Smart Folders?

Hello.
I've signed up to this mailing list and it has so much email that I prefer to look at it separately apart from my normal emails. So I've set up a smart folder so that anything that is marked a certain subject (Which each mail from the mailing subscription has).
So it works. It works great. However, the thing is that Mail now has two copies of that email. One in the special folder and one in my inbox.
I'm pretty sure it's just a preferal in the options dialog but how do I make it so that only one copy remains? One copy in the smart folder instead of the Inbox itself?
Thanks!
Keehun Nam

A Smart mailbox is a "virtual" mailbox which contains a pointer to the original message in the originating mailbox only - not a copy of the message.
If you delete the original message from the originating mailbox for a message contained in a Smart mailbox, the message will no longer be available in the Smart mailbox. If you have multiple Smart mailboxes and depending on the Smart mailbox criteria for each, one or a number of messages can be available in all or several Smart mailboxes but Smart mailboxes do not contain a copy of the message.
What you need to do instead is create an actual Mailbox - at the menu bar go to Mailbox and select New Mailbox.
Create/utilize a Rule or rules in Mail to sort received messages by category from the account's Inbox mailbox to the designated "On My Mac" location mailbox.

Similar Messages

Disappearing Smart Folders in Mail

When I close Mail and then reopen later, I find that all my Smart Folders disappear including the Smart Mailboxes I have placed inside them. Is there someplace I can find them? Or is there a setting I need to make to prevent them from disappearing?

Found the solution on this thread

I have just recently bought a MacBook Air. I am looking for an email which I put into a folder on my Mac Pro. The smart folders have come across to the Air, but not the 'On my Mac' folders. Are they lost?

I have just recently bought a MacBook Air. I am looking for an email which I put into a folder on my Mac Pro. The smart folders have come across to the Air, but not the 'On my Mac' folders. Are they lost?

Are you sure that the "On My Mac" folders weren't empty? If all your mail accounts are IMAP, they may have been.

I lost the capability of using Outlook 2011 Smart Folders after my Mountain Lion 10.8.2 install

After my OS 10.8.2 upgrade from Lion 10.7.5, I noticed an immediate problem with Outlook 2011 attached to our Exchange Server. 1) I rebuild My Identity two times using the Microsoft Database Utility Program, 2) I re-Indexed my whole Hard Drive Volume using Spotlight's Privacy Feature (actually inputing the volume in the Privacy screen, then immediately removing it to start the indexing which took 24 hrs.), and 3) I removed and added back the Outlook .plist files located in both Preference Folders (Home-User) and System.
All email Smart Searches stop at the date 10/5/12 the day I finished my Mountain Lion Install. I cannot add Outlook Smart Folders as well. Is there a Mountain Lion/Outlook .plist file that was stepped on or should I export my Identity file and create a New Identity and re-import my information. It seems that that has been tried on the Microsoft Mac discussion boards and it has been ineffective at solving the functionality of Outlook 2011 after a Mountain Lion Install.
Interestingly, I have an an older mid 2009 iMac, a late 2009 Mac Mini and a mid 2010 MBP iCore7 home computers running Outlook after a Mountain Lion Install and the program works great!!! However, I only have Mail coming into the InBox on the Exchange Server and do not download any mail to the Computer Inboxes. I download emails from the Exchange Server to the Computer (Late 2009 Mac Mini) office and the Rules to move mail to "on my computer folders" work nicely. The Smart Folders in which I want to filter and view 0 Day or 1 Day old (Yesterday) emails does not function and seem to stop functioning the day I installed OS 10.8.2.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Thanks! ~DDAM

