3.14   SpamSieve and Multiple Macs

If you are accessing the same IMAP or Exchange mail account from multiple Macs running SpamSieve, it can be difficult to know which copy of SpamSieve needs to be trained to correct a mistake. There are several ways to deal with this (in order of preference):

1. Run SpamSieve on a single Mac and let it clean your inbox for all the Macs. All the training is done from that Mac. This is the simplest solution. It works well when the Mac with SpamSieve will be running most of the time, and when you can easily access that Mac to do the training.
2. Run SpamSieve on a single Mac using the drone setup. This setup works well when the Mac with SpamSieve will be running most of the time. When you’re away from that Mac, you can remotely train SpamSieve from any Mac, iOS device, or even via Web mail.
3. Run SpamSieve on all the Macs and uncheck the Auto-train as needed preference (on all the Macs). You can train whichever Mac you happen to be using at the moment. This will have lower filtering accuracy than (1) or (2) but is useful in situations when you do not have a single Mac that is always available for mail filtering. With auto-training off, you may find it especially helpful to enable allowlisting of previous recipients.
4. Run SpamSieve on all the Macs, being careful to only let one copy of SpamSieve run at a time, and to always correct all the mistakes before switching to another Mac. This will give better filtering accuracy than (3) but is a lot more work.

Server Spam Mailbox

If you have selected a local mailbox for storing spam messages, they they will only be accessible on the Mac that caught them. If you are using multiple Macs, we especially recommend that you store the spam on the server so that the same spam is visible on all the Macs.

Training Data

When upgrading to a new Mac or using setup (3) or (4) above, you can copy SpamSieve’s training data from one Mac to another. This is only recommended if the two Macs will be filtering the same mail account. Macs filtering different people’s mail should be trained separately for the best filtering accuracy.

Do not copy SpamSieve’s files using a file synchronization program or cloud syncing utility such as Dropbox while the SpamSieve application is running. Doing so can corrupt the files.

License Info

An individual user running SpamSieve on multiple personal Macs generally only needs to purchase one SpamSieve license. The Purchase… section of the manual has more information about the license policy.

iCloud Rule Syncing

Multiple Macs using the same iCloud account will automatically have the same rules in Apple Mail. If you want to use the SpamSieve rule on one Mac but not the other, you should uncheck it on the Mac where you want it to be disabled. Do not delete the rule because that would (through syncing) delete it from the other Mac as well.

POP Accounts

If you are accessing the same POP mail account from multiple Macs, you can safely run SpamSieve on all of the Macs simultaneously. Each Mac is entirely separate from the others, so you don’t have to worry about any of the training issues that IMAP and Exchange accounts have. The downside is that it’s more work to train each copy of SpamSieve separately.