Can mutt be persuaded to use a sensible maildir hierarchy?

[Kurt Hackenberg]

On 2020-09-22 13:30, Chris Green wrote:

>> Does mutt still use the (IMHO silly) maildir hierarchy where mail
>> 'folders' are simply represented by another '.' and name in the
>> maildir directory name?
>>
>> Is there some way I can get to use real directories to represent my
>> hierarchy of mail?


Originally maildirs had no subfolders; the '.' names were invented by 
Sam Varshavcik, I think a long time ago.[1] What you want also exists; 
it may be more recent. The IMAP server Dovecot, at least, can be 
configured to name maildir subfolders either way.

I think Mutt can read or create a maildir at any pathname you supply, 
including the pathname of either kind of subfolder. What Kevin said 
about the new function <descend-directory> sounds like a handy shortcut.

> I just run mb2md on my existing mail folders, I ended up with a single
> directory (~/Maildir) containing 2354 files mostly with ridiculously
> long names!  This just isn't a sensible way to organise my mail.


Do you mean you have 2354 mbox files, and now 2354 maildir subfolders? 
Maybe you can write a shell script that renames all those maildir 
subfolders to the pathnames you want. Or a script that runs mb2md 2354 
times, with an input and output pathname each time, if it can be used 
that way. Or use a different conversion tool.


[1] <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maildir>