Mail Archiving FAQ

This document is an FAQ for the mail archiving feature that was introduced in Confluence 1.3. Versions of Confluence before 1.3 do not have this feature.

Since this document was written before we released Confluence's mail archiving features, these are more "frequently anticipated questions" than "frequently asked questions". Hopefully I have anticipated correctly.

Q. Can Confluence replace my regular mail client?

A. No.

Confluence's mail archive is designed to supplement the way you currently handle email, not replace it. This is why Conflence deliberately does not come with features common in email clients. You can not mark emails as read or unread, you can not reply to emails from within Confluence, and so on.

Q. So how would you use the mail archive?

A. Here are two scenarios that were suggested during our planning meetings:

Project-related conversations

Say you are using a Confluence space to organise some project. The project lead and the customer have a long conversation (via email) clarifying the project's goals and requirements. Rather than have that conversation lost in their individual mailboxes, they CC: their mail to a POP box being monitored by Confluence, and all that information is archived alongside the rest of the project's documentation.

Customer Support Tracking

All incoming and outgoing sales and support email is diverted (at the mail-server) to be read by Confluence. Staff can then use Confluence's features to find all previous communications with particular customers.

And?

Of course, the real fun will come from seeing what uses people put this feature to that we didn't even think of.

Q. How do I get mail into Confluence?

A. All mail messages belong to a particular space. Space administrators can, from the space administration screen:

• configure Confluence to poll a POP mailbox for incoming mail
  • Go to Space Admin
  • Choose "Mail Accounts"
  • Add Pop Account
• import mail from an mbox-format mail file

Warning: Confluence will delete mail from a POP box as it reads it. Do not point Confluence to an account unless you are happy with it removing all the mail you have stored there.

Q. OK, I've imported the mail. Where is it?

A. Because of the typically overwhelming volume of email, especially compared to the more sedate pace of wiki updates, we do not notify you of recently arrived mail in the same places we notify you of changed Confluence content.

Mail will not appear in the recent changes list on the dashboard or space summary pages. Similarly, mail will not appear by default in search results.

You can view mail in order of arrival from the Mail Archive section, found under the Content tab of the Space Summary screen. You can also explicitly select Mail (or All Content) in the search page to include mail in your search results.

Q. I want it to do...

A. Chances are, so do we. We just haven't got there yet. The emphasis for the DR3 release was to be able to:

• import email into Confluence
• have Confluence monitor POP mailboxes
• view email
• search email

We have a lot more planned, from threading email through to allowing you to write your own custom pre- and post- processors for incoming mail.

Your suggestions are, of course, welcome. File an issue in JIRA, comment on Atlassian Answers.