Sort Option

The Sort ... option lets you specify the order in which mail messages should be listed in the Folder Contents area of the Main window.

To specify the sort order of messages, click the Sort ... option. The Sort Specification window appears, in which you can:

• Specify the message sort order using up to eight available sort keys.

• Specify the direction of the sort, either ascending or descending.

• Specify a different sort key for each folder.

• Select the Thread messages parameter to group messages by subject-thread and sort each group by newest or oldest message in the group.

The Sort Specification window contains a row of toggle buttons, each of which controls an associated sort key. Adjacent to each sort key is a pair of radio buttons for controlling sort direction-either ascending or descending. (For alphabetical characters, ascending order is A to Z; descending order is Z to A.) The radio buttons for the Status key act differently, in that they select between the sort orders New, Unread, and Other and Other, Unread, and New.

When you toggle On a button that corresponds to a sort key, a number appears in the Order column to the left of the buttons. The number indicates the precedence of the sort key. The first key you toggle On becomes key 1, the second becomes key 2, and so on. Conversely, if you toggle a button Off, the corresponding sort key is removed and the number is removed from the Order column. The other sort keys are renumbered. You can specify any or all eight sort keys and any order of direction in your sort specification.

There are eight possible sort keys.

Message number

Select the Number option to sort mail messages by number. When you do this, the first mail messages to arrive have the lower numbers. So, if you sort in descending numerical order, the newest messages appear at the top of the Folder Contents area. If you sort in ascending numerical order, the oldest messages appear at the top of the Folder Contents area.

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NOTE:
This differs from sorting by Date in that Number indicates the order in which messages were received, while Date indicates when a message was sent. These usually result in the same sort order, but not necessarily. Differences result from variable delays in the mail network and differences in clock time among systems.

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Message status

Select Status to sort mail messages by status. The buttons for the Status key select between these two sort orders New, Unread, Other and Other, Unread, New.

Subject

Select Subject to sort mail messages alpha-numerically by subject, as indicated by the message's Subject: header. For alphabetical characters, ascending order is A to Z; descending order is Z to A.

Sender

Select Sender to sort mail messages in alpha-numerically by sender's name, as found in the message's From: header. For alphabetical characters, ascending order is A to Z; descending order is Z to A.

To

Select To to sort mail messages alphabetically according to the name(s) in the To: header. If you display mail messages by the To field in ascending order, a message addressed "To: adam@someplace.com" would be lower in the message list than a message addressed "To: bob@someplace.com".

Date

Select Date to sort mail messages by the time and date the message was sent, as indicated by the message's Date: header. If you display mail messages by date in ascending order, the oldest messages appear at the top of the message list.

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NOTE:
This differs from sorting by Number in that Number indicates the order in which messages were received, while Date indicates when a message was sent. These usually result in the same sort order, but not necessarily. Differences result from variable delays in the mail network and differences in clock time among systems.

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Number of lines

Select Line Count to sort mail messages by line count. If you display mail messages by line count in ascending order, the shortest messages appear at the top of the Folder Contents area.

A line is counted as a string of characters ending with a newline character.

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NOTE:
For messages containing data other than ASCII text, for example GIF or JPEG data, the count of number of lines may not be meaningful.

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Number of bytes

Select Byte Count to sort mail messages by number of bytes, or characters. If you display mail messages by byte count in ascending order, the messages with the lowest byte count appear at the top of the Folder Contents area.

Only the characters in the message body are counted, not the characters in the headers.

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NOTE:
Some mail messages contain a Content-Length: header. This is a good indication of the number of bytes in a message, but it is not always accurate. Ishmail counts the number of bytes instead of relying on a Content-Length: header, if present.

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Select the Thread messages parameter to sort messages by subject thread. Messages will be grouped in the message list according to their subject line (from the Subject: mail header). If you sort in ascending order, the oldest subject is shown first.

To illustrate how this works, consider this example: You have 3 messages in your folder, each with a different subject line. Applying the Thread messages parameter has no apparent, immediate effect. The messages remain sorted by arrival sequence. When new mail with a unique subject arrives it is added to the end of the list, so the list still appears sorted by number. However, when new mail arrives containing a subject line that matches an existing message, the new message appears inserted in the list just after the message with the same subject.

Sort keys are added in the order you select them. Sort criteria is based on this order and on the direction (ascending or descending) of each sort key.

For example, to specify sorting first by Date, descending order (that is, latest message at the top of the message list), then by Status (new messages first, followed by unread messages, then other messages), you would:

1. Select (toggle On) the Date sort key. A 1 appears in the Order column next to the toggle button.

   Click Descending to select that direction.

2. Next, select (toggle On) the Status sort key. A 2 appears in the Order column next to the toggle button.

   Click New, Unread, Other to select that direction.

3. Apply your changes.

NOTES:

1. For the Date field, the value of the date string is first resolved into a number before comparing, so that values in different formats (for example, Dec 01 versus December 1) will sort correctly.

2. The Date and Number keys have roughly the same meaning since messages are numbered sequentially in the order received. The Date indicates the time of day and date the message was sent. The Number indicates order of arrival in your In-Box. However, there may be subtle differences due to propagation delays within the mail network or differences in the time of day clocks on various machines. A message sent later than another (thus having a newer date) may actually arrive sooner (thus having a lower, older sequence number).

When you specify a sort for a folder, click the appropriate radio button in the box below the sort keys to make the sort apply to:

• The current mail folder, as displayed in the Main window Folder Contents area.

• All mail folders selected in the Main window Open Folders area.

• All mail folders, overriding any other sort definitions.

• All mail folders which don't otherwise have an explicit sort order defined.

You make this selection by clicking one of the radio buttons in the box below the sort keys.