E-MAIL
E-mail
(electronic mail) is the exchange of computer-stored messages by
telecommunication. (Some publications spell it email; we prefer the currently
more established spelling of e-mail.) E-mail messages are usually encoded in
ASCII text. However, you can also send non-text files, such as graphic images
and sound files, as attachments sent in binary streams. E-mail was one of the
first uses of the Internet and is still the most popular use. A large
percentage of the total traffic over the Internet is e-mail. E-mail can also be
exchanged between online service provider users and in networks other than the
Internet, both public and private.
10 Advantages of Email
1.
It's free!
Once
you’re online, there is no further expense.
2.
Easy to reference
Sent
and received messages and attachments can be stored safely, logically and
reliably. It's a lot easier to organize
emails than paper.
3.
Easy to use
Once
you’re set up, sending and receiving messages is simple. That goes for a host
of other email functions. Data storage and contacts can be accessed quickly and
easily.
4.
Easy to prioritize
Incoming
messages have subject lines that mean you can delete without opening. How much
time does that save compared to ‘snail mail?’
5.
Speed
Message
to send? Done, under a second! Email is as fast a form of written communication
as any.
6.
Global
Web
based email means you can access your messages anywhere online. Going overseas?
Before you go, mail yourself a copy of your passport number, travel insurance
details or your accommodation details.
7.
Good for the planet
Actually
the advantages and disadvantages of email are clear here. Computers themselves
aren’t 'green', but email offsets some of the damage by reducing the
environmental cost of contact.
8.
Info at your fingertips
Storing
data online means less large, space taking file cabinets, folders and shelves.
You can access information far quicker if you learn how to use email this way.
9.
Leverage
Send
the same message to any number of people. Adaptations are simple, too. If you
have a product or service to sell, email is an effective medium to get your
message out.
10.
Send reminders to yourself
Do
you use more than one account? Email yourself messages from work to home or
vice versa. Does the idea of two or more accounts seem complicated? It's not if
you know how to manage multiple accounts.
10 Disadvantages of Email
1.
Emotional responses
Some
emails cause upset or anger. A reply in the heat of the moment can’t be easily
retracted, but it can cause lasting damage.
2.
Information overload
Too
many people send too much information. They cover their backs citing ‘need to
know’ as the justification. Learn how to use email effectively and you’ll
reduce time wasted on this.
3.
Lacking the Personal Touch
Some
things are best left untyped. Email will never beat a hand written card or
letter when it comes to relationships.
4.
Misunderstandings
Emails
from people who don’t take the time to read what they write before clicking
‘send’. Time is wasted, either to clarify or, worse, acting on a misinterpretation
of the message.
5.
No Respite
Your
email inbox is like a garden; it needs to be constantly maintained. Leave it
and will continue to grow. Ignore it at your peril!
6.
Pressure to Reply
Once
it’s in your inbox, you feel an ever increasing obligation to act on it.
Procrastinating doesn’t making it go away. Do it, dump it or delegate it.
7.
Spam
Having
to deal with spam and spoofs is one of the worst avoidable time wasters
online. Use some anti spam software.
8.
Sucks up Your Time
Over
checking messages is so common, but it is time wasted on a low value, passive
activity. Better to check once or twice
a day.
9.
Too Long
How
long is too long? It’s hard to say exactly, but the longer it goes on, the
harder it is to take in. Email is suited to brevity - keep it short and sweet.
10.
Viruses
A
virus could seriously affect your computer. If you want to know how to use
email effectively, it's worth learning how to deal with these.
What is a Mail Server and How Does it
Work?
A
mail server (sometimes also referred to an e-mail server) is a server that
handles and delivers e-mail over a network, usually over the Internet. A mail
server can receive e-mails from client computers and deliver them to other mail
servers. A mail server can also deliver e-mails to client computers. A client
computer is normally the computer where you read your e-mails, for example your
computer at home or in your office. Also an advanced mobile phone or
Smartphone, with e-mail capabilities, can be regarded as a client computer in these
circumstances.
