Rookery
Rookery sorts and guards

Why did this happen?

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A conversation was marked done, reopened, filed or handed to someone, and you weren't the one who did it. Rookery tells you why, in one plain sentence.

Ask why

There are four places to ask:

  • On the thread's history. Each line that changed something, like "Rookery filed this as a notice and marked it done", ends in Why?. Click it, or tab to it and press ?.
  • On a sticker in your inbox. Click They replied, Nothing to answer, Draft ready or any other sticker on a row to see why it's there.
  • On a reply's due time. In a conversation, Reply due by 3:40 pm ends in Why?: which priority it has and who set it, the inbox's reply target for it, and the business hours it counts in.
  • In the ⋯ menu. Open a conversation and choose ⋯ → Why is this here?. It explains three things: why the conversation is in this inbox, who has it, and why it's open, waiting, snoozed or Done.

What it tells you

Each answer is one sentence, then up to three short facts:

  • Who: a teammate by name (or you), or Rookery, and when.
  • What it read: when Rookery decided, the signs it went on. For example: "It's an automated email its own domain signed: a List-Unsubscribe header, a no-reply sender and nothing asked of you."
  • Next time: how to make it go differently.

For example:

  • You marked it done. Yes, it was you, at 3:04 pm. Reopen is right there.
  • Rookery reopened it because Dana wrote again. New mail from a person reopens a Done conversation, unless you set a rule for their mail.
  • Rookery kept it Done: 5 of Parcel Express's last 6 conversations here were marked done within a day, with no reply. Reopen it, and Rookery stops filing their mail on its own.
  • Rookery filed it in Reading as a newsletter from Tallyboard: it's a company's marketing email, not a person writing to you. A product update or a promotion with no unsubscribe link still reads as a newsletter when it's built like one: links through a click tracker, an open-tracking pixel, "View in browser". Not a newsletter? Treat the sender as a person on their page.
  • Rookery filed it as a notice from Card Co and marked it done when it read the email again. An older reading had left it open in your turn; reading the mail again with what Rookery knows now filed it. It only does that when nobody reopened or answered it.
  • Rookery filed it in Reading as a newsletter from Sky Deals: it's a list's issue, not a person writing to you. The facts say why, like "list mail that names no booking, order or bill of yours": a deal with travel or money words in it, and no booking, order or account number.
  • Rookery's drafts wait for Sam's yes because the inbox picked Sam to approve them. You can change that in Settings → Inboxes.

Fix it from there

When there's something to undo or correct, the answer offers it:

  • Reopen or Mark done, Unsnooze, or Undo an assignment.
  • Not a notice: also on Today → Review, beside everything Rookery filed today. Rookery filed a person's email as a machine's notice or receipt. Say so, and the email is a person's again, the conversation opens if the filing closed it, and Rookery treats that sender's mail as a person's from now on, in this inbox (or, for a team inbox, across the team's inboxes).
  • Stop filing their mail: someone said this sender's mail needs no reply. This turns that off, so their next email waits for a person.
  • Their mail needs no reply: the opposite, for a machine's email that reopened a Done conversation.

Where the reasons come from

Rookery keeps a short note of why at the moment it decides: which rule applied and which signs it read, like "a no-reply sender". It never keeps the email's words for this, and it never makes up a reason afterwards. A change from before Rookery kept reasons says so: "Rookery did this before it kept reasons, so it can't say more."

An answer only uses this conversation and its own inbox, so it never mentions mail you can't see.

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