Mail Call: A Guide to Customizing your E-mail at Ole Miss

Seminar Notes

http://www.olemiss.edu/depts/it/
http://www.olemiss.edu/depts/it/seminars/guides/guides.html
http://www.mcsr.olemiss.edu/bookshelf/doc/e-mail/e-mail_table.html

E-mail Host Systems Used at Ole Miss

sunset - All new official accounts. Bring ID to IT Helpdesk in the lobby of Weir Hall.
cedar - some older official accounts are here.
cypress - some remote MCSR users have accounts here.
departmental servers - some users have accounts on these.
off campus Web-based e-mail - e.g., hotmail, Netscape mail, yahoo mail, etc.
ISP provided mail - watervalley.net, AOL, MSN, etc. Others

Protocols for Retrieving E-mail from Servers to Clients

POP - all IT e-mail servers (sunset); http://webopedia.internet.com/TERM/P/POP2.html
IMAP - more server-side features; http://webopedia.internet.com/TERM/I/IMAP.html

WebMail Ole Miss

• New as of Summer 2002, replacing pine as the campus solution for server-based e-mail management.
• http://webmail.olemiss.edu/
• WebMail Users' Manual
• Pros:
  1. Send e-mail securely from any internet-connected computer with a Web browser, including your friend's office, your home, or the conference you are attending. (You can do this even if you normally "pop" your e-mail to your PC at work...even if you read it in WebMail, the read messages will still be popped to your PC next time you log in, but you must have closed your PC mail program prior to leaving the office.)
  2. Easier to use that the old pine e-mail client.
  3. No installation of software is necessary on your computer.
  4. Interface is similar to hotmail, netscape mail, yahoo, or other Web-based e-mail services.
  5. No ISP dependencies: you should have the same capabilities to send and receive e-mail, regardless of which Internet Service Provider you are using. (Watervaley.net, Dixienet, BellSouth, etc.)
  6. You can reject e-mails and all future e-mails from the same sender, helping reduce spam.
• Cons: (as opposed to a PC or MAC-based e-mail client)
  1. Since e-mails are stored on the server, you have to live within your sunset quota.
  2. Since e-mails are stored on the server, if sunset or the network is down, you won't be able to compose e-mails, or view previously received e-mails.
  3. You can only see one page of e-mails at a time. Click left and right arrows to move from page to page.
  4. The interface might not be as powerful as a PC or MAC-based e-mail client.
  5. Remember to log off!
     

Prevalent E-mail Clients at Ole Miss

• Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express - pop client for Windows platforms
  Pros:
  • Express free with Internet Explorer: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/oe/
  • Can "pop" mail from POP3 servers (sunset): sunset.backbone.olemiss.edu
  • Can download e-mail from http servers (hotmail): http://services.msn.com/svcs/hotmail/httpmail.asp
  • Can send and receive mail hosted by ISPs.
  • Easy to use
  • Supports filtering, attachments, address books

  Cons:

  • For MS Windows platforms, Outlook is to computer viruses what shared hypodermic needles are to human viruses
    • Never open (double-click) an Outlook message from an unknown source.
    • Never open (double-click) an Outlook message with an attachment (as signified by a paperclip symbol) unless:
      • You trust the source, and
      • You were expecting the attachment.
    • Many computer viruses spread by reading your Outlook address book and secretly e-mailing themselves, to all your friends and contacts, disguised as friendly messages from you.
    • Periodically, do a Windows Update, to get the latest Windows Service Paks, Security Patches, Office Service Releases, and IE releases, which will protect your computer from attacks through known security holes.
  • May have difficulty sending or receiving sunset e-mail off campus when connected via certain online service providers. (Temporarily change your SMTP server from sunset.olemiss.edu to a server name supplied by your ISP. Change it back the next time you pop e-mail from the Ole Miss campus network.

   

• Eudora - pop client for Windows or Macintosh systems
  Pros:
  • Eudora Light is a free version available from the Eudora Web site: http://www.eudora.com/e-mail/index.html or from IT Helpdesk site: http://www.olemiss.edu/helpdesk/resources.html
  • Can be used with IT's POP servers (sunset, etc.) or with ISPs.
  • Less susceptible to the spread of viruses than Outlook.
  • Preferred PC client of UM Office of Information Technology.
  • Supports filtering, attachments, address books

  Cons:

  • Can not be used with Web e-mail such as hotmail.
  • Eudora Light users must endure annoying advertising, or pay to upgrade to Eudora Pro.

   

  
  Leaving Mail on Server

  • When you don't always check e-mail from the same machine/client.
  • Automatically, when you use pine
  • Can configure PC/Mac e-mail clients to leave e-mails on server
  • For client-specific instructions on leaving mail on the server, see the e-mail client feature matrix.
  • Sunset Quota:
    40 MB - warning e-mail sent
    50 MB - account becomes crippled until enough e-mail is deleted

  Forwarding

  Each UNIX account you have is a candidate for receiving e-mail. If you don't want the burden of logging in to and checking e-mail on all of your various UNIX accounts, you can forward your e-mail from all of your secondary accounts to your primary e-mail account. Forwarding can be set up at E-mail Forward Form .
  

  You can also configure your desktop pop e-mail client to forward mail after popping it from the server, using filtering.

  Vacation Messages

  When you are going to be away from the office or unable to read your e-mail for a day or more, you arrange for an ""I'm out of the office" type message to be automatically sent to the sender of each e-mail sent to your account while you are away.
  
  If you use a UNIX e-mail client such as pine, two UINX commands have been prepared on sunset to provide assistance for setting up these auto-reply messages:

  
  going_out
  
  coming_in
  

  The going_out and coming_in scripts are actually just friendlier interfaces to the Unix vacation command. To learn how to use the vacation command to exert even greater control of your vacation messages, see the Unix man pages for vacation. In general, going_out creates an entry in your .forward file which forwards incoming mail to a vacation script, which responds to the sender with the message in your .vacation.msg file, which going_out also creates. If you want to have this auto-reply, AND forward the incoming message to yourself at some other account, then you may run the going_out script, and then edit (pico) the .forward file, adding a second line/entry with your target e-mail address. Be careful. If you make a mistake, you can undo the damage with the coming_in script, then try again.
  
  If you use a PC e-mail client, you may use a filter to set up auto-reply messages.

   

  Filtering

  Filtering allows you to organize incoming and outgoing mail into folders. Eudora, Outlook Express, and Netscape Messenger all support filters. Filters can be used to handle "Spamming," to guard against viruses. The following links explain how to set up filters for your e-mails. For client-specific instructions on setting up filters, see the e-mail client feature matrix.

   

  Attachments

  Attachments are files that you "attach" to an e-mail. These may be text files, MS Word files, picture files, etc. For client-specific instructions on sending and receiving attachments, see the e-mail client feature matrix. Never open an attachment that you were not expecting, even if it is from someone you trust.

   

  Address Books

  Each e-mail client has it's own method for managing address books--tools which associated easy-to-remember names and nicknames with harder-to-remember e-mail addresses. Address books can also be used to group e-mail addresses into mailing lists. For client-specific instructions on using address books, see the e-mail client feature matrix.

   

  Miscellaneous

For Assistance, Contact the IT Helpdesk:

Weir Hall
www.olemiss.edu/helpdesk
662-915-5222
helpdesk@olemiss.edu
Please provide as much information about your problem as possible. For example: which client software you are using (e.g., Eudora, Outlook Express...); how are you connecting (direct network connection, nexus dial-up, ISP dial-up ...); is it a retrieval problem, connection problem, sending problem, etc.