Brief Description
The most popular Internet feature is electronic mail or e-mail. Using e-mail, people can send messages to other people anywhere in the world. E-mail is just like traditional mail (called "snail mail" by Internet folks) only much quicker. This activity covers how to setup Netscape/Communicator e-mail so you can send and receive messages from within Navigator/Communicator and places on the Internet where you can learn more about using e-mail.
Activity Description
People want to socially interact or connect in any medium and the Internet is no different. To this end, the most common form of communication used is electronic mail or e-mail. E-mail allows you to communicate with anyone in the world, if you know their e-mail address. E-mail addresses are places on a specified mail server where your mail is sent and received, similar to a postal address. E-mail is passed along by mail servers until it arrives at its' final destination. E-mail can be simple text messages, files attached to messages, and even multimedia messages that include sound or video. To use e-mail, you need an e-mail account on a mail server. Each time you use Netscape Navigator/Communicator, you must setup your e-mail information so you can send or receive e-mail messages.
Visit the Beginners guide to effective e-mail and the etiquette for e-mail Websites (see Internet Resources) to learn more about the use of e-mail on the Internet. You can also visit the Netscape Website to learn more about using the Navigator e-mail function.
Within Netscape Communicator, as with all the other e-mail programs,
you must define your designated mail server location and address before
you can use the e-mail program. Note: If you are using Netscape
e-mail in a Windows/95 computer lab on campus, you can skip this step because
your e-mail has already been setup for you when you logged onto the computer.
Do this by selecting the Mail and News Preferences option from the
Options menu in Netscape Navigator 2.0 or later. This opens a dialog
box where you should select the Servers button which displays fields
that you must fill-in including your mail server, your e-mail address,
where Netscape should store you email messages, maximum message size, what
Navigator/Communicator should do when it retrieves mail from your server,
and how long it should wait before it checks for new mail.
Once you have established your mail server information in Netscape Navigator,
open it by selecting the Netscape Mail option from the Window
menu in Netscape 3.x or by selecting the Messenger Mailbox option
from the Communicator menu in Netscape 4.x. This will open a new
window overlaying the Netscape Web window and display incoming and outgoing
mail windows. Notice the Netscape 3.x Mail Reader window has three sections-one
for reading mail people send to you, called the InBox (the upper-left-hand
quadrant), one for outgoing mail (the upper-right-hand quadrant), and one
for reading mail messages (bottom-half of screen). Communicator, or Netscape
4.x, has a screen split into two sections - the top-half showing the messages
in a folder and the bottom-half showing a single e-mail message.
To read mail in Netscape Navigator 3.x, select the Get New Mail
option from the File menu or use the GetMail button. In Netscape
Communicator 4.x, select the Get Messages ... New option from the
File menu or click on the Get Msg button. The first time
you use the e-mail feature you will be prompted for your e-mail password
which you must enter to retrieve your messages. Click on the OK
button and Navigator/Communicator will check the mail server for any new
e-mail. If you have any new e-mail, it will be listed in your InBox
folder. Clicking on the message will open it and display the contents
in the bottom-half window.
If you want to send mail from within Netscape Navigator, select the
New Mail Message option from the File menu or click on the
To: Mail button. Within Netscape Communicator 4.x, select the New
... New Message option from the File menu or click on the New
Msg button. A message composition window will open and you can type
in your e-mail message. Enter a subject, the e-mail address the message
is going to be sent to, copies of the message to send to other folks (in
the Cc: field), and then type the actual content of the message. After
typing the message content, click on the SendNow button to submit
it. You can also attach files to any message you send by clicking on the
Attach button and create and maintain a list of your popular e-mail
addresses using the Address or To: button. See the Navigator
on-line help for more on these options.