3. Creating, Sending, and Receiving Email
In Windows Live Mail, you can create and send an email
simply by clicking the New button on the toolbar, entering the necessary
email addresses in the To field, typing a message subject, typing your
message text, and clicking Send. That’s it; it’s that easy. When you
want full control over the way your message is created and sent,
however, you’ll want to follow these steps:
To create an email message, click the New button on the
toolbar. Alternatively, you can click the New options button to the
right of the New button and select E-Mail Message or press Ctrl-N.
The From field of your message is set to your default email
address and your email will be routed through the outgoing email
server associated with this account. If you’ve configured multiple
email accounts, the From field becomes a selection list from which
you can select the email address and email server to use (see Figure 4).
In the To field, and optionally the Cc or Bcc fields (click
the link labeled Show Cc & Bcc), enter the email addresses for
the people to whom you are sending the message. If you’ve created
contacts or contact groups, these are available as well by clicking
the Address Book button to the left of the To, Cc, or Bcc field.
Alternatively, you can enter part of a name or email address and
then click the name in the match list to fill in the contact
information automatically.
In the Subject field, type the message subject.
Click in the message body and then use the Font and Font Size
lists to set the desired font. After you type the text of your
message, click the Check Spelling button on the toolbar to check the
spelling.
To attach a file to the message, click the Attach button on
the toolbar. Use the Open dialog box to locate the file to attach,
and then click Open.
Click Send to send your email.
When you click Send, Windows Live Mail will always try to send
your email immediately. It won’t necessarily check for new email as
quickly as you might like, however. By default, Windows Live Mail
will:
Send and receive messages when you start the program.
Send messages when you click Send after drafting an email
message.
Check for new messages every 30 minutes and play a sound when
they arrive.
You can change the way Windows Live Mail sends and receives
messages by following these steps:
In Windows Live Mail, click the Menus button on the toolbar,
and then click Options.
On the General tab, shown in Figure 5, you can control the way
Windows Live Mail sends and receives email using the following
options:
- Play sound when new messages arrive
Clear this checkbox if you don’t want Windows Live Mail
to play a sound when new email arrives. Otherwise, select this
checkbox and Windows Live Mail will alert you when new email arrives by playing
a sound.
- Send and receive messages at startup
Clear this checkbox if you don’t want Windows Live Mail
to send and receive messages at startup. Otherwise, select
this option to allow Windows Live Mail to check for new email
and send email in your Outbox at startup.
- Check for new messages every
Clear this checkbox if you don’t want Windows Live Mail
to check for new messages automatically. Otherwise, select
this checkbox and enter the desired interval to allow Windows
Live Mail to check for new email sent to your configured email
accounts.
Click OK to save your settings.
You can manually send and receive messages for all configured
accounts by clicking the Sync Options button on the toolbar to the right
of the Sync button and then clicking “All email accounts,” or by
pressing F5. To send and receive email for a specific account only,
click the Sync Options button to the right of the Send/Receive button
and then select the account to use.
NOTE
Clicking Sync or clicking the Sync Options button and then
selecting Everything (Ctrl-F5) synchronizes all email, calendar, and
contact data with the Windows Live service.
