Account should be part of filter not the other way around - any workarounds?
Greetings,
Filtering in TB is driving me nuts. I need to have filters that apply to all email accounts (for various reasons I have to use seven different accounts). I don't really understand why TB's filtering works the way it does - other clients I use, like Mail.app on MacOS, have the account as part of the filter not the filter as part of the account - but as of now I guess it is what it is.
Anyway, besides copying the filter files between accounts - which isn't a good solution either since I sometimes do want certain filter(s) to only operate on certain account(s) so all this gets very complicated and unwieldly - is there any workable solution to this problem?
Searching this forum I've not found any solutions other than copying the filter file. Is there any point in my filing it as a bug or is this a "feature" we are basically stuck with? It shouldn't be because for anyone cursed with needing to use more than two or three accounts filtering is pretty much useless.
Thanks!
Modified by marktd
All Replies (9)
It certainly doesn't affect all users who need more than one account - I have over a dozen and no need to share filters, and I think that is true of most users.
However users in a business or more complex settings sometimes need what you are looking for.
It's not possible in Thunderbird nor is there an addon that supports it. I've heard that Postbox does.
Postbox is exactly the same as TB when it comes to almost everything (as far as I can tell it's mostly just a UI shell around TB).
Anyway, I like TB and it is probably about the best client I've found on Windows for our needs (although I've not tried eM Client due to its purchasing model, but I may yet) but this is one of a few kind of serious for us problems I'm having with it. This is our first Windows machine in a while and to this point we've always used Mail.app on MacOS, which has the account as part of the filter. The way TB does it is a problem for us since we need a number of filters that apply to all accounts but also some that are account specific and the way TB does it the risk of getting the filters set wrong is really high. Let alone the headache of doing it.
I can't find it in bugzilla but my skill searching it aren't great. Does anyone know if this has been submitted/rejected before? Is it worth submitting it?
Modified by marktd
Postbox is exactly the same as TB when it comes to almost everything (as far as I can tell it's mostly just a UI shell around TB).
Anyway, I like TB and it is probably about the best client I've found on Windows for our needs (although I've not tried eM Client due to its purchasing model, but I may yet) but this is one of a few kind of serious for us problems I'm having with it. This is our first Windows machine in a while and to this point we've always used Mail.app on MacOS, which has the account as part of the filter. The way TB does it is a problem for us since we need a number of filters that apply to all accounts but also some that are account specific and the way TB does it the risk of getting the filters set wrong is really high. Let alone the headache of doing it.
I can't find it in bugzilla but my skill searching it aren't great. Does anyone know if this has been submitted/rejected before? Is it worth submitting it?
I think this bug started 22 years ago includes most of the related requests:
sfhowes said
I think this bug started 22 years ago includes most of the related requests: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=34973
Sigh.
So I guess that the answer is "no." It's never going to get implemented.
I wouldn't say never, but it certainly isn't on the checklist for the next release.
Postbox is a Thunderbird derivative, and it definitely has the (global) feature based on what I read earlier today. You can judge for yourself. https://support.postbox-inc.com/hc/en-us/articles/202200660-Filters-Rules-
Wayne Mery said
I wouldn't say never, but it certainly isn't on the checklist for the next release. Postbox is a Thunderbird derivative, and it definitely has the (global) feature based on what I read earlier today. You can judge for yourself. https://support.postbox-inc.com/hc/en-us/articles/202200660-Filters-Rules-
I've actually got Postbox installed and the filter dialog I see is exactly the same as the TB dialog. I don't see any way to do global filtering or have the account be part of the filter.
But I'll definitely look into it a little more later when I have some time. Thanks.
Postbox actually looks nice but the issue that we had with Postbox was that it doesn't include calendar and contact integration and sync with online cal/contacts.
Modified by marktd
Wayne Mery said
I wouldn't say never, but it certainly isn't on the checklist for the next release. Postbox is a Thunderbird derivative, and it definitely has the (global) feature based on what I read earlier today. You can judge for yourself. https://support.postbox-inc.com/hc/en-us/articles/202200660-Filters-Rules-
I've actually got Postbox installed and the filter dialog I see is exactly the same as the TB dialog. I don't see any way to do global filtering or have the account be part of the filter.
But I'll definitely look into it a little more later when I have some time. Thanks.
Postbox actually looks nice but the issue that we had with Postbox was that it doesn't include calendar and contact integration and sync with online cal/contacts.
You're right. I see how it works in Postbox now. What I wasn't getting is that you can only select "Global" when you first create a filter for a specific account. After it's always greyed out, you can't change or edit it - if you don't initially create a filter as global you can't ever make it global. And although it looks like you should be able to, you can actually never select it on the main filter dialog.
Anyway, thanks. I'd not realized that's how it works.