E-Mail

One of the most popular uses of the Internet is sending e-mail. It's fast, 
free and you can attach files, such as pictures, documents, audio files, 
video clips, etc. To take advantage of this, you need to set up a few 
things on your PC to be able to use e-mail. 
First, let's take a look at how e-mail works. Your Internet Service 
Provider (ISP) has a computer called a mail server. Its only purpose is to 
take e-mail that you sent to the server and send it out on the Internet to 
the appropriate place so the recipient can get it. It also will receive e-
mail that others sent you and store it until you download it to your PC and 
read it. 

To be able to compose and send an e-mail to the mail server so it can send 
it out for you, or to connect to the mail server and download the e-mail it 
received for you, you need to install and configure a program on your PC. 
This program is called an e-mail client. 

E-Mail Clients

There are many e-mail clients available. Most of them are free, some of 
them offer an upgrade option to the professional version for a price. Your 
choice should be based on what features you need and which program you're 
most comfortable with. You can always switch to another e-mail program if 
you don't like what you currently use, don't find it user-friendly, or are 
missing some features. Also, keep in mind, that even though your ISP might 
recommend, urge, or insist on you using a certain e-mail client, it doesn't 
mean that you have to use that one. It's your choice, find what works best 
for you. 

Outlook Express

This is my e-mail client of choice right now. It is a compact, but powerful 
e-mail program. I like the way you can customize the layout and toolbars, 
set up filters, and manage multiple e-mail accounts easily. The most recent 
version of Outlook Express comes with Windows 98 SE or can be downloaded as 
part of the Internet Explorer 5 package from Microsoft at 
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/default.htm. There is a more 
professional version called Outlook which can be either purchased 
separately or comes with MS Office. It has built-in scheduling, calendar 
and other information management functions. 

Netscape Messenger

The Netscape e-mail client is part of the Netscape Communicator suite which 
can be downloaded for free from Netscape at 
http://www.netscape.com/computing/download/index.html. It is also pretty 
easy to use, and sufficient for the average home users. 

Eudora Light

Eudora is another good e-mail client which has been around for a while and 
is often adapted in business environments. You can download the light 
version for free from the Eudora web site at 
http://eudora.qualcomm.com/eudoralight/. If you like it, you can upgrade to 
Eudora Pro for $49.95. 
There are other e-mail clients available, but these are the top three. 
Chances are that your ISP recommended one of these or that you might have 
heard about one and want to try it. Either way, you choose the one you 
want, install it, and then it's time to configure it. 

What you need to configure the E-Mail client

After installing the e-mail client, you need to give it some information so 
that it knows where to get e-mail sent to you and how to send out e-mail 
you wrote. You need the following information to configure it, no matter 
which e-mail program you chose: 

- Your user name 
- Your password 
- The name of the incoming mail server 
- The name of the outgoing mail server 

Your user name is how you are identified by your provider and also the 
first part of your e-mail address. Some people chose to use their last 
name, or their initials, or first initial, middle initial, last name. So, 
if your name would be Mike Portnoy, you could use portnoy, mportnoy, 
msportnoy, etc. This is the easiest and also most boring way of choosing a 
user name. 
Your user name could be something more creative like couchpotatoe, 
catlover, ihateasparagus, or anything else funny and unique you can come up 
with. 

Either way, your ISP will ask you to pick a user name when you sign up, so 
choose it wisely because it will be the first part of your e-mail address: 
username@yourisp.com 

They will also require you to choose a password so that only you can 
download your e-mail. 

Earlier in this guide I mentioned that your ISP has a computer (or usually 
several) that handle mail by either receiving or sending it. These are also 
called incoming and outgoing mail servers. Sometimes they are called POP 
servers (incoming) - it stands for Post Office Protocol which is the 
technology used to retrieve the email from the mail server - and SMTP 
servers (outgoing) - it stands for Simple Mail Transport Protocol which is 
the technology used to send e-mail between e-mail servers. Your provider 
will give you the name of each. They could be something simple like 
mail.yourisp.com (incoming) and smtp.yourisp.com (outgoing), or something 
different, it depends on your provider. 

Set up your e-mail client

In the e-mail program of your choice, you need to enter all this 
information in the appropriate place, so that the program knows how to log 
in to the e-mail server and send and receive your e-mail. Most programs 
will launch a wizard when you open them for the first time after installing 
it and walk you through setting up your first e-mail account. The steps 
below are useful if you didn't get the wizard or need to set up your 
account again, or set up an additional account. 

