ARCHIVING MESSAGES USING APPLE MAIL

This document explains how to use archiving to save older messages in an archive on your hard drive. (Messages will only be available on your computer, not from another location.)

Contents
ITS Policy on Message Deletion and Archiving
Setting Up An Archive Folder
Manually Archiving Messages
Setting Up Automatic Archiving

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ITS Policy on Message Deletion and Archiving

ITS no longer automatically deletes any GroupWise messages other than those in your Trash folder, which are automatically deleted after 14 days. This means that users are now responsible for routinely deleting all messages (including Sent Items) they no longer need, to avoid overloading the storage capacity of our GroupWise servers with old messages.

If you want to keep older messages, then you must archive them to your hard drive.  You can archive messages manually or automatically using a rule in Apple Mail. Full instructions are included in the sections below.

Note that once you setup archiving on Apple Mail, you will only be able to access archived messages from within Apple Mail on your computer (not from another computer or another application).


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Setting Up An Archive Folder

Before you can archive messages in Apple Mail, you will need to create a folder on your hard drive to store the messages and attachments. Once you have created the Archive folder, you can also create sub-folders.

1. From the Mailbox menu, select New Mailbox...
   
   
2. In the New Mailbox window, select On My Mac from the Location drop-down menu and type Archive into the Name field. Click OK.
   
   
   
   
3. Creating an Archive folder may change the look of your Inbox. Do not be alarmed. Your folders have not been deleted, they can now be accessed if you expand the GroupWise Mailbox.
   
   

   before Archive setup	after Archive setup

   
   
4. Optional: To create Archive sub-folders, select the Archive folder by clicking on it and choose New Mailbox from the Mailbox menu.
   
   In the New Mailbox window, select On My Mac from the Location drop-down and give your subfolder a name. Click OK. (Note that the text below New Mailbox says that the new mailbox will be created as a child of the local mailbox "Archive.").
   
   

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Manually Archiving Messages

To archive one message, select the message and drag it into the archive folder.

To archive more than one message at a time, select the messages then drag them into the archive folder. To select a range of consecutive messages, click on the first message and while holding down the Shift key, click on the last message. To select more than one message (not consecutively), hold down the Command key (Apple key) and click.

The message or messages will be moved to the Archive folder. There is no longer a copy on the server (although you can move messages back into your Inbox by dragging them from the Archive to the Inbox).

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Setting Up Automatic Archiving

To setup automatic archiving based on how old a message is, you can create a rule in Apple Mail.

1. Open Preferences from the Mail menu. Click on the Rules icon in the upper-right-hand corner of the window.
   
   
   
   
2. Click Add Rule.
   
   
3. In the Description field, type Auto-Archive.
   
   
4. From the first conditions drop-down menu, choose Date Received.
   
   
5. From the second drop-down menu, choose Is Greater Than.
   
   
6. Type 180 into the text box.
   
   
7. Click on the plus sign next to the first condition.
   
   
8. From the first conditions drop-down menu, choose Date Sent.
   
   
9. From the second drop-down menu, choose Is Greater Than.
   
   
10. Type 180 into the text box.
    
    
11. Under Perform the following actions, choose Move Message and select your Archive from the mailbox dropdown under On My Mac.
    
    
    
    
12. Click OK.
    
    
13. A pop-up will ask you: Do you want to apply your rules to messages in open mailboxes? Click Yes.
    
    
14. Close the Preferences window.

The rule above will move all messages (sent or received) into the Archive folder if they are more than 180 days old. You can adjust this rule to move your messages into a subfolder of the Archive folder or to move the messages sooner. You also have the option to create more than one rule, one for your sent messages and one for your received messsages. Use the rule above as a guide.


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