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| Mail From Afar |
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Mobile Computing March 2002 • Vol.8 Issue 3 Page(s) 110-111 in print issue |
Mail From Afar 10 Suggestions To Follow When Checking E-mail From A Notebook | ||
 If you are a frequent traveler who depends on e-mail to stay in touch with colleagues, clients, and family, you probably carry a notebook computer with you when you're on the road. If your notebook has all the power and features you need, you may have already abandoned your office desktop altogether in favor of the simpler life of a single computer. Using just one computer means all your e-mail is in one place, and it eliminates the need for complicated synchronizations. But what if you can't adopt a notebook as your only platform? Maybe your employer has a pool of notebooks that must be shared by those who are away from the office or your office work requires capabilities or peripherals not available on a notebook. Maybe your employer just doesn't realize the benefits of staying connected while on the road. Whatever the reason, here are some tips for anyone who has to manage e-mail across two (or more) computers. 1. Save your e-mail on the server. One of the simpler ways to manage your e-mail while you're away from the office is to set up your notebook to check the same e-mail account your desktop computer does. However, you want to instruct your notebook's e-mail program to leave copies of the messages on the server after they have been downloaded to the notebook so they will be available for download again when you return to your office. In either Outlook or Outlook Express, click the Tools menu and select Accounts. Click the Mail tab, select the appropriate account you want your notebook to check, click the Properties button, and select the Advanced tab. Click the Leave A Copy Of Messages On Server checkbox and click OK. You can read and reply to your e-mail as usual, but because a copy is left on the mail server, it will be downloaded again each (and every) time you check your e-mail. Unfortunately, you won't be able to tell previously read messages from new ones. This rather unsophisticated technique of keeping all your e-mail on your desktop computer only works if your trip is short and you don't check your e-mail frequently. It is most appropriate for casual e-mail users who don't want to deal with e-mail setup, forwarding, or other technical issues. 2. Use multiple e-mail addresses: case 1. If you use a primary e-mail account (you@work.com), and if your e-mail system provides forwarding services, you can have your e-mail automatically sent to a second account set up exclusively for your notebook computer (notebook@work.com). When you send e-mail from your notebook, set the Reply Address field to reflect your primary e-mail address. In either Outlook or Outlook Express click the Tools menu and select Accounts. Click the Mail tab, select the appropriate account, click the Properties button, and enter your primary e-mail address in the box labeled Reply Address. This results in e-mail messages and replies sent from your notebook to appear to have originated from your office PC. If you fail to do this, some recipients might think you've changed your e-mail address and update their records accordingly. The drawback to this method of managing e-mail is you have to remember to forward and then remove the forwarding capability from your primary account. 3. Use multiple e-mail addresses: case 2. Here's another multiple e-mail account approach that works well if you have three computers (home, office, and notebook) to manage. Assuming you use two primary e-mail addresses (myname@myjob.com at work and anothername@myhome.com at home), establish two additional accounts, one for each computer. For example, work@myjob.com would be configured as a second account on your office computer and home@myhome.com would be configured as a second account on your home computer. Configure your notebook to check both primary accounts. When you go away on business, you can use your notebook to check both accounts and forward the appropriate messages to either your home computer or your office computer by forwarding messages to either work@myjob.com or home@myhome.com. This strategy lets you read and respond to all your e-mail while you are out of town and still get messages into the right computer's inbox for archiving and reference purposes without having to remember to set up forwarding and remove the feature when you're finished. 4. Get it sent. In order to eliminate, or at least control, spam, many dial-up service providers use physically separate servers to handle incoming and outgoing e-mail. Many also require subscribers to use only mail servers under the control of the dial-up provider for outgoing e-mail. If you use more than one dial-up service on your notebook computer, or if you use a LAN (local-area network) connection at work and a dial-up connection when traveling, you should know how to change the name of the outgoing mail server. The name of the incoming mail server, of course, must never be changed because it represents the physical server where your incoming e-mail is stored until you retrieve it. In Outlook, click the Tools menu, select Accounts, click the Mail tab, and select the appropriate e-mail account. Next, click the Properties button and the Servers tab. In a typical LAN setup, the Incoming Mail field will contain something to the effect of mail.work.com and the Outgoing Mail text box might contain smtp.work.com. When traveling, you might use a nationwide dial-up service, such as EarthLink, which requires the Outgoing Mail setting to be changed to mail.earthlink.net. Other providers, such as AT&T Worldnet, do not require a change. Check with your provider. 