After my OS 10.8.2 upgrade from Lion 10.7.5, I noticed an immediate problem with Outlook 2011 attached to our Exchange Server. 1) I rebuild My Identity two times using the Microsoft Database Utility Program, 2) I re-Indexed my whole Hard Drive Volume using Spotlight's Privacy Feature (actually inputing the volume in the Privacy screen, then immediately removing it to start the indexing which took 24 hrs.), and 3) I removed and added back the Outlook .plist files located in both Preference Folders (Home-User) and System.
All email Smart Searches stop at the date 10/5/12 the day I finished my Mountain Lion Install. I cannot add Outlook Smart Folders as well. Is there a Mountain Lion/Outlook .plist file that was stepped on or should I export my Identity file and create a New Identity and re-import my information. It seems that that has been tried on the Microsoft Mac discussion boards and it has been ineffective at solving the functionality of Outlook 2011 after a Mountain Lion Install.
Interestingly, I have an an older mid 2009 iMac, a late 2009 Mac Mini and a mid 2010 MBP iCore7 home computers running Outlook after a Mountain Lion Install and the program works great!!! However, I only have Mail coming into the InBox on the Exchange Server and do not download any mail to the Computer Inboxes. I download emails from the Exchange Server to the Computer (Late 2009 Mac Mini) office and the Rules to move mail to "on my computer folders" work nicely. The Smart Folders in which I want to filter and view 0 Day or 1 Day old (Yesterday) emails does not function and seem to stop functioning the day I installed OS 10.8.2.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Thanks! ~DDAM

How to auto-restore Smart Folders on the dock after reboot?

So I've created a smart folder that basically gathers all the applications that I use with the Adobe Creative Suite (i.e. Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, etc.). For quick access, I drag the smart folder to the dock and I change the sort method to NAME and the view to LIST. And here's what I get as a result, which works very nicely:
http://imgur.com/EWUgm6w
The problem is, after I restrat my Mac, that smart folder on the dock gets completely messed up (the folder icon is changed and nothing pops up when I click on the icon) so I have to then delete the one that's on the dock, drag a new copy out and then change the sort and view methods to my preferences all over again. I was a bit surprised the first time I noticed this but after seeing the smart folder get messed after multiple restarts, I realized that there's something wrong.
My assumption is that the smart folder gets reprocessed on a reboot and though the original location where the smart folder is stored is fine when I go look at it, the shortcut that I place on the dock loses its functionality altogether.
I'm wondering if anyone has run into this on their end and found a good solution? If there was a script I could run when the computer started to automate the tasks that I have to do (remove old folder from dock, copy new one, change sort & view methods), that would be great -- but I don't know how to do this! Alternatively, if there's another way to achieve this pop up list without creating a folder manually and dragging 10 shortcuts into the folder, that would be great. I like the idea of keeping the list dynamic (hence the smart folders method) so that if anything changes, the updates would be reflected autmatically in the folder.

I have the same issue. Upon restarting, my two smart folders get a drawer-looking icon and don't function. I am able to right click to change settings, but nothing seems to get them to actually work.

Smart folders seems not to work with star rating. Is there a fix?

I Rate photos with a five star rating either on iPhoto or Adobe Bridge CS5. When I create a smart folder setting the search attribute to "Rating equals 5" nothing appears on the search.

Sorry,
I think I misunderstood your question. You were talking about smart folders in the Finder and not about smart albums in iPhoto, right? "Rating equals 5" does not work on any of my machines, neither in Snow leopard nor in Lion. The problem seems to be how to represent the rating in the search string. If I search for "Rating is not 5" the smart folder contains plenty of pictures, also those with a rating of five. Does anyone know how the rating is coded to be used in a search string in the Finder?

Major change to how smart folders work?

I'm an ex-PC user and one way I configured the finder to work more like how I was used to working was to color code all my folders red and the half-dozen files I work with on a daily basis green. I had smart folders for both in the Tiger sidebar and they were there all the time. In Leopard they are only there in a finder window and are in the search for area. When I am in a program and want to open a file, that search for section is no longer in the sidebar, so I have to drill down through all folders and sub-folders to find the file I want. Am I going to be limited to launching files directly from the smart folder to easily find the files I need and not open from within the application?
RR

By default when you make a Smart Folder and save it you get it saved into this folder:
"/Users/yourname/Library/Saved Searches"
If you open that folder you should see your Smart Folders. Drag them into the "Places" section of the Sidebar in your open Finder window. They will now show up in the Open dialog window of your application. Of course, you will have them listed twice in the normal Finder window: once in places, so you can see them in the Open window, and once in Search For. Jeez, don't the programmers ever have to talk to each other? Anyway, the sensible thing to do is to have other sorts of things, that you don't need access to from an application, in the Search For section--or just close that section up. This is definitely another "what were they thinking" moment.
Francine
Francine
Schwieder

