Or how to survive a constant deluge of email messages without going postal
A very common complaint from people who use email these days is that they
are annoyed/snowed under by the huge volumes of email that they receive
and they just want out. This may be handled in a number of ways, not least
of which is throwing your monitor through the nearest window and following
it out, then making a bee line for the nearest desert island. It might
be advantageous to your health, wealth and freedom to try a few simple
technology solutions before going totally postal.
The core problem isn't actually the volume of messages received,
its the fact that they are presented in a way that the human perception
finds difficult to deal with. Having said that, if the volumes are really
high, then ... where's the window.
The two complementary techniques presented by this page allow your machine
to split up and organise your messages into a format that your mind can
more easily deal with. Allowing you to spend more mental effort digesting
the mail and less on wading pointlessly around in a stream of data.
The two problems it tackles are "Context switching" and "Sequencing".
Context Switching
You have a bunch of sequential messages in front of you. Some are from
the departmental mailing list. Another set from a small group of people
discussing a technical problem that you are trying to follow, 1400 are
Spams advertising a new get rich quick pyramid scheme, and a clutch
are from a Sports and Social mailing list we will call "mmcc". They are
all jumbled together. Due to the vagaries of the mail system, they aren't
even necessarily in any particular order. You may have replies before the
mail they are replying to etc etc.
In order to deal with this mess, you have to either hold the context
for each of the conversations in your mind as you switch from one to the
next, or you must, in some way, read all the ones about the same thing
together. You must place them in groups by their context.
Sequencing
From this mess you separate out the mails about the technical problem.
This is quite easy. You can see them in date order and they all have the
same subject. So you resolve to click on them in date order and ignore
the other mails in your intray for now. SOme of the group are in Chicago,
some in Swindon and the rest in China. So you have answers being offered
and comments being made brfore the question is even asked! You have two
people going off chewing over the point at right angles to the rest of
the conversation. Even one context is becoming a strain.
What to do
If the above sounds familiar, welcome to the late 20th century. Some of
us receive 100s of messages a day, from mailing lists and from automated
notification systems. Properly handled, it isn't an issue. The two main
weapons against this problem are, "Mail Filters" and "Threading"
Mail Filters
What is a mail filter
A mail filter is a mechanism put in between the incoming mail stream and
your mailer's in box that can perform some action on the incoming mail.
In this case the function would be to divert the mail to a different folder.
How is this useful
While messages from a given mailing list are muddled in with messages direct
to you, or for other lists, it can be difficult to make any sense of them.
It also makes it more difficult to ignore them until one has more time
to sit back and read them in the appropriate frame of mind. It puts them
into their broader context, sorting them into individual mailing lists,
or machines or sources.
What mailer do I need
The standard mail platform "Netscape Messenger" which is a part of Netscape
4, supports filtering and I will describe how to set it up under this platform
below.
Other mail clients also support this feature and I will attempt to answer
questions via email.
How do I do it
I will use the example of separating out mail to a mailing list called
mmcc@ecid.cog.mot.com (Hi Folks). The original version of this page was
a mail to that list. Some of my friends on that list were complaining about
the volume of messages they were getting.
Create the mmcc folder
The first thing you need is a folder to put the mmcc messages into. To
create this, select the very topmost folder in the "Netscape Message Centre"
window, with a single left click. Right click the mouse to bring up the
popup menu, and select "New Folder". Enter the name "mmcc" in the "Name:"
text box and hit OK. This should create the mmcc folder as a peer of the
Inbox folder.
Create the filter
Now you can create a filter to send incoming mmcc mail into this new folder.
Once again on the "Netscape Message Centre" window, select Edit on the
menu bar. Then select Mail Filters. This will bring up the "Mail Filters"
dialogue box. Select New to create a new filter.
The default displayed will be:
Filter Name: "untitled"
(If the) "sender" (of the Message) "contains" " "
(then) "Move to folder" "Inbox"
Fill it in thus:
Filter Name: "mmcc"
(If the) "To or CC" (of the Message) "contains" "mmcc@ecid"
(then) "Move to folder" "mmcc"
Then hit OK on the "Filter Rules" dialogue and OK on the "Mail Filters"
dialogue. That's it, job done.
What will happen after I have done this
You will receive all other mail in the normal way. When you have an incoming
mail from mmcc, it arrives in exactly the same way as it previously would.
As before you press "Get Msg" or the mailbox icon, however you choose,
and the mail will be read up from the server. However if it is an mmcc
mail it will go straight to the mmcc mailbox. If you don't want to read
mmcc mails just now, just ignore them and go back to what you were doing.
When you are having a break or whatever, open the mmcc folder and there
they all are.
Threading
What is Threading
This is separate, but complementary to Filtering. The idea is that a list
of messages can be displayed in the hierarchy of their creation.
E.G.
First message (1)
|- Reply to 1 (2)
| |- Reply to 2 (3)
| |- Reply to 3 (4)
| |- Reply to 4 (5)
|- Another Reply to 1 (6)
|- Reply to 6 (7)
Why is Threading
Threaded messages are displayed not just in their context, but in their
proper sequence, making it even easier to make sense of them. It also makes
it much easier to ignore "Threads" of a single conversation that you have
no interest in. You can also focus in on not just the sequence the messages
were created in, but the parent message.
It may well be that messges 6 & 7 above arrived between 2 &
3 and 4 & 5 respectively. It may be that the two people involved in
the conversation 2->3->4->5 are in different time zones, so date ordering
is all messed up. This doesn't matter. An unshown header in each of the
messages (from mailers that support this feature) specify exactly which
message they are in reply to so the mail client can order them correctly.
How do I Thread Messages
Making this happen is even simpler ... one click.
There is a little icon tucked into the top left corner of the "<whatever>
- Netscape Folder" window that dictates the way in which it displays. By
default the folder list displays in date order and there will be a triangle
over the date column in the window. Go to the left
from the "Date" header to the far left. There will be a little button
with 4 horizontal parallel lines. If these line are all the same length
the window is not threaded. Click this icon. This should then thread the
window and the icon should change to different length lines. If you want
any other ordering, click on the column header for the order you want.
Has this helped?
If this has helped you not to jump off something or take up letter sorting
for a living, then please let me know. If there is something from within
this page that you don't understand, please mail me, you doubtless won't
be the only one.
Finally
Try and enjoy the fantastic ability to communicate that this technology
has given us. Once you have mastered the very few techniques demanded by
this new medium, it opens up a whole new set of opportunities for us all.
