OUTLOOK FOR PC

This guide is written specifically for Outlook 2003, but other versions are simlar.

Open Outlook. If you have not entered your account information yet, do so by following the directions on the http://wiki.williams.edu/display/docs/Email+Setup page.

Quick definitions: IMAP mail lives up on the mail server. You can view this mail from Outlook, Webmail or any client. POP mail lives on your computer. You can only view this mail from the one computer (with some exception for the Inbox if you have "leave mail on server checked in your client").

GENERAL OUTLOOK APPEARANCE

On the left is the Navigation Pane. This contains the “Favorite Folders” the “All Mail Folders” and the Outlook programs (Mail, Calendar, Contacts, Tasks, Notes) at the bottom. On the right is the Mail List window (with your email messages) and the Preview pane (the email message you are reading).

Favorite Folders – These are just shortcuts to your most used folders. To add a folder here, drag it from the All Mail Folders section. To remove, right click on the shortcut and remove it. The “Inbox” in this list is the local POP (Personal Folder) inbox, the “Inbox in facstaffmail.williams.edu” is the IMAP inbox

Personal Folders – these are folders that exist on your computer only, not up on the server. Most of these are not used when you are set to use IMAP. Normally the only one you will care about is the Sent Items folder because any mail sent out is in the Sent Items folder. If you are composing a message but want to save it for later rather than send it out immediately it will be in the Drafts folder. If you are unable to send a message for some reason (bad network connection for example), the outgoing message will be in the Outbox, so check there if you are having trouble. Unless you are set up in POP mode, you will not use the Inbox, Deleted Items or Junk E-mail folders.

IMAP Folders – these are mail folders that exist up on the server. These will often be listed under the server name (like facstaffmail.williams.edu)

Outlook Application list – To minimize or expand, put your cursor over the grey bar and move up or down.

VIEW MENU
Change the view layout:
Go to the View menu, Reading Pane, select Right, Bottom or None

Change how messages are listed:
If you don’t want messages “grouped” by day – View menu, Arrange by, uncheck “Show in Groups”

To get a short summary of the email message:
View menu, select Auto-preview

CHANGING THE EMAIL LIST WINDOW
To add, right click on a column header (like From). Select Field Chooser. Drag the field you want over next to another column header.
To remove, right click on the column header to remove, select Remove this column.
To move a column, left click and drag the column until you see red arrows pointing to where you want it.

MOVING, SORTING, DELETING AND PURGING EMAIL
To sort messages in any way – click on the column header (for example, From or Received to sort by person or by date)
Note “Deleting” a message is a two step process. First you mark the message for deletion (usually has a line through it). Then you purge the message which removes it from the server permanently.
To delete you can either right-click a message and select Delete, or you can click the X in your menu bar or you can hit the Delete key on your keyboard.
To Purge messages, go to the Edit menu and select Purge Deleted Messages.
To move a message, left click on the message and drag it to a different folder.

TOOLS MENU
To use Word to compose your email:
Tools menu Options, Mail Format tab. Select Use Word To Edit. (If you do not choose Word then Outlook is used to compose messages – you have slightly fewer editing options that way).

To create a signature:
Tools menu, Options, Mail format tab. Select Signatures at the bottom. Click New. Enter a name for the signature (since you can have more than one), then create it. If you want your signature to go out on all new messages, select it from the Mail Format tab. If you DON’T want your signature to go out on replies or forwards, don’t select it from the Mail Format tab.

Turn off Outlook junk mail filtering (recommended):
Tools: Options: Junk E-mail button: Select No Automatic Filtering (This is recommended because our mail server already does heavy filtering. If you leave Outlook filtering on then you will eventually get a false positive - legitimate mail filtered to your Junk folder).

COMPOSING EMAIL

Click New, a blank message will open.
To add an attachment click the paperclip icon and locate the file to attach, or you can drag and drop a file directly to the email message pane.
To change from HTML to Plain Text select the HTML pull down and switch. Don’t use Rich Text.
To create an importance for the message, select the red exclamation point or the blue down arrow (most recipients ignore this).
To add a BCC field (blind carbon copy meaning the address is hidden to the recipients) for your outgoing messages: if you are using Word to compose messages create a new message, click the Options button, select BCC. It will show up from now on. If you are not using Word, create a new message, click the View option, select BCC.
To add your signature (if you haven’t set it to add automatically), select Email Signature from the Options arrow, select your Signature, then copy and paste it into the message.
To check your spelling manually, select Tools: Spelling and Grammar.
To choose to not include the original message when replying, Tools: Options: Preferences: Email options. Change the option at the bottom.

ADDRESSES

Contacts, recently used email addresses (auto-complete) and LDAP (online name server)
Contacts are addresses in the Outlook Address Book.
Auto-complete addresses are ones that Outlook generates as you enter addresses in to the To: field. Outlook will learn these addresses and give you suggestions automatically as you start to type in the To: field.
LDAP is our online name server for looking up williams.edu addresses.
To pull email addresses from your contacts or from LDAP: In the To field, type in the persons name, or part or all of the last name. Auto-complete will give you suggestion, but if it does not have the one you want: Click the To… Select Contacts (your local address book) or LDAP (online name server). It should give you some options.
OR you can also type in part of a name to the To… field, then hit the Check Names button (person with a checkmark).
To add someone to your Contacts right-click on their address in the message (preview) pane, select add to Contacts.
To create a list open the Contacts icon at the bottom of the Navigation pane or select Go: Contacts. Click New Distribution List. Enter a name for the list (that you use), then Select Members. Again, select either your Contacts or LDAP for the source. Type in a name to the Members field and click ok. If there are multiple hits you can choose the one you want.
To remove a name from the autocomplete list, Select the unwanted name using the UP ARROW or DOWN ARROW. Press DELETE.

ADVANCED FUNCTIONS

To set up an email filter (RULE):

1. Tools: Rules and Alerts: New Rule: You can use the template or a blank rule. Normally you will be filtering mail based on either the sender, or on the subject line into a specific folder.
2. Choose “from someone to a folder” or “with specific words in the subject to a folder”.
3. Check “from people” or “with specific words”
4. In the lower box, click the underlined “people or distribution list” or the “specific words” and enter you criteria for filtering.
5. Click the underlined “specified” and choose the folder.
6. Other rules can be set up in a similar manner.

To add a button (like Purge) to your menu:
Right click on the blank area of your menu (like next to Help). Select Customize. Click on the Edit category on the left. Then drag Purge Deleted Messages up to your menu bar (like next to the X for delete would make sense)

Setup LDAP - How to look for on-campus email addresses in Outlook

1. If it is not set up yet: Go to Tools | E-mail Accounts | "Add a new directory or address book"
2. Internet Directory Service (LDAP)
3. Server Name: ldap.williams.edu
4. Click More Settings
5. Click the Search tab
6. In search base, put: o=williams (Note: "o" is the letter o, not a number)

Then, when composing a message, type the name to search for in the To field and click the Check Names button (looks like a person with a check next to them)