Microsoft Outlook Express

E-mail has become one of the most popular and effective ways for people to communicate, both in business and in their personal lives. Until recently, most e-mail has been limited to text-only messages, with perhaps some attachments. Internet Explorer supports an entirely new type of standards-based messaging, opening the door to greater richness and detail. Outlook Express 5 supports full Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), so you can create e-mail messages that have the color and functionality of Web pages, and even send full Web pages as part of your message. You can also design your own HTML stationery or use professionally designed stationery from Microsoft Greetings Workshop to give e-mail a personal touch.

The following illustration shows the Outlook Express start page.

In addition, Outlook Express provides powerful mail management features, more efficient e-mail and newsgroup use, enhanced security, and full support for Internet standards and technologies. Outlook Express is flexible enough to meet the diverse e-mail needs of a variety of users - for example, users with dial-up Internet access through an Internet service provider (ISP) and users who work on a local area network (LAN) based on Internet standards, such as Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), Post Office Protocol 3 (POP3), and Internet Mail Access Protocol 4 (IMAP4).

Microsoft Outlook Express Features

Outlook Express offers a wide range of features that make it easy for you to communicate more effectively with others, whether they are down the hall, across the city, or around the world. The following sections describe important Outlook Express features.

Setup and Migration Tools

You can get up and running easily with Outlook Express. The Internet Connection wizard guides you through each step of establishing new e-mail, news, and directory service accounts. Migration is simplified because Outlook Express automatically detects and offers the opportunity to import existing e-mail messages, message rules, e-mail account settings, news settings, and address books from Netscape Messenger, Eudora, and Internet Mail. You can import information from these products when you first start up Outlook Express or at your convenience. You can also use Outlook Express to import information from Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft Outlook (in order for Outlook Express to import messages or address books from Exchange or Outlook, you must have these applications installed on your computer).

Web Integration

As the successor to Microsoft Internet Mail and News, Outlook Express further integrates e-mail with the Web by using the Internet Explorer Web browser control. Outlook Express supports HTML as a native message format, so you can create messages in HTML and communicate using the richness of Web pages without knowing how to write HTML code. Support for MIME HTML (MHTML) enables you to send full Web pages from the Internet or intranet and insert content from existing Web pages into messages. To maintain compatibility, messages created in Outlook Express are readable by both HTML-capable and non-HTML-capable e-mail clients. Outlook Express also doubles as a newsreader, so you do not need to switch between two separate applications for e-mail and news.

Security

Internet Explorer features state-of-the-art security technology. Support for the Secure Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (S/MIME) standard enables you to encrypt messages, digitally sign messages, and verify senders with digital certificates. Outlook Express uses public key cryptography to facilitate the encoding and decoding of encrypted messages. Outlook Express also incorporates Internet Explorer security zones, which protect you when you access Web sites and receive e-mail with Web content. By default, Outlook Express is set to the Internet zone, but you can select a more restrictive setting to limit specific types of content, such as scripting and Java applets.

Support for Internet Standards

Outlook Express implements leading Internet messaging standards and protocols to provide e-mail services, regardless of the Internet service provider or browser. Outlook Express provides full support for the following standards and protocols:

• POP3 and SMTP - POP3 and SMTP are the two most commonly used protocols for sending and receiving e-mail over the Internet. Outlook Express provides full support for POP3 and SMTP, including multiple Internet e-mail accounts and distributed password authentication.

• IMAP4 - IMAP4 is the next-generation standard for e-mail messaging. This protocol allows messages to be stored on the server so that e-mail is accessible from any computer on the network. As a result, users can have access to e-mail at both work and home. Support for IMAP4 also offers improved bandwidth use and central mail-store administration.

• HTML Mail - HTML Mail allows e-mail messages to be sent in standard HTML format. These messages retain their formatting, even if they are read by an e-mail client other than Outlook Express. Text and attachments can also be read by non-HTML e-mail clients.

• MHTML - Images embedded directly into messages by using MHTML create richer e-mail content. Recipients do not have to connect to the Internet or intranet to view the message contents.

