| name | spark-recipe-notification-hygiene |
| description | Tame notification overload by reclassifying noisy senders, grouping repetitive notifications, and bulk-archiving cleared alerts. |
| metadata | {"version":"1.0.0","requires":{"skills":["spark"],"accessLevel":"triage"}} |
Recipe: Notification Hygiene
Tame notification overload by identifying noisy senders, reclassifying misplaced mail, grouping repetitive notifications, and clearing out what's no longer relevant.
Prerequisite: Read the spark base skill for tool reference and filter syntax.
Access level required: triage.
Steps
Step 1: Assess notification volume
emails { "folder": "Inbox", "filter": "category:notification is:unread" }
Count the unread notifications. If the number is high, scan the sender list for patterns - which senders dominate?
Step 2: Identify noisy senders
Look for senders that generate high-volume, low-value notifications (CI bots, social media alerts, shipping updates after delivery, etc.).
Read a few to confirm they're noise:
thread { "message_id": "<id>" }
Step 3: Reclassify misplaced senders
Some "notifications" are really newsletters in disguise:
contact-action { "action_name": "changeCategoryNewsletters", "emails": ["noisy-digest@example.com"] }
Some are actually from real people and should be in People:
contact-action { "action_name": "changeCategoryPersonal", "emails": ["colleague@example.com"] }
These changes apply to all future mail from the sender.
Step 4: Group repetitive senders
For senders that are useful but send too often (CI systems, monitoring alerts):
contact-action { "action_name": "groupEmailsFromContact", "emails": ["ci-bot@company.com"] }
This collapses their messages into grouped entries, reducing inbox clutter while keeping them accessible.
Step 5: Bulk archive cleared notifications
For notifications that have been seen and are no longer relevant:
action { "action_name": "archive", "message_ids": ["<id1>", "<id2>", "<id3>"] }
Pass multiple IDs in a single call to archive in batch.
Step 6: Disable notifications for low-priority senders
For senders whose emails you want to receive but not be alerted about:
contact-action { "action_name": "unmarkContactAsImportant", "emails": ["alerts@service.com"] }
Tips
- The goal is to reduce the notification count to a manageable number, not zero - some notifications are genuinely useful.
- Reclassification at the contact level (
contact-action) is more effective than per-message (action) because it fixes all future mail.
- Grouping is a middle ground between keeping and blocking - the emails still arrive but don't flood the inbox.
- Run this recipe after a vacation or any period of inbox neglect to quickly get notifications under control.
- Combine with
recipe-newsletter-cleanup for a full inbox declutter session.
