[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote on Sunday, January 27, 2002:
JN>> you are using the program. But you can adopt a different type of
JN>> organizing strategy for archiving email outside the program. That is
JN>> the "third dimension" I noted.
> Would you mind expanding on how you have addressed the issue of
> long-term archiving (outside the program)? I am relatively new to the
> Bat! and I have yet to find a satisfactory solution for this.
I'm happy to relate what I do, but I'm not sure how helpful it would
be for others. So, first, a few words of background: I use my mail
for both business and personal purposes. I have two primary accounts,
one of which is for business and close personal use; the other of
which is for mailing lists, IT matters, and similar mail which I do
not want mixed in with my primary account. I have other accounts on
the Web, but they don't fall into this mix generally.
In TB!, I keep all mail that will require some type of action or
reference. That includes client mail on pending projects; mail
pertaining to projects I haven't yet invoiced; social mail to which I
want to reply if it contains something I want to not in my response;
mail that requires follow-up, etc. The basic idea is to keep mail in
appropriate folders which are organized topically. As much as
possible, I try to put all my task reminders in one place (Lotus
Organizer), so if an email has a task in it, I send it to Organizer
rather than relying on the email itself to remind me that there's
something to be done. (Although I do color-code mail that needs
follow-up, and periodically search by color group.) All this mail
that is in TB! is grouped in folders by topic, i.e., the client mail
is in a folder for each client (both outgoing and incoming); the
social mail is in a "social" folder; mail pertaining to administrative
stuff is in a folder for that purpose, etc. There may be different
projects or threads going on within each folder, but the volume is
such that it's not too difficult to keep them clear.
My archiving strategy is somewhat different, however. The idea there
is to keep mail in as few folders as possible and to use search
strategies instead of separate folders. I archive each client's email
(both ways) by client. One archived email file per client per year,
although if there were a huge amount of mail I might break it down
somehow. Mailing lists are all consolidated into one archive file.
Social mail I want to keep has one archive; an organization I'm
involved with has one archive; family related matters have another
archive; and--with perhaps an exception or two that I can't recall at
the moment--all other mail of any type goes into one miscellaneous
archive file. I regularly move my mail out of TB! into these
archives, appending the file with the new material.
For a while, I was using Unix-style mailboxes from TB!, but opening
them by importing them was a pain. Now I use Mailbag Assistant (which
someday might soon export into Unix fomat), and am very pleased at its
ability to sort mail and create subsets from the sort results. If I
need to find something from an archive, I open it in Mailbag Assistant
and search. If I'm unsure what archive it's in, Mailbag Assistant
will open them all and let me search and create a view of only the
search results. (I can print, extract attachments, or reply through
TB! all from within Mailbag Assistant.) Moreover, although I have no
plans to switch email clients, this archiving strategy would work
without any change if I saw the need to start using another email
program.
(Mailbag Assistant archives can be read--other than attachments--in a
word processor, and they can be parsed and read in Zoot. When the
Unix export is incorporated, they could be picked up by any email
program that can import Unix format.)
Hope this helps. Feel free to ask more or suggest alternatives.
JN
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