EMAIL

Email, or electronic mail, is the most basic form of computer-based telecommunications. Email is used for many purposes including exchanging information, communicating ideas, discussing issues, sharing files, and editing and reviewing manuscripts.

Email is one of the most popular and heavily used functions of computer networks. The ability to compose, send and receive messages within minutes and without regard to time is wonderful. With email, you can effectively avoid the routine delays associated with “snail mail” and the frustrations experienced by getting caught up in a game of "telephone tag."

I, for example, use email to communicate with my children, who are away at various schools and keep very different hours than I do. I also use it to communicate with colleagues here about our work whenever I happen to think of something. Email will make sense to you when you find the function it fulfills for you that somehow enriches your life.Email began to make sense to me when I started using it to communicate with an old friend I hadn’t seen in twenty years.

Once you have figured out how to use email, you can use it to communicate with all sorts of people. You can get a free email account through HOTMAIL at hotmail.com.

There are many different programs for handling email. Netscape and Internet Explorer, for example, both have email programs. They look a little different and function slightly differently, but essentially they handle the same basic functions:

INCOMING EMAIL FUNCTIONS

OUTGOING EMAIL FUNCTIONS:

OTHER OPTIONS:

Once you obtain an email account and your own address, you'll probably want to practice sending email messages. You can begin by sending one to yourself. Once you've mastered the basics by mailing to yourself, send an email message to your classmates.

Everyone who sends and receives email has an email address. Do not confuse the email address with a password. Your email address is public; it's like your mailing address. You give it to others so that they may reach you. Your password is private and you shouldn't give it to anyone.

Email addresses are important for all they can tell us. At first glance, these addresses appear strange and sometimes incomprehensible. However, there's a logic to them. For example, here's mine:

swan@cnsvax.albany.edu

Let's take a closer look at it. Every Internet email address has three parts:

When reading and deciphering an email address, the trick is to read it in reverse order, from right to left. The letters at the far right-hand end of the hostname are the most general designation and tell what kind of a site it is: EDU - educational, COM - commercial businesses, GOV - U.S. governmental/non-military, NET - special large network machines/companies/organizations, MIL - U.S. military sites and agencies, ORG - U.S. non-profit organizations, and others.

Other countries have their own two letter codes in the final part of their hostnames, e.g., UK for United Kingdom; CA for Canada; FR for France, etc. Because the Internet was created in this country, US was not originally assigned to U.S. domain names; however, it is used to designate state and local government hosts, including many public schools. With the tremendous growth of the Internet, state and city names are being added to the US designation as well.

The rest of the hostname, still reading right to left, tell you the name of the institution where the mail server is actually located, perhaps indicating a department or division, and finally, the name of the machine on which the mail server resides.

For example, my email address – swan@cnsvax.albany.edu – reading backwards, tells you that it is on the educational network, at the University at Albany, on the Computer Network Services' VAX mainframe. The rest of my address, the part to the left of the @ sign, is my personal account name, swan.

Your email address at HOTMAIL will be on a commercial network, at the hotmail server. Your unique user name (your "mailbox") will be the part to the left of the @ sign.