Volume 2009, No. 1
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Volume 2009, No 2 Law Office Computing Page Puritas Springs Software Law Office Computing VOLUME 2010, NO. 1 PURITAS SPRINGS SOFTWARE Lesson 5. Email How It Works to send the message to the INSIDE THIS ISSUE: local mail transfer agent. The Email (sometimes hyphenated transfer agent gets the desti- as e-mail) stands for electronic nation from the message by Lesson 5. Email 1 mail. Although it began as a using the part of the address Top 5 Free Utilities 1 hodge-podge of incompatible after the “@.” Once the loca- protocols, the introduction of Digital Inklings 6 tion of the destination system the Internet to the general Child Support 8 is returned from the Internet’s populace effected a necessary directory computers, the mes- Spousal Support 10 standardization that ultimately sage is forwarded to the re- Family Law Documents 13 made it what it is today. The (Continued on page 2) Probate Forms 14 standard in widespread use Ohio Estate Tax 16 today was first published in 1982 as the simple mail trans- U.S. Estate Tax 17 fer protocol (SMTP). U.S. Income Tax (1041) 18 Ohio Fiduciary Tax 19 It basically works this way. The sender’s email software for- Ohio Adoption Forms 20 mats the mail and uses SMTP OH Guardianship Forms 21 OH Wrongful Death 22 Loan Amortizer 23 Ohio Workers Comp 24 Top 5 Free Utilities Deeds & Documents 25 Bankruptcy Forms 26 It’s not a demo, it doesn’t ex- Office Management 28 pire, and there’s no strings attached. Enough trumpet OH Business Forms 30 blowing. What exactly does it OH Business Dissolution 31 1. LogMeIn. In our opinion, the do? It lets you remote control Living Trust/Estate Plan 32 undisputed leader of free utili- your Internet-connected com- HUD Settlement Forms 33 ties is a company called Log- puter remotely. That means MeIn. Guess what product you can access your office Web Sites & News 34 they make? Yeah, that’s computer from home (and vice In Good Humor 36 right—LogMeIn. Not only do versa) just as if you were right Technical Support 38 they make a phenomenal there in the office. How won- The ? Pages 42 product that you can buy, they derful. As if you don’t work Inbox 44 make a phenomenal product enough already, right? At any Product Upgrade Info 46 that you can download for free! (Continued on page 5) Page 2 www.puritas-springs.com Volume 2009, No 2 Outlook’s Secrets Lesson 5. Email—Con’t. Writing Tools. A dictionary tains transmission details and and thesaurus can be handy (Continued from page 1) when you’re writing an email. typically includes at least four It was swell of Microsoft to fields: ceiving agent computer. Finally, include these tools in Outlook, From—the email address (and the recipient “gets” their mail but they’re not easy to find. sometimes the name) of the from that computer using what’s First of all, they’re not accessi- sender. ble from the main window, known as the post office protocol only from the Message win- (POP3). To—the email address (and again sometimes the name) of dow where you create emails In actual practice, not all email the recipient. (guess that makes sense). works this way. Instead, email is You’ll find them on the Mes- transmitted like web pages using Subject—analogous to the RE: sage tab. Look on the far right the hypertext transfer protocol section of a business letter. and you’ll see the Proofing (HTTP). The difference to users group which includes both is significant. First, HTTP email Date—the local time and date tools. doesn’t require specialized soft- the message was sent. Backing Up. When we could- ware to convert your email into There can be any number of n’t find a section in the Out- SMTP and POP3. All you need other fields in the header such look Quick Steps book de- is a browser like Internet Ex- as carbon copy (cc), blind car- scribing how to backup Out- plorer or Firefox and you’re good bon copy (bcc) and other tech- look we soon realized why — to go. Hotmail is a good exam- nical information. Software like there’s no quick or easy way ple. Some advantages are that Microsoft’s Outlook allows you to to do it. For starters, you must you can send or get your email show or hide some of these download a Personal Folders using any computer by simply fields. Other header fields can Backup Tool from Microsoft visiting the site. With SMTP/ be viewed, but you need to dig online. The object is to save POP3 you can still use any com- to find them. In Microsoft Out- your pst file that contains all of puter, but it must have an appro- look, for instance, you can