How to archive emails in nextcloud?

ℹ️ Support
1
Apparently, there is a way to archive emails inside nextcloud (https://github.com/nextcloud/mail/issues/22, apparently solved in https://github.com/nextcloud/mail/pull/7355). However, I cannot find any documentation about how this works (is it just about moving emails to an archive folder on the original mailserver, or moving/copying them into a folder on nextcloud?) or can I find an archive button in the nextcloud mail app. Could anyone please point me to where I can find out more? Thank you!
2

Hi there.

Archiving apears to work on my set up (Nextcloud AIO 14.1.1 beta) with Mail 5.11.5

On my setup, if you hover the cursor over the message in the left hand list of messages until the icon bar appears, and click on the 3 dots, the submenu that appears has the archive option.

From a quick test, this moves the message into the Archive folder, and this is reflected on the mail server.

3

Thanks a lot! After trying again, it now works for me as well, in the same way. This is after I created an archive folder on the imap server, logged out, and logged in again another day. A bit disappointing, though, as this only moves it from one folder to another on the imap server, so I don’t really see the point. I wish it were possible to archive emails on the nextcloud server.

4

Yeah, Nextcloud Mail is ultimately just an IMAP client. In other words, the email messages remain on the mail server, and an Archive folder/mailbox, if the server provides one is simply another folder/mailbox within the relevant account.

The special thing about it is that the folder is marked as an archive folder on the IMAP server, which many email clients recognize. This allows you to move messages there using the respective Archive button in an email client instead of having to move them manually.

Of course, that also means that an IMAP archive is generally more about keeping messages out of sight without having to manually organize them or delete them. It usually has little to do with a proper email archiving system, unless the mail server is configured to process messages in that folder further or store them on separate storage.

Even then, though, a proper and legally compliant email archive generally shouldn’t depend on users manually archiving messages. Ideally, every message should be captured automatically when it is received or sent and stored in dedicated archiving software, with appropriate retention and access controls. Depending on the requirements, users may also need to be prevented from modifying or deleting the archived messages.