2.1. Accessing Your E-Mail
Among the more powerful features of the AUC system is a full-featured e-mail client, which allows you to use your e-mail account from any web browser, anywhere in the world. When your Start Page appears, the first panel on the page will always be your E-MAIL panel. If you have already specified an e-mail account for the system to access, the panel will let you know how many e-mail correspondences are waiting in your in-box, as well as how many are new. In addition, the e-mail panel on the Start Page lets you access several functions:
- INBOX -- this will take you to your e-mail accounts inbox (Section 2.3)
- COMPOSE MESSAGE -- allows you to write a new e-mail (Section 2.4)
- FOLDER LIST -- allows you create and manage your folders (Section 2.5)
- PREFERENCES -- lets you specify e-mail client preferences (Section 2.2)
The sections that follow explain how to use the features of the AUC e-mail client.
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2.2. Setting E-Mail Preferences
Before you use the features of the e-mail client itself, you may wish to specify your e-mail preferences. Click on the "Preferences" link in your Start Page panel, or in the top-panel of your e-mail client, to access the Preferences screen. From here, you may control several options:
- Personal Name: This setting will default to the name attached to your e-mail account. If you wish to have another name appear in the "From" field in your e-mail messages, type it into the blank field, and select it as your choice.
- New Window On Compose: If you would like AUC to open a new browser window for you to write e-mail in (to help keep your place), you should select "Yes" for this option. If you prefer to compose e-mail in the same window, select "No."
- Edit Signature File: Whatever text you enter into this field will automatically appear at the end of each e-mail that you send from AUC. (If you would like to specify a file in your account to act as your signature, see "Advanced Preference Options" (Section 2.6) for more information.)
- IMAP Server: This option lets you specify an IMAP e-mail server for the client to work with. If you are not sure what to put, see your school or organization's system administrator for more information.
- IMAP User: This field lets you enter more information needed by AUC to interface with your IMAP server e-mail account.
- Edit Advanced Options: For information, see Section 2.6.
Now that you have set your e-mail preferences, you are ready to use the e-mail client.
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2.3. Using the E-Mail Client
When you open your INBOX, you will see the main e-mail interface -- this consists of two grey navigation bars, above and below your INBOX listing. On the top navigation bar, you will find links which provide access to the many functions of the e-mail client. Those functions are as follows:
- Compose Message: Allows you to write a new e-mail (Section 2.4)
- INBOX: Returns you to your INBOX from other screens
- New Folder: Opens the dialogue to create a new folder for organizing and sorting your e-mail messages.
- Folders: Opens your folder-management screen, where you can create and rename your e-mail folders. (More information in Section 2.5)
- Empty Trash: Deletes all e-mail messages which have been sent to your trash folder. (More details on moving items to the Trash in a moment.)
- Preferences: Lets you specify e-mail client preferences (Section 2.2)
- Goto Folder: This option lets you view the contents of other folders in your e-mail account (such as sent-mail, Trash, and any that you have created). Select the folder that you wish to access from the drop-down menu and click "go".
The top navigation bar also indicates which folder you are currently viewing, how many messages are in it, and how many of those are new. It should look something like this:
{imap.server.name} INBOX (mail:4 new:2)
You can also choose the order in which e-mail messages should be sorted, by clicking on the word "Sort" -- it will alternate between Newest First and Reverse Chronological modes.
Beneath the top navigation bar, you will find a list of the e-mail messages in your current folder, and details about each. For each e-mail message, the client will display the date it was sent, the name of the sender, and the subject of the e-mail. Clicking on the subject opens the message for viewing.
You will also notice checkboxes to the left of each message in the list -- these are used to sort messages to other folders, and to send messages to the Trash. Simply select all of the e-mail messages you would like to move, select a destination folder from the drop-down menu in the bottom navigation bar, and click "move". By default, messages will be directed to the trash.
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2.4. Composing New Messages
The process of composing e-mail messages in AUC's e-mail client should be familiar to anyone who has used a commercial or web-based e-mail client. Simply fill in the fields indicating "To", "cc:", and "Subject", and enter the text of the e-mail in the large field which follows. When you are finished, click the "Send Message" button beneath the letter.
NOTE: Planned features for a future release of AUC include the capability to postpone e-mail messages and to use an address book.
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2.5. Managing Folders
If you send and receive a lot of e-mail, you may find it useful to organize messages into folders when saving them. AUC allows you to do just this -- you can create and maintain multiple folders from within the e-mail client. To access the Folder Manager, click on the "Folders" link which appears in your Start Page e-mail panel, or in the e-mail client's navigation bar.
The screen that appears will show you all of the folders which exist for your e-mail account, along with the number of messages in each, and the number of new (unread) messages in each. In the right column, "Options", you can choose to Delete a folder and all messages inside of it.
NOTE: Planned features for a future release of AUC include the capability to rename existing folders, a feature currently unavailable.
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