Tools Menus.
On the main window, click on the Tools menu, and then on "Options". You will get a display of an options selection panel, with several "card tabs" and many options. As before, you really need to play with these to understand them.
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Each of these tabs presents a different range of selections. Many of them work in common with the options for Internet Explorer. |
Here are my recommended selections, with reasons why. Most of these reasons have to do with my desire to have control, rather than let the program make decisions for me. Unless I say "uncheck", check the options I suggest. You can change them later to your own preferences, but remember to experiment.
General.
When starting, go directly to my 'Inbox' folder. Seems the most obvious place to start.
Play sound when new messages arrive. Quite useful if you are doing something else but have the computer connected.
Check for new messages every 10 minutes: BUT if my computer is not connected, do not connect. I want to control the connection, since I do not use continuous connection.
Read.
Mark messages read after displaying for 2 seconds. Unread messages show their headers in the header pane in bold; helps me to manage my reading habits.
Automatically download .... This one only seems to apply to newsgroups, where you have the option of downloading only the messages that interest you.
Send.
Save copy of sent messages in the 'Sent Items' folder. I can always delete less important messages later.
Uncheck.. Send messages immediately. I want to control when messages are sent. Maybe I will want to change something before it goes out. With this unchecked, all "sent" messages go into my "Outbox" or out basket, waiting for the "office boy" to come and take it to the mail room; this happens when I click the Send/receive button on the main window.
Automatically put people I reply to .... Quite useful when you first start using Outlook Express, but I unchecked it once I had a reasonable number of contacts in the Address Book. Now I can put them in there if and when I wish.
Automatically complete e-mail Addresses .... Makes it much simpler when you are composing e-mail to go to a regular correspondent. As soon as you type in a name the program begins to scan your address book.
Uncheck.. Include message in reply. I just hate to see e-mails which include string and strings of previous material. It makes the messages too long, and I can always go back and look at an earlier message if I need to. If I am replying to a long e-mail I can go back and pick out bits of text to copy and paste; this strikes me as being more useful than copying the whole lot.
Uncheck Reply to messages using the format .... etc. See my reasons below for not using HTML format.
Mail sending format. Plain text.
HTML is very pretty in some ways, but it is not appropriate in a short message system. Besides, HTML e-mail is one of the routes by which some types of virus are transmitted. Also, HTML messages are longer than plaintext message, because the messages are sent out in two different formats within the one message. When you are composing a message, you can override this option to send in HTML (Rich Text Format) if you wish.
Compose.
No stationery. It uses HTML.
Signatures.
Uncheck ... Add signatures to all outgoing messages. Again a preference for control. You can have more than one signature, and add whichever one you choose, normally at the end of your text.
Spelling.
Uncheck... Always check spelling .... Again, I want to control. It's a little annoying when you have picked up a message from the Outbox to make a little change and it goes through the routine again when you click on "Send".
Suggest replacements for ..... Helpful.
Check all the abc boxes recommending ignoring some words.
Security.
I check the Internet zone, and uncheck everything else. As I am using the system only for home I have no worries about security. It would be different if I was in business sending highly sensitive material.
Connection.
Ask before switching dial-up connections. Again, I like to be in control.
Uncheck Hang up after .... I may want to compose an answer and send it out during this session. Now that internet service is so cheap, there is no longer any point in switching off the connection so that you can compose your answer off-line, provided that the answer is short.
This button takes you to the connection options for Internet Explorer. Leave alone for the moment. It will only become important if you have more than one dial-up connection or are using a networked computer.
Maintenance.
Empty messages from the ...... Deleted messages are stored in the 'Deleted Items' folder, and can be retrieved if need be. But once I exit I don't want a build up of old deleted items.
Compact messages in the background. This is a maintenance task performed for you, to keep the message folders "clean".
© James Nelson, 2001.