How to: Mozilla Mail Configuration

Author: Lachlan Simpson?
Date: 2002/2003

Kylie's note 14/03/05: Screen shots were lost during the upgrade of silva. Whoops. Can someone re do them, please?

Details You Will Need Before You Start

An Internet Service Provider, or ISP. They will provide you with a login name and a password. If you already have an internet account, the login name and password will be the same as the ones you use currently.

Every ISP has an incoming mail server and an outgoing mail server. The incoming one will either be POP (or POP3) or IMAP. If you are not sure, presume it is a pop server. Note that as it's name implies, a pop server will pop them off the server and into your inbox - they will not be re-retrievable at a later date, unless you are on your computer and you did not delete them.

These details should be available here. Otherwise, check your ISP's homepage or technical support line.

Your email address. This should be your_login_name@your_isp_name.com.au.

A Step By Step Guide

Once you have all of your details, start mozilla mail. For some Computer Bank Users, this will be the letter icon on the panel at the bottom of the screen. If this makes no sense, or the icon isn't there, go to Kmenu->Internet->Debian->Mozilla Components->Mozilla Mail.

This will start Mozilla Mail. You will see it in the background. In the foreground you will see what are known as "dialogue boxes". Hereafter I will simply refer to these as "boxes" or "box #".

Throughout this process, you will be provided with three buttons at the bottom of each box: back, next and cancel. To stop the process at any point you can press cancel. A new dialogue box will appear with two buttons: exit and cancel. This is a confirmation box. Hitting exit will stop the mozilla mail setup program, pressing cancel again will take you back to the Mozilla Mail setup program.

Box 1

The first box will say "Account Wizard" at the top. It will have a heading that says "New Account Setup".

You have two choices: Email Account or Newsgroup Account.

Email Account should be the default (ie, already filled in), so just press the next button.

Box 2

This box will have the heading "Identity".

This box has very clear instructions, so you should read them as you go.

In the first field, type the name that you want ppl to read when your mail arrives in their mailbox.

In the second field, type in your email address. This is what the mail program uses as the "reply to" address when you send other ppl mail. ie if this is wrong no one will be able to reply to your posts.

It is safe to put yr email address in here - do not fear spammers at this early stage.

Box 3

This box will have the heading "Server Information".

You will need to choose between a Pop or and Imap incoming server type.

In the first field you will need to enter your incoming server name.

In the second field you will need to enter your outgoing server name.

Box 4

This box will have the heading "User Name".

This is the login name that you have arranged with your ISP.

Box 5

This box will have the heading "Account Name".

The default setting will have the email address you typed in earlier in this box.

This may seem strange, but it is quite handy, because if you have more than one email address, you can have them all delivered to the one Mozilla Mail account on your computer, and they will come up seperately in the folders list, sorted by email address. This is one of the best features of Mozilla Mail, and you will find it replicated in many other mail programs around today (like KMail or Evolution)

Box 6

This box will have the heading "Congratulations!". This is usually a good sign.

It will list the information you have entered and asks you to hit the "finish" button if it is all correct. You should go ahead and do that now.

What next?

You should now have the Mozilla Mail interface in front of you.

It will probably be divided into three parts - a long left hand side division, and two right hand side division. This configuration can be played with under the Edit->Preferences menu item.

But, first, you will notice the name of the account you set up (in the item titled "Box 5", above) in the left hand column. Next to that will be a little arrow. Clicking on that will expand and contract your account folder. The default setup will have folders called Inbox, Drafts, Templates, Sent and Trash.

You can add to this later by using the menu item file->new->folder while the account name is highlighted. For the moment, you should highlight the Inbox folder, then press the Get Msgs icon at the top of the screen. If all has gone according to plan, and you are connected to the internet, your inbox should slowly fill up with all of your mail.

To sort the mail so that the most recent arrivals appear at the top, click once the "date" bar on the top of the top right hand division.

Highlighting a mail will bring that mail up in the bottom right hand division of the page.

Mail you have read will be in a normal font, unread mail will be in a bold font.

Extra Tips

Problem: Your Mail account is full - ppl cannot email you - you can't delete anything, you need it all

Solution: When you are on the computer you trust the most (probably your home computer), you can empty your email box in this way, without deleting anything.

First, expand the "Local Folders" listing on the left hand side. It's default settings will be the same as your account folder, except that instead of an inbox, it will have an unsent messages folder. Create a new folder by highlighting the local folder listing, and going up to the menu bar, choose file->new->folder.

In the box that pops up, it will ask for a name for the folder. I recommend you use something like "girlfriend/boyfriend", "friends", "work", "important" or "funny" - something fairly broad, which will be a nice divider and has a lot of relevance to the emails in your full account.

Go back to you main email account's inbox, and go to the very oldest emails that you rarely read anymore, and will not need to look at when you log into your email account from the Sahara Desert or a Paris net cafe or anything.

Right click on the email, choose Move to->local folders->girlfriend/boyfriend (or whatever).

This will delete it from your email provider's server and move it your personal computer's hard drive. Note that copy to->local folders->etc will copy it to your hard drive, but not remove it from the server, and it is at the server that you need to clear up space.