5. Use your AOL or MSN account. If your employer hasn't provided you with a dial-up account, you may be able to use your personal AOL or MSN service to send and receive company e-mail when you travel. Most LAN-based e-mail connections simply require a usable connection to the Internet; they don't care how it is provided. When you are connected to your office network, a router or other gateway device usually provides that connection. When you dial into AOL or MSN from your hotel room, the same type of connection is provided via modem. Wait until the connection is established and the usual preliminary ("You've got mail") functions have completed. Minimize the AOL or MSN browser application and open your normal office e-mail application. You should be able to send and receive company e-mail from your normal mail server as if you were at your desk. 6. Working offline. If you must share your dial-up line with a telephone or fax machine, learn to work offline and connect to the Internet only when necessary. This is even more important if you receive a lot of e-mail in large batches. Both Outlook and Outlook Express have a Work Offline option located in the File menu. By selecting this option, you can stop either e-mail program from automatically sending and receiving e-mail messages at the regular time interval you may have configured in the programs' Options. Both programs connect to your mail server only when you specifically instruct them to, and they hang up immediately after sending and receiving any pending messages. Begin a session by connecting and downloading (receiving) your e-mail. Select Work Offline from the File menu. While offline, you can take your time reading and replying to the received messages. At the end of the session, connect a second time to upload (send) your replies.
Microsoft Outlook 2000 (but not Outlook Express 5.x) has the ability to limit the size of downloaded e-mail messages when it is using a dial-up connection. Click the Tools menu, select Options, and select the Mail Delivery tab. In the section labeled Dial-up Options (near the bottom of the window), check the Don't Download Messages Larger Than 100KB checkbox. You can adjust the maximum size of downloaded e-mail messages by changing the 100 to some other value. Because this limit is only in effect when you are using a dial-up connection, you don't have to remember to uncheck it when you return to your office's network connection. Unfortunately, Outlook Express doesn't offer this feature. 8. Use a browser-based e-mail interface. Many e-mail systems now offer a Web-based interface along with the more traditional POP3 services. This interface e-mail has to be accessed through a Web browser and is similar to the Hotmail or MSN interfaces with which you are probably familiar. Ask your e-mail provider if it provides this service for your existing e-mail address. One advantage of using browser access on your mobile computer is the e-mail remains on the server (unless you intentionally delete it) so it can be downloaded to your desktop computer when you return to the office. Another advantage is the body of a message can be read without downloading the attachment, letting you pick and choose the attachments you want to view while out of the office. If you share a notebook with other travelers, Web-based e-mail also eliminates the need to change an e-mail package's logon parameters for each new computer user. 9. Protect yourself. You should always use antivirus software to protect your computer from vandals, but this is especially true when traveling. You're pretty much on your own out there, and any built-in protection offered by your office network is unavailable. In addition, your IT staff and an alternate computer system are much farther away if something happens to your notebook. Make it a habit to update your virus definition file before leaving on your trip and always enable real-time e-mail protection. This instructs the antivirus software to scan all incoming e-mail messages and their attachments before they are placed on your PC's hard drive where they could infect your system. If you share a notebook computer, run a full virus scan as soon as you take possession of the machine and again before you turn it back in. 10. Manage your inbox. By default both Outlook and Outlook Express place incoming mail into a folder named Inbox. If you receive a lot of e-mail, you should turn on the Folder List view and create subfolders under Inbox for various customers, vendors, projects, activities, or other logical groupings. If you make a habit of moving your e-mail into the appropriate subfolder after you have read it, your Inbox will remain uncluttered and contain only items that still require your attention. To turn on the Folder List view, click the View menu and select Folder List. To create a subfolder, right-click the Inbox entry and select New Folder from the pop-up menu.  And Don't Forget. Before you leave on a business trip, be sure you close the e-mail program on your office computer. Otherwise, that important message you're waiting for may arrive back home on your desktop computer instead of on your notebook computer.  by Dick Archer |
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