Outlook Express
Other Useful features: Format and Personalize your message
Outlook Express is a great mail program, you can personalize every message you send, and make sending and receiving an easier task.
If you understand all the Outlook Express capabilities, you will never replace it with another program, because it has almost everything you need.
Outlook Express allows you to format your message, old mail programs were similar to NotePad, you could only write text.
With programs such as Outlook Express you can use colors, alignment, Fonts, even add images. When working with fonts make sure you don't choose anything out of the ordinary, the recipient must have the font you've used to view the effect.
Windows has a large variety of fonts, use them.
Use the formatting toolbar above the message body to write elegant email messages.
To insert a picture click
make sure
that the image is not "heavy", better use GIFor JPEG and keep it under 50K
In the Picture window press Browse to locate the image you want to insert, under Layout set an Alignment (Baseline, Left, right...) and Border thickness if you want -this will add a dark border to your image. Under Alternate Text write your picture description:
the description appears in case the recipient did not manage to view the picture inside the message. Old mail programs handle pictures only as an attachment, thus you cannot view images inside the message body.
Specify Horizontal/Vertical Spacing to separate your image from text in case you've inserted the image inside a text block.
When you finish click OK. To change the picture format settings, r-click the image and select Properties, to delete the image simply select and press Delete on your keyboard.
You can also add internet addresses to your messages, once clicked the browser is launched, no need to copy/paste like in the old days.
Just type the address, the text turns to underlined-blue indicating a hyperlink.
To modify the address, press
. You will understand hyperlink in FrontPage
Tutorial.Write down some text e.g "website" select it and press on Hyperlink icon, type the address in URL field and press OK. Instead of writing the whole address in the message you can write a name and give it a hyperlink. When the recipient clicks on "website",
the browser immediately opens the page on the Internet.
Quite useful when the internet address is lengthy.
Note: The formatting toolbar is very similar to the one we've seen in WordPad at
Windows Applications tutorial: you can use Undo/Redo, Copy/Cut, Paste, Select all.
If you always end your messages with a signature: name, contact info, some motto.
Let Outlook Express do it automatically. Click Tools>>Stationery, under Signature press Signature button. On the top of window check "Add this signature to all outgoing messages"
only if you want to add the signature automatically to all messages.
You have two options: write the text in Text field or use a file (.txt, .html) you've prepared in advance.
If you checked "Add this signature..", every time you Compose Message, the signature text is added to your message automatically, if not press
in your message window to add the
signature when you finish composing the email.Another interesting signature feature is Personal Business Card , it allows you to add your contact info from Address Book into any message, just make sure you've created your own entry in Address Book: Name and email address, phone....
In Stationery window, press Signature button. Check "Add card to all outgoing messages"
under Personal Business Card (vCard), click New to create your personal entry in Address Book if you didn't do it yet, click OK, Apply then press Ok to go back to main program. Compose Message and you'll notice this icon
in the header of your message,
this is you Personal Business Card, click it and select open to view your
contact info. When you send the message the Personal
Business Card goes with itAdding a Personal Business Card is more efficient than just a text signature.
Note: The Personal Business Card is in fact a file with .VCF extension, it can be viewed with many popular mail programs e.g Netscape Messenger.
Outlook Express even adds more life to your email messages with pre-designed templates called Stationery that suit all you occasions. Click on the arrow near Compose Message icon and choose from 7 listed stationeries, click More Stationery for more designs.
A Stationery includes special fonts, pictures...
You can even design your own Stationery, but remember to choose Windows default fonts. If you use a font that's not available on the recipient's computer he won't be able to see the effect you've created.
To create a stationery, simply Compose Message add some text, insert a picture using Insert Picture icon, next click File>>Save As and choose HTM or HTML file type.
Every stationery is stored at C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Stationery by default, you can use another location to save your own stationeries: create a folder
in Stationery main directory - call it MyStationery- and save all your designs.
If you have pictures in your stationeries, make sure you put all images in the same folder.
You might want to add a background image to your message, click Format>>Background, press Picture... You can also add colors from Color menu.
Click Format>>Style and choose your message format: Heading, Menu List, Formatted. Outlook Express will automatically change fonts, alignment to fit the style.