Re: fancy splitting interactively

[Eric Abrahamsen <eric@ericabrahamsen.net>]

Uwe Brauer <oub@mat.ucm.es> writes:

>>> "Eric" == Eric Abrahamsen <eric@ericabrahamsen.net> writes:
>
>    > Eric S Fraga <e.fraga@ucl.ac.uk> writes:
>    >> On Saturday,  3 Jan 2015 at 11:22, Uwe Brauer wrote:
>>> How can I run this splitting on the INBOX for all messages even read
>>> ones?
>    >> 
>    >> Possibly:
>    >> 
>    >> ,----[ C-h v nnimap-unsplittable-articles RET ]
>    >> | nnimap-unsplittable-articles is a variable defined in `nnimap.el'.
>    >> | Its value is (%Deleted %Seen)
>    >> | 
>    >> | Documentation:
>    >> | Articles with the flags in the list will not be considered when splitting.
>    >> | 
>    >> | This is a Gnus server variable.  See Info node `(gnus)Select Methods'.
>    >> | 
>    >> | [back]
>    >> `----
>
>    > Yup, this is what I've done in the past and it works a treat. Just set
>    > it to (%Deleted) temporarily, then refresh.
>
> Thanks for pointing this variable out to me, I see that it is not
> customize-able via customize, so I have to use:
>
>
> (setq nnimap-unsplittable-articles '(%Deleted))
>
> By refresh you mean 
> gnus-group-get-new-news??

Yes, any entry point into the "fetch new news" process will run the
splitting routine.

I think the idea is that you aren't really meant to run Gnus regularly
without the %Seen flag in that variable. That means (as far as I
understand it) that *every* time you get new news, *all* of your
existing messages will be run through the splitting process again. That
could be heavy, though to be honest when I've done this in the past I
don't remember it taking nearly as long as I thought it would.

What's meant to happen is that *unseen* messages are split once, on
their way in, and then left where they are.

It's been noted on this list that this can produce unwanted results if
you're accessing your mail from several devices, and some other device
marks a message as read before Gnus gets to it -- that way Gnus won't
know to split it. I'm not sure what the proper solution is there, but I
still don't think it's running day-to-day with %Seen removed from
`nnimap-unsplittable-articles'.

Eric