One of the Modern features in Apple ’s Mail app in Lion ( Mac OS X 10.7 ) is a widescreen - well-disposed , three - chromatography column layout , exhibit your mailboxes on the leftfield , your substance list in the middle , and a subject matter trailer on the right . I love this layout — I used a Mail MBD - on to get it under Snow Leopard ( OS X 10.6)—but it ’s not without drawbacks .
One of those is that there ’s less room to display information about each message in the subject matter leaning . As a event , post shortens the date showing dramatically liken to what you ’d see in the “ classic ” mail service layout . Specifically , for message receive today , Lion Mail shows only the fourth dimension received ; for message meet yesterday , Mail displays just the wordYesterday ; and for messages have prior to yesterday , Mail displays just the date .
Macworld lector Lynn P. need to know if there ’s a way to get Mail to display both the dateandtime for all messages . Though I have n’t happen a means to display the date and time for messages received yesterday — Mail is downright dictated to use justYesterdayfor those message — with a scrap of skulduggery , it ’s possible to lend the engagement for messages received today , and to add the time to subject matter have prior to yesterday .
For content received today or prior to yesterday , Mail utilise your preference for clock time and appointment format , respectively , in the Language & Text Zen of System Preferences . Here ’s how to tweak those setting to get today ’s messages to also exhibit the date , and older messages to also exhibit the clip :
reach the Language & Text pane of System Preferences . Click the Formats tab key . The Dates formatting — specifically , the Short format in the Customize duologue for Dates — is what Mail apply for days prior to yesterday . The Times formatting — specifically , the unretentive format in the Customize dialog for Times — is what Mail habituate for today . But you ’ll notice that time selection are n’t listed in the Dates dialogue , and date choice are n’t list in the Times dialogue .
Here ’s the trick : get across Customize for Dates . place up your favorite date format in the Short field . choose everything in that subject area ( Edit : Select All ) and copy it ( Edit : Copy ) . Click Cancel to exit the Date - format dialog without saving your change . Click Customize for Times , and then set up your preferredtimeformat in the Short field . Now put the pointer at the end of the shortsighted - formatting field , press the right - arrow key ( to be sure nothing is selected ) , type a comma ( , ) , thenpaste(Edit : Paste ) the date - format you copied earlier . The result should look something like12 : 00 AM , 1 / 5 / 11 .
The data format is now pay back for content have today , but you still need to prepare it for former content . Select the intact Short discipline ’s contents and , again , transcript ( Edit : Copy ) , then click OK . get through Customize for Dates . edit everything in the poor - format field , and then paste ( Edit : Paste ) what you copied from the Times dialog . fall into place OK .
You should now have the same Short format , render both the timeanddate , in both the Times and Dates dialogs . ring armour ’s substance list should immediately contemplate these changes , displaying both the time and day of the month for all message ( except those received yesterday ) .
Note that these changes also affect the presentation of the Short particular date and time in other places throughout OS X — for lesson , the Date Modified and Date create newspaper column in Finder window . If you ever decide to go back to the original date and time formatting , you could just give the Customize window for date and time and , in the poor theatre of operations , erase the condensation for sentence and date , respectively .
