I have a gmail account I have used for a while, so there are heaps of old messages in the all mail folder. I have been traveling a lot and trying to start using the folders on the server rather than how I used to - which is organize them locally ( I was using Thunderbird / POP config ). I tried IMAP on both Thunderbird and the Mail app and ran into the same problem. No matter what I do, I can't seem to stop it from downloading the entire contents of the All Mail folder. In thunderbird there was a way to uncheck the subcription to that folder but either it was a glitch or something funny would happen and I would uncheck it, then open that dialog up again and it would be checked.
So I try the mail app and it did the same. But even worse, somehow during this process my anti-virus caught a few virus downloads that were in attachments. Pax pci xfi all os driver for mac. As well, I couldn't find anywhere in the settings where I could unsubscribe/selectively avoid downloading that folder. Is there any way to get IMAP working with gmail and not have this 'all messages' landslide occur? Ok, I figured a few things out. Thunderbird will retain the settings, but it seems that you have to: Unsubscribe the relevant folders quit the app then open and it should no longer download the messages.
How To Unsubscribe From Gmail Folders In Mail For Mac
It was also interesting that you can limit the IMAP downloads to 1000 on gmail. I think this is a very noteworthy gmail setting that is probably often overlooked (I see now this type of question pops up a lot in various forms). I had even looked at that tab in gmails settings thinking I might find the solution. With it being tucked away at the bottom of the page and I missed it on the first pass.
Thanks for pointing that out and helping me in this thread.