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Christopher Leidigh edited this page Jan 25, 2021 · 5 revisions

Welcome to the import-export-tools-ng wiki:

Importing from Apple Mail mbox format - Notes/Script by @obar : Thanks!

Apple Mail's export is in a different format than expected by this plugin. An experimental script to restructure an Apple Mail export, applembox2sbd.py, is available in the utility-scripts folder of this repository.

First, use the Export function within Apple Mail to export selected folders to a directory.

To use this script, install Python 3 on your system, make a backup of your mail export (as the script transforms the export in place), and use it as follows from the Terminal within the scripts directory:

chmod +x applembox2sbd.py
./applembox2sbd.py -v /path/to/applemailexport/

In Thunderbird, right-click/Control-click on the destination you want to import to, and within the ImportExportTools NG context menu select Import mbox file. Here you will use Import one or more mbox files, with its/their subdirectory, the second radio button in the popup.

In the file dialog, select the files to import from the freshly transformed directory at the path used in the script above.

Note there is a --dry-run flag which can be used to test the script without modifying the files exported from Apple Mail.