Get selective GrowlMail-like notifications
David Coffin has written a little applescipt 
that “mimics” the new mail notifications offered by GrowlMail.
When I first started using Mail.app, I loved the full-on “in your face” style of notifications offered by Mail.appetizer, GrowlMail and other apps. After a while I started to find them too distracting and stopped using them.
However, there are some emails that are worth getting distracted by — emails from your boss, from your partner, from your partner containing the words “This is your last chance”, PayPal notifications of donations to defray the running costs of Hawk Wings or whatever.
The alerts that the script generates look good. It even picks up my customised Mail stamp icon.
And because this is a script, you can attach it to a Mail rule that will alert you only when emails emails arrive that match those criteria (or more sensible ones of your own).
Setting it up is easy.
Just create a new rule in the Rules pane of Mail.app’s Preferences.
Set whatever conditions who want notifications for (the screenshot below will notify me of any email my boss sends me) and select “Run AppleScript” as the action.
Navigate to wherever you saved the script from David’s site, and select it.
All done.
Now I am much better placed to react quickly to anything my boss sends. So he knows that I am always focussed on his needs and not bunking off to write posts for Hawk Wings or playing Civ IV.
Sneaky, eh? Productivity at its best.
Tags: Apple Mail, Apple Mail Tips, applescript, GrowlMail, mail.app, notifications, Productivity, rulesRelated posts
March 8th, 2007 at 8:40 am
Am I missing something or what?
From what I can tell (and have gotten to work on my computer) is that David’s script does selective GROWLMAIL alerts, not like the picture shown. Mail.appetizer displays something like the picture but does it for EVERY email received.
Did I miss something?
March 8th, 2007 at 10:43 pm
You did. The screenshot is taken from David’s script matching on the desired person’s email only, rather than Mail.appetizer’s blanket coverage approach.
That’s the point, I suppose. Loud notification only for the messages you choose.
Or did I miss something?