IMAP-Scrub

A command-line utility (Linux, Mac & Windows) to reduce the size of your IMAP mailbox through a series of pre-defined rules. Each rule contain a series of search modifiers, and one or two actions (delete, remove_attachments, save_attachments).

I wrote this tool because I receive many emails with attachments that I need for a limited time only. After a year or two, these attachments do nothing more than take up space, however I did not want to just delete the emails themselves as many contain information that I would rather keep. In another example, certain emails I just do not want to keep at all after a certain period (social media notifications etc).

Usage options

Usage: imap-scrub [options] <config.yml>

Options:
  -y, --yes            do actions (based on config rule actions)
  -m, --mailboxes      list mailboxes on server (helpful for configuration)
  -p, --print-config   print config
  -u, --update         update to latest release version
  -v, --version        show app version

Configuration

Each mail account should have a yaml configuration file. IMAP-Scrub does not currently support OAUTH, so username/password IMAP login is required.

Example config

name: My Gmail Account
host: imap.gmail.com
user: example-user@gmail.com
pass: MySecretPassword123
save_path: /home/me/email-files
rules:
  - mailbox: "[Gmail]/All Mail"  # IMAP mailbox name
    min_size: 5120               # minimum size in kB
    older_than: 365              # days
    actions: remove_attachments
  - mailbox: "[Gmail]/All Mail"
    from: invitations@linkedin.com
    older_than: 30
    actions: delete
  - mailbox: "[Gmail]/All Mail"
    from: myclient@example.com
    min_size: 512 
    older_than: 90
    actions: save_attachments, remove_attachments

See All yaml config options below for more info.

Installing

Download the latest binary release for your system, or build from source go install github.com/axllent/imap-scrub@latest(go >= 1.11 required)

All yaml config options

name:      string # reference name of this account
host:      string # IMAP hostname
ssl:       true   # use SSL (default true)
port:      993    # IMAP port number (default 993 if SSL is true, else 143)
user:      string # IMAP username
pass:      string # IMAP password
save_path: string # local directory to save attachments (default current dir)
use_trash: false  # see below
rules:
  - mailbox:         string # IMAP mailbox name see below)
    min_size:        0      # minimum message size in kB
    older_than:      0      # older than x days
    from:            string # match "From" field
    to:              string # match "To" field
    subject:         string # match email subject
    body:            string # match email body
    text:            string # match email message
    actions:         string # see below
    include_unread:  false  # include unread messages (default false)
    include_starred: false  # include starred messages (default false)

Option: mailbox

The mailbox you wish to search. On standard IMAP servers this is probably INBOX.

On Gmail this is possibly [Gmail]/All Mail or [Google Mail]/All Mail, but may differ based on your selected language. To list the mailboxes on your IMAP server to make a choice, run imap-scrub -m <your-config.yml> which will print out all mailboxes in your account.

Option: use_trash

If use_trash is set to true, and your IMAP returns a trash mailbox, then deleted messages will be moved into this mailbox. Note that Gmail does not support IMAP delete, so use_trash will always be set to true for Gmail.

Option: actions

There are three possible actions, namely:

• save_attachments will save any attachments to save_path
• remove_attachments will remove the all attachments and inline images from the original email
• delete will simply delete the email

The actions: config may include a combination of save_attachments and one other (comma-separated), eg :actions: save_attachments, remove_attachments.

Note that you cannot combine remove_attachments and delete.