Setting up a scanner that files straight into Thaw

The best filing is the kind that happens while you walk away from the scanner. Here is how to get there with the scanners most households already own.

Find your address

In Thaw, open Settings. Each family or business has an email-in address that looks like leonard-family-k7m2p9qx@in.thaw.app. Copy it. Anything sent to it is filed under that family or business.

Your own email address is already on the allowlist. Add the scanner’s sending address too if it sends from its own (many do); otherwise mail from the scanner will wait in the Inbox as “from someone new” until you accept it once.

Brother and Epson: scan to email

Most Brother (ADS series, MFC) and Epson (WorkForce, ES series) scanners can send to an email address directly from the front panel.

1. In the scanner’s web setup page or the panel, find Scan to E-mail or Scan to Email Server.
2. Enter your outgoing mail server. Gmail works with an app password; most ISP mail servers work too. The scanner needs an address of its own to send from.
3. Add a one-touch destination with your Thaw address.
4. Set the default to PDF, color, 300 dpi, multi-page.

From then on: load the pages, press the button, walk away. Thaw files it within a couple of minutes.

ScanSnap: through a cloud folder

Fujitsu and Ricoh ScanSnaps prefer ScanSnap Cloud, which delivers to Dropbox, Google Drive or OneDrive. A Thaw folder watch for those services is the next connector on the roadmap; until it lands, ScanSnap Home can also email a scan, which works today.

Phone

Share a photo or a PDF to Mail, address it to your Thaw address, send. An iOS Shortcut that skips the email step is in the works.

What happens after the button

The document arrives as an Inbox item with its pipeline state: received, checking, reading, filed. The reader classifies it, pulls the facts, links it to whoever it concerns and records any dates. If it was not sure, the item is flagged “check this” rather than held. If the email had no attachment (an e-receipt, a confirmation), the email itself becomes the document.

If an address leaks

Issue a new one from Settings. The old address stops working at once. Update the scanner’s one-touch destination and carry on.