I run
Debian Unstable on my workstations, which can lead to "interesting" experiences with new versions of software. The latest interesting experience was the upgrade to
Evolution 2.24. In previous versions the default sort order for folders was the time and date the messages were received on my computer.
Due to some changes under the hood, the folders now appear to be displayed in a random order (at least, on my boxes that is the case). You can either go through every folder and change the order by right clicking on the column headers (like "Subject") and going Sort by -> Received.
Don't use the "Date" header, because if people sending you email have the wrong date on their computers (which is so common) the messages appear in random places in your messages list (and with over a 1,000 messages in my INBOX that is an issue).
The catch with this method is you have to change each folder. I have a lot of folders. A lot.
But it turns out you can save the view setting once you've made it in one folder and then apply it to all of them. Make the change. Then go View -> Current View -> Save Current View. In the dialog window that appears, select the "Replace existing view" option, and then select "Messages" from the list of views. Now, because Messages is the default view applied to folders, everything just works.
Thanks to mrcha in #evolution for pointing in the right direction of custom views.
