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Email Triage

Source: hooks/ways/ea/email/email.md

Frontmatter
Field Value
description triage my email, scan inbox for unread messages, classify and filter email threads, what needs a reply
vocabulary triage inbox unread email scan messages filter noise priority action required check email review mail urgent reply thread
refire 0.15
scope agent, subagent

Scan emails across all accounts for a given time period, filter noise, cross-reference with calendar and tasks, and present an intelligent summary.

Workflow

  1. Determine date range. Parse relative references ("last 24 hours", "since Monday") into timestamps.
  2. Fetch inbox per account. Get messages for the period, read full content, extract headers (From, To, Subject, Date), note thread IDs.
  3. Check response status. Fetch sent messages for the same period. If an inbox message's thread has a sent reply with a later timestamp, the user already responded.
  4. Fetch calendar for the same period to cross-reference meetings with email threads.
  5. Cross-reference with open tasks. For each action-required email:
  6. Does an open task already cover this? Note the match.
  7. Does this email resolve an existing task? Prepare a completion suggestion.
  8. Does this email create a new obligation? Prepare a creation suggestion.

Presentation Structure

Section Content
Action Required Emails needing response that the user has NOT replied to, ranked by urgency
Already Addressed Messages with sent replies found in thread. Brief note of what was said.
Calendar Cross-Reference Upcoming events with related email threads noted
Sent Items of Note Outbound emails that may generate follow-ups
Open Tasks in Play Tasks related to people/clients/topics surfaced in this triage
Suggested Task Actions Create / Complete / Update / Stale? (see tasks way)
Filtered as Noise Brief count of what was excluded
Suggestions Scheduling recommendations, deadline reminders, follow-up nudges

Filtering Rules

Filter OUT: purchase receipts, shipping notifications, marketing, automated alerts, recruiting spam, subscription renewals.

Filter IN: real people expecting responses, meeting-related threads, deadlines, invitations, anything mentioning the user by name.

When uncertain: include with a note rather than filtering out.

See Also

  • email/drafting(ea) — drafting workflow for outbound email
  • trust/voice(meta) — voice and attribution in email