SMTP
and POP3 server
When
you press the "Send" button in your e-mail program (e-mail client)
the program will connect to a server on the network / Internet that is called
an SMTP server. SMTP is an acronym for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol and it is
a protocol that is used when e-mails are delivered from clients to servers and from
servers to other servers.
When
you download e-mails to your e-mail program the program will connect to a
server on the net that is known as a POP3 server. A POP3 server uses a protocol
named POP3 for its communication. That is the reason why it is called a POP3
server and POP3 is an acronym for Post Office Protocol version 3.
How can my e-mail program (e-mail
client) find right mail server on the Internet?
When
you start your mail program for the first time, you must normally enter e-mail
account information before you can use the program. You must for example
specify the name of a server for outgoing e-mail and the name of a server for
incoming e-mail. It is here you specify which SMTP server and which POP3 server
that your mail program will communicate with over the Internet. The servers can
be located anywhere on the Earth, but usually they are located in same country
as your client computer.
Can I use any mail server I want on
the Internet?
No.
The Internet service provider (ISP) that you use when you browse the Internet
will normally have mail servers that you can access for your e-mails (both
incoming and outgoing e-mail) but you can normally not access mail servers that
other Internet service provider own. The reason for this is that mail servers
only accept certain IP addresses (the IP addresses that the ISPs provides) and
if your IP address is outside this range you will be denied access to the
server.
There
are exceptions, however. In some cases you can download e-mail from POP3
servers provided by other ISPs. They will only check that your username and
password is correct. And there exists also standalone email servers on the
Internet that works independently of Internet service providers, and through
them you can send and receive e-mails if you have access to the username and
password. Many web hosting services provide this kind of stand-alone mail
servers.
How do mail servers find each other on the
Internet?
When
you send an e-mail from your local computer to a mail server, your e-mail has
just started it's journey to your recipient. Perhaps your receiver is on the
other side of the world, and then it's a very long distance that the e-mail
must travel before it arrives to your receivers computer.
Before
the mail server that your e-mail program communicates with knows where to
deliver the e-mail message it will examine the e-mail address that you have
specified as a receiver of the message. The mail server will extract the domain
name of the e-mail address and use it to locate the mail server (POP3 server)
that your receiver's client computer communicates with. The domain name is
found after the "@" character in an e-mail address. If for example
the e-mail address is john@abc.com, the domain name is abc.com. By using this
domain name as an address the mail server will find which mail server on the
Internet to deliver the e-mail message to. When the server has been identified
and it has responded that it will accept an e-mail delivery, the e-mail is sent
to this server. And next time your receiver logs on to the POP3 server via
his/her client computer, your e-mail will be downloaded to the person's e-mail
program. Normally all this will take just a few seconds, but if the mail
servers or Internet have a lot of traffic at that moment it can take some more
time.
CC and BCC
Carbon
Copy Section (cc)
·
Send a message to more than one person,
all the recipients will see the list of email addresses.
Blind
Carbon Copy Section (bcc)
·
The addresses won’t be seen by the
recipients.
·
When email is sent to a large group of
people who don’t know each other.
MIME
MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) is a standard which
was proposed by Bell Communications in 1991 in order to expand upon the limited
capabilities of email, and in particular to allow documents (such as images,
sound, and text) to be inserted in a message. It was originally defined by RFCs
1341 and 1342 in June 1992.
Using headers, MIME describes the type
of message content and the encoding used.
MIME adds the following features to
email service:
·
Be able to send multiple attachments
with a single message;
·
Unlimited message length;
·
Use of character sets other than ASCII
code;
·
Use of rich text (layouts, fonts,
colors, etc)
·
Binary attachments (executables, images,
audio or video files, etc.), which may be divided if needed.
MIME uses special header directives to
describe the format used in a message body, so that the email client can
interpret it correctly:
·
MIME-Version: This is the version of the
MIME standard used in the message. Currently only version 1.0 exists.
·
Content-type: Describes the data's type
and subtype. It can include a "charset" parameter, separated by a semi-colon,
defining which character set to use.
