I, probably like you, receive several dozen email messages a day in my Apple Mail application that I really don’t want to receive / deal with. Call them Junk or Spam but they occur; there are 1,000’s more that are blocked and doesn’t reach me. Thank heavens.
And yes I am now starting to be hit with unwanted text messages on my cellular phone. This message does NOT address this newer problem
I use two tools to address these intrusions. The primary is the included JUNK folder in Mail that Apple’s mail server sends on to me because the messages MIGHT be not junk. This will be commented upon later
The second is an App (Spam Sieve from C-Command software https://c-command.com/spamsieve/) that checks all incoming messages and finds the few that Apple’s server software missed. Great product as it lets me train the software as to what is Spam or not Spam. (I wish they were available for the telephone calls I get)
But back to the Apple Mail Server and its putting messages into the Junk folder. Occasionally this Junk folder ends up with a message that it marked as Junk but I don’t think is Junk. Several versions ago the mailbox offered a “Not Junk” button to “train” the AI (Artificial Intelligence) algorithm. Currently there is NO “Not Junk” button in the Junk message window. The training method is to “maybe” click on Move to Inbox button.
Incidentally the most recent explosion of messages tagged wrong was a set where the Subject included the name of an “Apple Mail” alternate application. Tomorrow’s article in WSJournal about Amazon bias on searches just reinforces the fact that Big Tech cheats?
Thanks to dialogue with TidBITs.com I now have a “Not Junk” button to click on. Maybe the result is the same as “move to Inbox” but I feel better about a “Not Junk” click
How to get a “not Junk” button
In Mail use View / Customize Toolbar to add the “Junk” icon to your toolbar if not there already
That is all
When you select a message that is NOT flagged as (Junk or Spam) the toolbar will show “Junk” as a marking option
I’m wondering if you still have “Enable junk mail filtering” EN-abled in Mail’s Prefs. Mr. Tsai includes a request to UN-check that Pref when you use his great app. I haven’t seen anything in my normal “Junk” mailbox since Aug 15, 2019. I may have put that in there myself!
Yes I do still have Enable Junk mail filtering checked
This past week I have seen 5 messages from TidBITs personnel in the Junk folder (The Apple server) that I then marked as not junk in hopes of training the Apple server.
Incidentally they all were TidBITS news about an Apple Mail alternative
I think this is the reason Mr. Tsai recommends UN-checking that Mail Prefs box and editing / installing the AppleScript and adding to your Rules:
The junk/spam filter on your mail server can cause problems. It is more likely than SpamSieve to mistakenly classify your good messages as spam, yet it rarely catches spam messages that SpamSieve would have missed. Additionally, most people don’t want to deal with two separate spam mailboxes, one for the server junk filter and one for SpamSieve. It’s often best simply to turn off the server junk filter, however some mail servers such as iCloud do not allow this.
This script solves two problems:
It saves you from mistakes that the server junk filter made by moving any messages that it thinks are good back to the inbox.
It consolidates the spam messages from all the accounts into a single spam mailbox (the same one where SpamSieve is already putting your spam).
Occasionally I find messages in Junk that are not only Not Junk, but Mail doesn’t even show them marked as Junk; i.e., neither is there a banner at the top of the message stating ‘you marked this message as Junk… ‘ , or similar, nor is the ‘Not Junk’ button available (grayed out); so in these occasions, my paranoia has me first Mark as Junk (using the keyboard shortcut or button), then remarking as ‘Not Junk’, just in the hopes it recorrects the Bayesian filters in Mail.
Though, as noted, none of this, as far as anyone knows, has any effect on what happens at the iCloud server level.