In Outlook Express 5, go to Tools/Accounts/Mail/Add/Mail to start the 
wizard. First you enter your actual name, how it should be displayed as 
Sender. In the next screen, enter your e-mail address, which is usually 
your user name plus the @ symbol plus the ISP name, username@yourisp.com. 
They will tell you what it is. In the next field, enter your ISP's mail 
server names as discussed above. After that, enter your user name and your 
password. If you want Outlook Express to remember it so you don't have to 
type every time, check the box provided there. That's all you need to do 
and it's pretty easy with the wizard. 

In Netscape, go to Edit/Preferences, expand the Mail & Groups section, 
select Mail Server, and enter your username and the mail server names. If 
you click on More Options, you can check a box to remember your password. 

In Eudora, go to Tools/Personalities, right-click in the Personalities 
window and select New to start the wizard. You can either let wizard walk 
you through the process by selecting to create a brand-new e-mail account, 
or select to skip to the advanced setup to do it quicker. 

That's all you need to do. Now you're ready to send and receive e-mail.

Using e-mail

Now that you've set up your e-mail client, you can start sending and 
receiving e-mail. Sending e-mail is easy: select to create a new message, 
enter the e-mail address of the recipient (be sure to enter the entire 
address, it should be in the following format: username@ispname.com), type 
in a subject field, then type your message. When you're done, simply hit 
Send. If you're already online, the message will be sent automatically, 
otherwise you will be prompted to go online or it will dial automatically, 
depending on your setup. 

Address Book

But there is a lot more to e-mail which you will probably discover after 
using it for a while. First, you can set up an address book where you store 
the e-mail addresses from all your friends and relatives. This lets you 
store them electronically and you can address a new e-mail with one click 
instead of having to type in the entire e-mail address every time. And when 
you receive an e-mail from somebody not in your address book yet, you can 
add this person to your address book with just a click. 

Mailing Lists

Then you can set up mailing lists or groups where you group a number of e-
mail addresses, give the group a name, and then are able to send out one e-
mail to all members in that group. You could create a group for your 
relatives, one for your friends, one for your co-workers, one for the 
people in your French basketweaving class, anything you want. 

Rules and Filters

Another neat feature is setting up automatic tasks, they are called rules 
or filters. This lets you automate certain tasks so you don't have to do 
them by hand every time. For example, you could set up several folders to 
stay organized, then set up rules that move e-mail automatically into a 
certain folder if the e-mail contains a certain subject, comes from a 
certain sender, etc. Or if you have received a spam message, you can set up 
a rule that will automatically move any further e-mail you receive from the 
same sender into the trash. Or if you go on vacation, you could set up a 
rule that automatically replies to every e-mail you receive with a message 
saying that you will get back to the sender after you come back from your 
vacation. The possibilities are endless. 

Attachments

Then you can send attachments via e-mail, a very handy feature. Let's say 
you took some pictures on your vacation with your digital camera and saved 
them on your PC. You want to share some of them with your friends and 
relatives to show off what a great time you had getting wasted on 
margaritas, lying at the beach, and getting such a mother of a sunburn that 
the doctor at the emergency room asked you if you used to work at 
Chernobyl. How do you get those pictures to them? No need to save them on 
floppies, stick them in the mail and pray that they'll arrive this century 
in one piece. You can send them via e-mail. Create a new message, address 
it, enter your text, etc., then click on Attachment (usually a button with 
a paperclip on it). A dialog will appear asking you which file you want to 
attach. Simply use this dialog to maneuver to the folder that contains the 
file(s) you want to attach and select it. If you want to attach multiple 
files, you probably have to repeat this process for every file. When you're 
done and hit Send, the e-mail program will make a copy of the selected file 
(the original file on your hard drive will remain there untouched, don't 
worry) and send it to the recipients. With this method you can send any 
type of file, text documents, spreadsheets, video clips, sound files, 
picture files, anything. The only caveat here is that most ISPs limit the 
size of attachments, common limits are anywhere between 1 and 5 MB. If you 
have more than that to send, you might have to split it up and send 
multiple e-mails. 


http://www.PCNineOneOne.com