right your Outlook folders including priately configure email software click on an email in your Inbox the Inbox, Calendar, and package, i.e., Microsoft Outlook, and select Message Options. In Contacts. Typically everything to access your account. It’s not the Message Options dialog, in Outlook is contained in a too hard (usually) to configure there’ll be a section labeled single pst file which can ex- the software, but certainly it’s not Internet Header. There you’ll ceed 100 MB in size. Archived as easy as just logging on with see it all—more than you proba- data is contained in a separate your browser. bly wanted to know. Example fields are the “real” sender, and pst file. The backup tool is The Header designed to backup your pst every server the email travelled files. If you’ve ever lost all your Now that you’ve got a basic idea through en route. We’ve also contacts, or your email ad- of how email works, you might seen headers that included fields be wondering what email actu- dress book, or your stored log (Continued on page 3) of received emails, you’ll know ally is. In many ways it’s like a how important it is to back up word processing document. One this information. At the same distinction is that email has two time you’ll wonder why Micro- basic parts: the header and the soft chose to make it so hard body (as it turns out, word proc- to do. Our recommendation is essing documents usually have to go to Outlook help and type a secret header as well, so it’s backup. There you should find not as much of a distinction as a somewhat lengthy descrip- we’re making out). The body is tion of the entire process. the actual content of the email— the message. The header con- Volume 2009, No 2 Law Office Computing Page 3 Improving Lesson 5. Email—Con’t. Your Outlook There’s a number of ways that you can configure Microsoft (Continued from page 2) Security Outlook to help keep yourself related to spam score. How your organized and working more email software uses this informa- As we mentioned earlier, with efficiently. Here’s a few tips that tion is not clear, but it would the added pizzazz of HTML will help you do just that. seem that your privacy/security came security issues. While Folders settings establish a spam thresh- plain old text messages are rela- old. Emails that score higher tively impervious to scurrilous Outlook comes with a bunch of than the threshold value are intent, HTML messages are not. pre-defined folders, i.e., Input, HTML messages are diverted to the Junk Deleted, Sent Items, Outbox, E-mail folder in- capable of perform- Junk E-mail, etc. However, stead of the In- ing some ugly don’t overlook the fact that you tricks. Be- box. More on can create your own folders as that later. cause most part of the Personal Folders modern email group. Here’s an example. As a The Body software software publisher we consumer What can we comes de- office supplies at a feverish rate. faulted to the say about the Considering that most of our body? It’s just a HTML format, ordering (as well as confirma- bunch of text, it’s required that tions and tracking) is done you have some right? Well, yes and online, and that Staples provides no. Early email messages were security in place before rewards based on the amount, exactly that — just a bunch of you receive your first email. Most type and frequency of ordering, text. But, like the Virginia Slims anti-virus programs now come it’s helpful to store all Staples- commercials said, it’s come a with a component that specifi- related email in one spot. Ergo, cally scans incoming emails. Our long way, baby. Today, email we create a Staples folder. How that looks like old TTY text is in free AVG anti-virus software, for easy was it? About as easy as it the minority. There’s only two example, “stamps” each incom- is for Paris Hilton to make a bad ing email: “No virus found in this reasons it’s still around: (1) it’s movie. In Windows Explorer, universally compatible with all incoming message.”In addition, right-click the Personal Folders email software; and (2) plain text email software such as Microsoft item and select New Folder. is secure whereas HTML email Outlook, although it defaults to You’ll be asked to name the new HTML format, also deliberately can have hidden surprises. folder and it’s ready for use. fails to recognize certain aspects Regardless of the security risk, of HTML (i.e., hidden links) Flags today’s email traffic is predomi- unless you affirmatively acknowl- Here’s one that’s easily over- nantly in the HTML format edge the sender as a “safe” looked.