List view status of flagged messages in Yosemite Mail Smart Folders

I'm using Mail in Yosemite with an Exchange server. Before Yosemite, everything was fine, now I have an issue with message flag status in Smart Folders. I have a Smart Folder which is my "ongoing" mail folder; it is set to only show unread and/or flagged messages. In the latest version of Mail, setting the messages flagged status does not change the flag icon in the message list, but does in the header of the actual mail message. The only way to get the flag to show up in the list is to select another folder and then reselect the smart folder. It does this on both my MacBook Pro and iMac, with with the latest Yosemite version and all updates applied.
In the previous OS X Mail (Mavericks) changing the flag status would remove/add the flag icon in the message list pane; now it doesn't. It's insanely annoying.
Anyone else seen this bug? I have tried recreating the smart folder and that makes no difference, neither has rebuilding the mailbox/deleting index/envelope file. No changes have been made to our Exchange server.
Cheers
Matthew

Well, I guess those are more "smart inboxes" and not "smart mailboxes" in iOS...

Smart folders not working...

I've got some smart folders that just stopped working... I haven't changed the definitions and they were working fine, but all of a sudden they are not.
The one that is not working is defined with 3 things, one of them is another smart filter. This has always worked in the past.
I booted the machine, and inso doing went in and out of mail. Is there anything to reset?
thanks...

I found a work around... but I'm still curious why this stopped working...
The original logic was to have a sort of pre-filter Smart Mailbox with tons of conditions with "Any" selected. Then the second folder had "All" selected with "In the pre-filter mailbox" and "in the inbox selected". This stopped working and I had to then change it to "In the pre-filter mailbox" and "not in the specific folder I later sort into" This isn't quite as useful since sometimes I sort into different folders, but it did work.
I'm on 10.4.10 on a PPC iMac G5 1GB DDR2 SDRAM... I've done all the updates Apple can put out here except the iPod stuff since I'm not in that world... yet.

Mail Smart Folders across accounts / between Macs

OS X Mail Smart Folders are very useful, but I have one problem:
My "Unread" folder between accounts and Macs has two criteria: Unread, plus on one account, not in a certain Inbox. Now, the mail account that I use for that 2nd criteria is only set up for use on one account. I have 2 accounts on my Mac Pro and 1 account on my MBP. When I check my Mail Unread folder on the other account and other Mac, the Unread folder syncs across iCloud, but since that email account I use for the 2nd criteria is not set up (active) on the other account / Mac, the Unread folder essentially breaks. If I edit it, then it breaks on the other user account where that 2nd criteria is effective.
Does that make sense? Anyone else having iCloud Mail Smart Folder sync issues across accounts / Macs?
Running OS X Yosemite all up to date on everything.

iCloud does not support or sync Smart Mailboxes or local folders. You can create mailboxes at the iCloud.com site that will be IMAP and show in the Mail sidebar under the iCloud folder. Those will show up on all devices.
Other than that, iCloud will only sync Mail's main mailboxes (default mailboxes).
In Addition to better explain:
Local folders under On My Mac are folders only located on the computer. They are not part of any IMAP or Exchange account.
Smart Mailboxes are for the most part just search engines. Messages are not stored in those, but they merely point to messages which actually reside in the original mailbox where they are stored.

Mac Mail Smart Folders triplicate messages (Gmail-based mail server)

I can't get Mail Smart Folders to work well with my Virginmedia mail server, which seems to use a Gmail type of system. (I'm using IMAP).
It is easy to set up an instruction to select mail e.g. from defined individuals only, or any other qualifier.
However, I get all mail in triplicate: from the normal Inbox, but also from Gmail-type "All Mail" and "Important" inboxes. I know these mailboxes exist on the Virginmedia server, and also, virtually, in Mail, but I don't ever look at them or need to. There might be a way of not having all mails defined as "Important" on the server, but "All Mail" exists by default and can't be removed, for obvious reasons.
I have tried various additional instructions in the Smart Folder such as include if "Message is in Inbox", but that selects all messages. Also, if "Message is not in Inbox", so that I get only two sets of messages, but that has produced strange results such as messages marked as in Spam folder, which seem to have nothing to do with the defined instructions.
Is there anything "smart" I can do about this, or is it just a matter of Mail not being up to speed with Gmail-based servers. It's just an annoyance, more than anything.

