In yesterday’s post, I wrote that I had installed the new version of mu/mu4e but that the inbox and searches were showing some deleted messages as well as the ones I was looking for. I was gearing up to dive into the code when I noticed that the “extra” messages appeared to be from the same threads as the unread ones. Once I realized that, it was easy to figure out what was going on. A little RTFM brought me to §7.4.3 of the user manual where I learned about the option mu4e-headers-include-related that controls whether related messages (those from the same thread) are also shown. Apparently the default value was changed from nil to t in version 1.0.
I can see where that might be a useful default for some workflows but it’s a disaster for mine. After a bit of thought, I realized that that’s because I get three types of email messages:
- Those from the clueful who use the interleaved posting style;
- Those from the non-clueful who reply at the top and let their MUA add the original email at the bottom;
- Emails from mailing lists.
The first two types always provide any missing context so I don’t need to worry about threads and I always the delete the third after reading them—they’re in the list archives if I need them—so most of the thread comprises deleted emails. That’s why I was seeing a bunch of deleted emails in my inbox. They were from the thread of the current email from a mailing list.
Now that I know the option exists, I can see where I might occasionally find it useful. Happily, the developers have me covered. All I need do is type W in the headers view to toggle it on or off.
One final note: if you like the option and leave it on you should use ] and [ to move to the next and previous unread message rather than n and p. There’s all sorts of useful keybindings for the headers view that you’ve probably forgotten about since you first skimmed the manual. It’s worth taking another look at them.
So the TL;DR is that the “problem” was indeed as configuration issue and after the appropriate adjustment I’m back to enjoying mu4e just as I always have.