Keeping only the last ## messages on your computer.

Question

I would like to free up some space on my HDD and since I rarely ever use mail.app to find old messages I would like to keep only the last 50 messages on my computer sort of like the iphone handles my mail and leave everything else on the server. I use IMAP so deleting everything but the newest 50 will delete everything on the server too.

Answer 1

Hiya,
1) on mac mail (mobile me) you can do that, by opening mail, choosing "preferences" from the finder/mail menu, then click on your mobile me account and choose "advanced" (third tab). there is a drop down menu "keep copies of messages for offline viewing"
And in "mailbox beahviours" (the second tab) at the there is a bottom tick box "store deleted messages on the server" which you can tick (it will, obviously, fill up your quota).
2) With regular mail, such as virgin/blueyonder/etc or other pop3 accounts, the above features are not available, but in the "advanced" tab, there is a tickbox, which reads: "remove copy from server after retrieving the message";
if ticked, just UNtick and you can delete the messages safely from your computer (as your internet/ mail provider will still have them on their email platform). Note, that, again, your quota may state "full", so you need to, periodically, manually sign into your webmail to remove the superfluous messages.
3) I do not think that there is a way to automate this, since the remote email platform is not part of your own machine/network, so it appears, it boils down to good old-fashioned housekeeping. Also, an automated services would delete messages regardless. Hope this helps