Nope. Gone.
I went to my second mac. Opened Mail, it refreshed its previous state, with 1100 messages in the Inbox, I was relieved and while thinking about my backup options, Mail started its new activity cycle and POOF....Gone. One test message in the Inbox.

How can I add "AND" "OR" criteria to smart folders?

I want to create some smart folders in Finder that search for documents based on type and date last edited, opened or modified. In some instances I want the result to show files that match some of the criteria and in other instances, I want results to return files that match all of the criteria. I have read somewhere that you can add these conditional filters by pressing the Option key when clicking on the '+' sign to add a new criteria, but it doesn't seem to work in Mavericks. Is there another key combination for this?
Any help greatly appreciated.
Many thanks
Donna

When adding Criteria, hold down the Option key on the keyboard. The + button will turn to and elipsis (…)
You can make groups of Any, All, or None (Or, And, Not).

Using the due date function in Smart Folders

Hi
I'm experimenting with my smart folders and I saw there is an option for "due date".
Does this mean I can create a folder with files that need to be processed by a certain date?
How do I add a due date to a file?
This would be useful for me, for instance, in following up invoices. I could set a 30 day date on them and then they would show up in my smart folder when they should be paid.
iJemz

It's not very simple, unless there is a third-party program out there that might set them.
The dates in the MDItem attributes are stored as binary plists.
You would have to create an xml plist with the date, like this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<array>
<date>2013-07-28T05:03:59Z</date>
</array>
</plist>
Then, you would convert it to a binary plist using
plutil -convert binary1 path/to/xml.plist
Then, you would load it into the extended attribute using
xattr -wx com.apple.metadata:kMDItemDueDate "`xxd -p /path/to/binary.plist`" /path/to/file/to/set/dueDate
This could likely be all wrapped in shell script or automator service, but I don't know how to due that.

Smart Folders and Filtering based on Focal Length

Can we please be given the ability to create Smart Folders and be able to Filter images based on focal length?
Doing so based on Lens alone does not take into account that more and more people rely on zoom lenses. When you have 16-35, 27-70, 35-135 and 70-200 lenses, one could benefit from having the ability to search for images created in wide-angle, normal, zoom and tele-zoom ranges.
Providing this feature would be greatly appreciated.
Regards, JML

Thanks Colin, I will try it.
Sounds like it may work - however bit awkward solution in otherwise ergonomic LR environment :-(
I really do not understand why this value is not among the filtering metadata when LR recognizes it and shows it on every corner. Especially considering the fact LR is supposed to be full WF solution and certain development settings cannot be effectively applied without selecting images only with certain focal length values.
The very last feature I am missing on this SW designed to cover entire WF (since LR1) is the distortion/perspective control and ability to apply corrections based on lens/focal length used.
b Does anyone have an idea if Adobe plans to eventually implement this feature?
I do not want to be forced to use DxO which always means interruption of the WF and inevitably generated new files on disk.

Smart folders just refuse to work

hi i cannot get anything to show in smart folders/web gallerys, i have tried a simple star rating, and keywords, both cases knowing there are not too many of either so its not a problem dues to 1000s of pics.

As you are probably aware, smart folders are "aware" of the library structure...if you're attempting to build one in a library folder where there are NONE of the target images, you'll get this result. If you set the smart folder at the main Library level, then it will "operate" on the entire Library and find any that are there. So, be sure you've made the proper selection in the folders pane....
hope this helps.

How do I get smart folders to stick on search?

I am organising my graphics on my iMac.
I started setting up smart folders to find all my material.
The first searching on ".pdf" did what it was supposed to and retained its search.
All the subsequent ones for ".eps", ".tiff", "Lists" etc initially find what they are supposed to then after saving & adding to the control bar they find nothing but the first search: ".pdf"
What am I doing wrong, if anything?

On looking at the parameters of the search I find they are cumulative.
After I searched on one, it added the subsequent search to the terms of the previous search.
Now why would that be a good idea?
For a start I have to go back and redit the searches every time I do a new one, instead of it just doing the obvious and retaining the parameters of that single search when I add it to the control bar.
It appears to be doing the expected at the time of the search, not when saved.

Smart Folders?

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