notmuch-mailmover

notmuch-mailmover is a tool to move notmuch tagged mails into Maildir folders (e.g., created by offlineimap/mbsync).

For example, you can move all mails tagged as trash to the Trash folder.

Use-Cases

Some use-cases are:

• delete mail from IMAP server (e.g. move trash mail to a non-synced folder and let offlineimap/mbsync do the rest)
• sync your notmuch tags across devices by using notmuch-mailmover in combination with offlineimap/mbsync (this is similarly to muchsync but easier to setup since you don't need a muchsync server)
• purge old mails from the IMAP server (by moving them out of synced folders)

Installation

Only Linux is tested, but Windows and Mac should work as well.

Arch Linux

notmuch-mailmover-git is available on the AUR. Use your favorite AUR helper to install it, e.g.

$ yay -S notmuch-mailmover-git

NixOS

$ nix-env -iA notmuch-mailmover

Building from Source

Otherwise, you have to build from source. You need the following build dependencies (see install-deps.sh):

• Rust
• libnotmuch-dev
• liblua5.4-dev

Then run

cargo install --git 'https://github.com/michaeladler/notmuch-mailmover/'

Setup

It's recommended to run notmuch-mailmover as part of your notmuch pre-new hook. You can also invoke notmuch-mailmover directly, but don't forget to run notmuch new afterward (this isn't necessary if you add it as a pre-hook).

Configuration

Running notmuch-mailmover for the first time will create $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/notmuch-mailmover/config.yaml. Then edit the file as you like, see below for an example. Alternatively, it's possible to write the configuration in Lua 5.4 by creating config.lua instead. See the provided config.lua for an example.

The configuration is largely self-explanatory, except perhaps for the choice of the rule_match_mode. You need to decide whether you want your rules to be pairwise distinct (meaning the queries must not overlap) or ambiguous (where the first or last matching rule wins). The unique approach is more explicit but also more verbose, while the first or all approach is more concise but may lead to unexpected behavior if you have overlapping rules, as the order of the rules matters.

Example

The provided config.yaml does the following:

• move mails tagged as trash to folder Trash
• move mails tagged as sent to folder Sent
• move mails tagged as archive to folder Archive

See config_first.yaml for a different approach (using the first strategy for rule_match_mode).

Similar Projects

This work is inspired by afew's Mailmover plugin but doesn't require you to setup rules for each folder individually. Instead, notmuch-mailmover applies your rules once to all folders (so it may be easier to configure if you have many folders).