·
Content-Transfer-Encoding: Defines the
encoding used in the message body
·
Content-ID: Represents a unique
identification for each message segment
·
Content-Description: Gives additional
information about the message content.
·
Content-Disposition: Defines the
attachment's settings, in particular the name associated with the file, using
the attribute filename.
MIME types, used in the Content-Type header,
are used to classify documents attached to an email. A MIME type is comprised
as follows:
Content-type: main_mime_type/mime_subtype
A GIF image, for example, has the following MIME type:
The primary data types, sometimes called
"discrete data types," are:
·
text: readable text data
text/rfc822 [RFC822]; text/plain [RFC2646]; text/html [RFC2854] .
·
image: binary data representing digital
images: image/jpeg; image/gif; image/png.
·
audio: digital sound data:
audio/basic; audio/wav
·
video: video data:
video/mpeg
·
application: Other binary data: application/octet-stream; application/pdf
MIME types are also used on the Web to
classify documents transferred using the protocol HTTP.
Thus during a transaction between a web server and a browser, the first thing
the web server does is send the MIME type of the file to the browser, so that
the browser knows how to display the document.
Encoding formats
To transfer binary data, MIME offers
five encoding formats which can be used in the headertransfer-encoding:
·
7bit: 7-bit text format
(for messages without accented characters);
·
8bit: 8-bit text format;
·
quoted-printable: Quoted-Printable format, recommended for
messages which use a 7-bit alphabet (such as when there are accent marks);
·
base64: Base
64, recommended for sending binary files as attachments;
·
binary: binary format; not
recommended.
Since MIME is very open, it can use
third-party encoding formats such as:
·
BinHex (a
proprietary format belonging to Apple),
·
xxencode
The transfer-encoding header
is used to specify an encoding format for the message body, but it doesn't
solve the problem of encoding headers themselves (such as the message subject).
To encode headers with character sets
which use more than 7 bits, such as for including accented letters in an
email's subject, the MIME standard offers the following format:
=?charset?encoding?result?=
·
charset represents the character set used,
·
encoding defines the encoding desired with two possible values:
·
Q for quoted-printable
·
B for base64
·
result: text encoded using the method
specified.
Below is an example of Quoted-Printable encoding with "Building
façade" as the email's subject.
Subject: Building
fa=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=E7ade?=
With the MIME type
"multipart", the MIME standard allows for composite messages, meaning
messages which include multiple attachments, which may even be nested.
To do so, MIME allows for a standard
called boundary. This is an arbitrary string defined as an
attribute in the Content-type header:
Content-Type: multipart/mixed;
boundary="------------020005090303070203010601"
Each separator delimits a portion of content beginning
with the headers Content-Type and Content-Encoding.
It is essential that the value of this separator is not found within the
message contents.
There are several types of separators:
·
multipart/mixed defines a series of
multiple elements
·
multipart/alternative defines
alternatives for the same information, such as a message in either text and
HTML format. If the email client is able to display messages with a layout and
configured to do so, it will show the HTML version; otherwise, it will display
the test version.
·
multipart/parallel defines data present
at the same time (such as sound and image).
·
multipart/signed defines a digital
signature for message data
·
multipart/related defines related pieces
of information
MIME types are standardized by a group
called the IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority).
Here is a non-exhaustive list of the most common MIME types.
