InboxAssistant
macOS
Process your email backlog.
Why This Even Exists
For a couple of decades, now, Gmail has trained me not to delete stuff from my inbox. Read it, flag it, search it, maybe move it into a different folder, but don’t delete it. This has led to my inbox getting really, really full. I have really (years, really) old emails with attachments, sitting in my inbox. For me, this is bad. When my accountant wants receipts or my insurance company wants invoices for work I’ve had done on my house or my car, I have to go rummaging around for that stuff and then stay focused on that task. Meanwhile, my mail client pings me with notifications of new messages every few minutes, because spammers and marketers, and because there are other people in the world who want to send me stuff. I am not trying to hit “inbox zero” but I am interested in helping myself accomplish what I need to get done while minimizing the mental effort required to do it.
So, this program exists to do two things:
- Take attachments from email messages and save them to folders on my computer.
- Delete email messages
Feature: Save email attachments
The app fetches email messages from the server, in batches of 20, and orders them from oldest to newest. The list of messages displays a brief snippet of data about the message (subject, date, sender, first bit of the email body) and a list of any attachments. At the bottom edge of the application window is a list of folders which you have configured. Dragging an attachment onto a folder saves the attachment at that location.
Feature: Delete email messages
Once you’re done with the email, delete it! Then it’s not hanging around, taking up space on some mail server somewhere, and it’s not part of the cognitive load of the inbox. Do you need that email? No! Delete! Delete! OK!
Data Collected
If I collect data, then I have to store it, I have to secure it, I have to tell you about it, and I have to be prepared to delete it. That’s way too much work. Rather than do that, I don’t collect anything, and my life is better for it. Frankly, so is yours. You’re welcome.
Support
If you do want to get in touch, everything you need is right here