For class 1, when I read this email, I will deal with it immediately. If you even don't have 10 minutes, treat as class 2.

For class 2, C-q set the due date is in 2 days. Create a smart box To Do in 2 days with rule: MailTags Due Date --- is within --- 3 days from today.

For class 3, C-a set the due date is in 5 days. Create a smart box To Do in a Week with rule: MailTags Due Date --- is within --- 7 days from today +
MailTags Due Date --- is after --- 3 days from today.

For class 4, C-z set the due date is in 10 days. Create a smart box To Do Later with rule: MailTags Due Date --- is after --- 7 days from today.

Everyday you only need to work on the emails in the mail box To Do in 2 days. After you are done with the selected email, C-x to set the due date is off. Then it won't be in this smart box. Mails in other boxes will be moved to this box automatically (thanks to smart box). If you cannot finish it, you can use C-q, a , or z to reset it. If the box To Do in 2 days is already empty, you can start to look at To Do in a Week.

* All the shorcut C-q,a,z, x etc are set by Act-On