MIME Type
|
Type of file
|
Associated extension
|
application/atom+xml
|
Files in ATOM format
|
atom
|
application/iges
|
CAS files
|
iges
|
application/javascript
|
JavaScript files
|
js
|
application/dxf
|
AutoCAD files
|
dxf
|
application/mp4
|
MPEG4 files
|
mp4
|
application/iges
|
IGES CAD exchange format
|
igs,iges
|
application/octet-stream
|
Non-interpreted binary files
|
bin
|
application/msword
|
Microsoft Word document files
|
doc
|
application/pdf
|
Adobe Acrobat files
|
pdf
|
application/postscript
|
PostScript files
|
ai,eps,ps
|
application/rtf
|
Rich text format
|
rtf
|
application/sgml
|
SGML files
|
sgml
|
application/vnd.ms-excel
|
Microsoft Excel spreadsheet files
|
xls
|
application/vnd.ms-powerpoint
|
Microsoft Powerpoint presentation files
|
ppt
|
application/xml
|
XML file
|
xml
|
application/x-tar
|
Compressed tar files
|
tar
|
application/zip
|
Compressed ZIP files
|
man
|
audio/basic
|
Basic audio files
|
au,snd
|
audio/mpeg
|
MPEG audio files
|
mpg,mp3
|
audio/mp4
|
MPEG-4 audio files
|
mp4
|
audio/x-aiff
|
AIFF audio files
|
aif,aiff,aifc
|
audio/x-wav
|
Wave audio files
|
wav
|
image/gif
|
Gif images
|
man
|
image/jpeg
|
Jpeg images
|
jpg,jpeg,jpe
|
image/png
|
Images PNG
|
png
|
image/tiff
|
Tiff images
|
tiff,tif
|
image/x-portable-bitmap
|
PBM Bitmap files
|
pbm
|
image/x-portable-graymap
|
PBM Graymap files
|
pgm
|
image/x-portable-pixmap
|
PBM Pixmap files
|
ppm
|
multipart/x-zip
|
Zip archive files
|
zip
|
multipart/x-gzip
|
GNU zip archive files
|
gz,gzip
|
text/css
|
Style sheet
|
css
|
text/csv
|
Comma-separated text files
|
csv
|
text/html
|
HTML files
|
htm,html
|
text/plain
|
Unformatted text files
|
txt,g,h,c,cc,hh,m,f90
|
text/richtext
|
Rich text files
|
rtx
|
text/rtf
|
Rich Text Format text files
|
rtf
|
text/tab-separated-value
|
Tab-separated text files
|
tsv
|
text/xml
|
XML files
|
xml
|
video/h264
|
H.264 videos
|
h264
|
video/dv
|
DV videos
|
dv
|
video/mpeg
|
MPEG videos
|
mpeg,mpg,mpe
|
video/quicktime
|
QuickTime videos
|
qt,mov
|
video/msvideo
|
Microsoft Windows videos
|
avi
|
POP3 and IMAP
POP3 and
IMAP are two different protocols (methods) used to access email.
Of the two,
IMAP is the better option - and the recommended option - when you need to check
your emails from multiple devices, such as a work laptop, a home computer, or a
tablet, smartphone, or other mobile device. Tap into your synced (updated)
account from any device with IMAP.
POP3
downloads email from a server to a single computer, then deletes it from the
server. Because your messages get downloaded to a single computer or device and
then deleted from the server, it can appear that mail is missing or disappearing
from your Inbox if you try to check your mail from a different computer.
To learn how
to get your AOL Mail on your mobile device, please visit our help article AOL Mail: Mobile Mail.
To learn how
to access your mail through a third-party email client (like Outlook, Mac Mail,
etc.) please visit our help article How do I access my mail through a
third-party email client?
Here are the
differences between POP3 and IMAP.
POP3 - Post Office Protocol
|
IMAP - Internet Messaging Access
Protocol
|
You can use only one computer to
check your email (no other devices)
|
You can use multiple computers and
devices to check your email
|
Your mails are stored on the
computer that you use
|
Your mails are stored on the
server
|
Sent mail is stored locally on
your PC, not on a mail server
|
Sent mail stays on the server so
you can see it from any device.
|
________________________________________________________________________________
Today I learned about the
email, every day and almost all people use email intended to communicate with
each other no matter near or far. On this topic I 've learned that there are
advantages and disadvantages in the email. Basically email we will send
directly to the new mail server and delivered to recipients. I can also see
where the CC and BCC recipients can see other recipients, while BCC recipient
does not know who the other recipients. In this topic I can also tell the
difference between IMAP and POP. It is knowledge that is useful to use in the
future.
