One rule to bind them all

[jsharr ★]

Should have left the office at 5 yesterday.  Instead I stayed late and paid a bunch of contractors, and wrote a rule in Outlook to move all the payment notifications of a new folder.  

All well and good except I forgot to tell the rule to look for a certain email address or email title, so my rule moved EVERYTHING in my inbox and subfolders to the new folder.

So I have to spend a few hours moving everything from the new folder back to the inbox and then running all my rules.

Luckily both my bosses are out of the office, so I have a bit of free time, but we are talking two years worth of correspsondence.  Might be over 100,000 emails.  Probably more.

[bikeman564™]

I like Outlook rules

[jsharr ★]

2 minutes ago, bikeman564™ said:

I like Outlook rules

Except when there is a PEBKAC or ID10T error

[Bikeguy]

1 hour ago, jsharr said:

Might be over 100,000 emails.  Probably more.

Wow... that's a LOT of email.   

You could write a rule for each  ____  (fill in the blank) category, company, etc.    and have Outlook search and move the stuff for that criteria to the correct folder.   Then just edit the rule for the next category and folder.  repeat as needed    (which apparently will be needed a LOT) 

Either way.. 100K of emails...  its going to take a LONG time to sort that out,  

Years ago... WoBG maxed out her Outlook PST folder, and it stopped processing email.  (now size limit is now larger)  That took me a while to fix. 

[Bikeguy]

Hmmm....   it could have been worse...   Your rule could have deleted all of the email.   

 

[jsharr ★]

19 minutes ago, Bikeguy said:

Wow... that's a LOT of email.   

You could write a rule for each  ____  (fill in the blank) category, company, etc.    and have Outlook search and move the stuff for that criteria to the correct folder.   Then just edit the rule for the next category and folder.  repeat as needed    (which apparently will be needed a LOT) 

Either way.. 100K of emails...  its going to take a LONG time to sort that out,  

Years ago... WoBG maxed out her Outlook PST folder, and it stopped processing email.  (now size limit is now larger)  That took me a while to fix. 

sorted.  Took a couple of hours.  We have some robust internet and it moved stuff around pretty quickly.

[Prophet Zacharia]

44 minutes ago, Bikeguy said:

Your rule could have deleted all of the email.   

That would have been my rule. I have so many work emails I barley try to keep on top of them. I have a “focused” email list that I reply to when needed, the others just stack up. Some day a real rain will fall and wash all the scum off the streets. Any my email inbox, too.

[maddmaxx ★]

3 hours ago, jsharr said:

Should have left the office at 5 yesterday.  Instead I stayed late and paid a bunch of contractors, and wrote a rule in Outlook to move all the payment notifications of a new folder.  

All well and good except I forgot to tell the rule to look for a certain email address or email title, so my rule moved EVERYTHING in my inbox and subfolders to the new folder.

So I have to spend a few hours moving everything from the new folder back to the inbox and then running all my rules.

Luckily both my bosses are out of the office, so I have a bit of free time, but we are talking two years worth of correspsondence.  Might be over 100,000 emails.  Probably more.

Abort.  Retry.  Fail.

The story of living with computers and without mistakes.  This would make a great book title.

[jsharr ★]

25 minutes ago, maddmaxx said:

Abort.  Retry.  Fail.

The story of living with computers and without mistakes.  This would make a great book title.

Trash In, Trash Out, the Jsharr story.

[Thaddeus Kosciuszko]

12 hours ago, jsharr said:

so my rule moved EVERYTHING in my inbox and subfolders to the new folder.

 

It sounds like your email became quite unruly.