• S/MIME - S/MIME helps ensure the security of e-mail and news messages by enabling users to digitally sign and encrypt messages. Digital signatures verify the authenticity and integrity of the message, and encryption protects the contents of messages from being read by anyone except their intended recipient.

• LDAP - LDAP provides users with a means to easily find people on the Internet through Internet white-page services, such as Bigfoot, Yahoo! People Search, and WhoWhere? Note that LDAP support applies to the Windows Address Book only.

• NNTP - The Network News Transfer Protocol (NNTP) enables news clients to read and post to newsgroups. This protocol also supports communication between news servers.

• HTTP - Hypertext Transport Protocol (HTTP) provides access to e-mail messages that have been sent to other types of Internet e-mail accounts, such as MSN™ Hotmail™.

Identities

With the new Identity Manager, you can create multiple identities on a computer with separate e-mail accounts, passwords, contacts, and preferences. You can create a separate identity for each person who uses Outlook Express (for example, you and a co-worker may share Outlook Express on the computer). Then you can easily switch between individual identities without having to shut down your computer or cancel the Internet connection.

A new identity folder is automatically created in the Windows Address Book when you create an identity by using the Identity Manager. You can keep contacts in your main folder, as well as organize them into subfolders. If you have contacts you want to share with other people who share your computer, you can move the contacts into the Shared Contacts folder.

Note Identities exist ** within Windows logon profiles and are intended to be an alternative to profiles. All information within a profile is available to all users with access to that profile. Identities, though, are not secure and are not intended for environments where security between users is a concern.

Message Rules

To help you manage and prioritize your e-mail, you can use the Outlook Express Rules wizard to develop rules for your e-mail messages. You can create one or more of these e-mail rules to organize the messages that you have already received and to screen your new incoming e-mail. E-mail rules enable you to designate the types of messages, such as e-mail from a specific account or with a specific priority, that Outlook Express forwards, moves, copies, highlights, or deletes automatically.

Note Message rules do not apply to IMAP or HTTP mail (MSN Hotmail) accounts.

Newsgroup Filters

You can create filters on an individual-newsgroup basis that ignore messages based on sender, subject, date posted, or length of message. Messages matching your filter criteria are neither downloaded to your computer nor displayed in the message list. Filtered materials can also include bitmap images, writings, audio and video clips, and links to other materials that can be accessed through Internet newsgroups.

Windows Address Book

The Windows Address Book provides a convenient place to store contact information for easy retrieval by programs, such as Outlook Express. Using the address book, you can store multiple e-mail addresses, home and work addresses, and phone and fax numbers. The address book enables you to create groups of contacts, which makes it easy to send e-mail to a set of people, such as business associates, relatives, or sports groups. It also features access to Internet directory services, which you can use to look up people and businesses on the Internet. You can store individual and business Internet addresses, and link directly to them from the Address Book.

The Windows Address Book has full support for LDAP directory services, which provide access to virtual Internet white pages. Using this feature, you can easily find anyone on corporate LDAP servers or use the built-in support for Bigfoot, InfoSpace, Switchboard, Verisign, WhoWhere?, and Yahoo! People Search to locate people on the Internet. Internet Explorer also includes support for vCard, which enables you to exchange business card information with other users.

You can also use Outlook Express to create both personal and shared contacts within the Address Book. Then, you can share your Address Book with other users, and they can use your individual and group contacts for sending their own messages.

Smart Reply

Outlook Express automatically sends your replies to messages in the same format in which they were sent. For example, if you receive HTML mail, Outlook Express responds with HTML. If you receive a message in plain text, Outlook Express does not send HTML mail when replying to that message, and it remembers not to do so for future messages to that recipient.

Outlook Express also automatically sends your replies to messages using the same account that received the message. For example, users can easily separate personal and business correspondence.

Multiple E-Mail and News Server Accounts

Outlook Express enables you to access and manage multiple e-mail and news accounts from a single client. You can also send and receive mail from numerous e-mail accounts. For example, if you have e-mail accounts for home and work, you can set up Outlook Express to receive messages for both accounts and sort them into separate folders. Outlook Express keeps track of which account an incoming message is using, so when you reply to it, you can just click Send , and Outlook Express sends your response using the appropriate account. Or, if several people share one e-mail account, you can set up folders for each person and then automatically route incoming messages to individual folders.

