I'm trying to clean up my Gmail inbox which has become swamped. My first step is to unclutter it by breaking it up into folders of related mail. That will let me deal with incoming mail appropriately and attack the older mail in chunks as I can get to it.
My problem is detailed below, but is, in essence, "How do I move a search-filtered set of emails into another folder?" Not to the archive. Not merely labelling them (which drag-and-drop also does). Moving them from the Inbox to another specific folder in my own folder hierarchy—and not all emails in my inbox, just the specified ones (as opposed to this post: How to move all (not just showing) mails in gmail to another folder?).
Here are the details (aka, what I already know how to do):
It is easy to check a number of emails on a given page. If one wants to select specific emails (say, from a given sender in this example) out of the Inbox, one can use a search filter.
One can also check the emails selected by the filter in a method similar to just checking them in the Inbox.
The problem is that the Move button now changes from a picture of a folder with the drop-down to choose which folder, into a button with the text "Move to Inbox". The messages are already in my Inbox. I'm trying to move them out into another folder. That's what most people would want to do, most of the time. Yet, that's the one functionality that has been taken away.
So how do I move those emails into a folder?
Being able to do it for more than a page's worth of emails would also be handy. FWIW, the Qs and As posted so far on this site (and others, like here: http://www.justanswer.com/computer/4e06z-gmail-how-move-large-number-emails-folder.html) don't answer this question, at least not that I have found.
If there is another article, or version, or I'm missing something obvious, that's fine. I'm not proud. Tell me it's simple. So much the better.
I just want an answer, as not having one is the reason my Inbox has become unmanageable to begin with.
My setup: Chrome on Win 7.
Best Answer
The key is to labels and archive.
Every new message starts with the inbox label and the all mail label.
New labels can be added via filter when the email arrives, or manually by selecting a message and either adding a label via the label drop down, or doing a combination of adding a label and archiving by using the "Move to" drop down.
A powerful part of gmail is the fact that each message can have multiple labels. This is better than a folder.
If you archive a message/conversation it strips the inbox label from the message leaving the other labels intact. When you start archiving you are
To move them from the front page of gmail you must archive them. The labels on the side of the screen are a just an easy way to see all messages that have that label. It will find messages that have the inbox label, those that only have that label, and ones that have multiple labels.
The move to inbox command you see actually adds the inbox label to the messages, which essentially un-archives the message.