Feb 12, '04 10:00:00AM • Contributed by: dmmorse
The hint is this ... when you want to select several emails that appear consecutively in a list, click on the first email in the group and move your pointer in the vertical direction. No matter what was previously selected, Mail will interpret this action to mean that you want to select a new group.
Now, when you want to move a single email or a group of selected email, click on the email you want to move, and move your pointer in a more or less horizontal direction. Mail will understand this motion to mean that you want to move the selected email via drag and drop.
The above might seem a little confusing, as I find it somewhat difficult to explain the action. But try it, and you should notice how Mail treats vertical pointer movements differently than horizontal pointer movements when selecting emails. The same also holds true for the lists of groups and contacts in Address Book. I wouldn't be surprised if other apps have the same functionality.
[robg adds: Yes, this is a simple hint, but it does a nice job of explaining what I consider to be "UI oddness" in Mail. In TextEdit or Safari, for instance, if you select a chunk of text, click and hold, and then drag, it will move. Mail will work the same way within the text of a message, but the list is handled differently. No matter how long you click and hold on a message or group of selected messages, if your first mouse movement is "down" instead of "across," you'll change the selection instead of moving the group. I realize that chunks of text and lists are different types of objects, but this has always struck me as inconsistent behavior.]