Support for Roaming Users

Users may need to access their e-mail account and read messages from several different computers. Outlook Express provides this capability for MSN Hotmail account users. These users can access their e-mail messages from any computer with an Internet connection and Outlook Express installed.

MSN Hotmail Integration

Outlook Express includes MSN Hotmail integration features, which enable you to do the following:

• Read your MSN Hotmail e-mail messages from within Outlook Express. Support for the HTTP protocol enables Outlook Express to communicate with MSN Hotmail e-mail servers.

• Configure your existing MSN Hotmail account for use with Outlook Express.

• Synchronize your Outlook Express and MSN Hotmail contacts.

• Sign up for a new MSN Hotmail account from within Outlook Express.

Productivity Features

Microsoft has added numerous features to make Outlook Express easier to use. Now you can perform the following tasks:

• Create multiple hierarchical folders and drag them and the messages they contain as needed to organize them.

• Easily save important e-mail addresses by using the Auto-Add feature, which automatically adds replied-to addresses to your Address Book.

• Enter a partial name of a recipient on the To: line. Outlook Express automatically compares it against your Address Book and fills in the rest of the name if it's found.

• Save e-mail messages in the Draft folder before they are sent, so you can easily keep track of messages in progress. The Draft folder ensures that important messages do not get overlooked among the e-mail in your Inbox.

• Execute the Send and Receive commands separately, so you can spend your time online efficiently. For example, if your connection is slow, you can choose only to send messages and not download large messages with attachments.

• Receive notification of unread messages and unfinished messages in your Draft folder when you start the application.

• Take advantage of several word-processor-like features, including changing font sizes, rich-text editing, and up to 150 levels of the Undo command.

Format for Message Stores

All Outlook Express messages are now stored in files with a .dbx extension. When you upgrade to Outlook Express 5 from a previous version (Outlook Express 4.0 or Internet Mail and News), a copy of the message store is converted to the new Outlook Express message format.

If you subsequently uninstall Outlook Express 5, you will see only the messages you received in Outlook Express 4.0 or Internet Mail and News.

Note If you were using Outlook Express 4.0 previously, you can import the Outlook Express 5 messages into Outlook Express 4.0. A message importer remains on your computer after you uninstall Outlook Express 5 (accessible by clicking Import on the File menu in Outlook Express 4.0).

Outlook Bar

Outlook Express offers the same style of navigational bar that Microsoft Outlook 97 introduced. Because you can use the Outlook bar to easily access different folders and modules, it is one of the most popular features of Outlook. You can also customize the Outlook bar by adding and deleting folders and changing the folder order according to your preferences.

Integration with Internet Explorer

Because Outlook Express is tightly integrated with the rest of the Internet Explorer components, you can easily use them together and switch between them seamlessly. Not only does Outlook Express share common menus and toolbars with the other Internet Explorer components, it also enables you to send an entire Web page to someone with a single click in the browser. The message embeds the page, not just a link to a Web site.

In addition, you can use the Internet Explorer Customization wizard to customize Outlook Express options as part of your custom browser package. You can specify the following information:

• The custom settings that apply to all users, including the default e-mail and news client, new account source information, and message rules

• The configuration for e-mail and news servers

• Whether users are required to log on by using secure password authentication (SPA) to access a server

• The default IMAP settings used to preconfigure IMAP accounts for users

• The LDAP directory services (in addition to standard Windows Address Book directories) that are available

• The custom views and default settings for the Outlook Express main windows, toolbar, and preview pane

• Whether HTML or plain text is used for e-mail and news messages

• The default signatures for e-mail messages and newsgroups

• Any other welcome message, in addition to the Outlook Express welcome message, that greets new users

• The custom content that appears in the Outlook Express InfoPane

• The presubscribed newsgroups for the default news server

• A menu item for users to sign up for a new mail account (Internet service providers only)

For More Information

Additional information about Outlook Express is available from the Microsoft Internet Explorer Web site.

.