Many thanks, Hannah

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Dear Hannah,

You are headed in the right direction, but what you need to do, is import your Outlook Express messages into Windows Mail.

This process requires some sort of device to transport your files from the old computer to the new laptop. Either an external hard drive that has a USB connection, or a USB data stick are the best tools to use.

1. First, you need to find the location of your old email files. To do this, open Outlook Express, click on “Tools” in the menu bar, then click Options.

2. In the Options window, click on the Maintenance tab, then click on the button that says “Store Folder”.

3. A small window will appear with the location of your e-mail files. Highlight the folder location, and then press CTRL+C to copy the location.

4. Click Cancel, and then click Cancel again to close the dialog box. Close Outlook Express.

5. Now, you want to open the folder that contains your mail files. An easy way to do this is to click Start, and then click Run.

6. In the Run window, click in the box that says “Open” and press CTRL+V to paste in the location, and then click OK. The window containing your files will now open.

7. To make it easier to copy, I like to click on the “Up” button. Now you can see the Outlook Express folder.

8. Click on “Start” then “My Computer” and double click on your USB backup device to open it.

9. Arrange the two windows on your desktop so that you can see the contents of each of them.

10. Drag the Outlook Express folder to your backup device.

Now you have your Outlook Express email files on the backup device, and you are ready to import them into Windows Mail. Here are the directions.

1. Insert your USB drive in the new computer.

2. Open the drive by clicking on “Start” then on “Computer”, and double click on the drive.

3. Use your mouse to drag the Outlook Express folder to your desktop, and close the computer window.

4. Open Windows Mail. Click on “File” in the menu bar (if the menu bar is not visible, tap to Alt key) point to “Import” and click on “Messages…”.

5. Click to select the format you want to import from (in this case Outlook Express) and click “Next”.

6. Click the “Browse” button and scroll down to find your folder. Click on it, and click “OK”.

7. Click “Next” to import your messages.

Elizabeth

Help, Jane

Dear Jane,

It sounds like the formatting toolbar has been turned off. Here is how you can fix that.

1. Open Windows Mail.
2. Click on the button in the command bar that says, “Create Mail”.
3. In the window for your new mail message, click on “View” in the menu bar and point to “Toolbars”.
4. In the submenu under toolbars, click on “Formatting Bar” to display the toolbar.

Now, you can create your email message and send it.

Elizabeth

Read your newsletters all the time. Great Stuff. Thanks, Bob

Dear Bob,

Yes, there is a way to leave the mail on the server to allow access for more than one computer. You will need to make this change on each computer that you are using.

In Outlook Express: (Windows XP)

1. Open Outlook Express.
2. Click on “Tools” in the menu bar, then click on “Accounts…”
3. Click on your mail account, then click on the, “Properties” button on the right.
4. Click on the “Advanced” tab of the properties window.
5. Click on the tab that says, “Mail” at the top of the dialog box.
6. Click to place a check mark in front of “Leave a copy of messages on server”.
7. Click “OK” to close the window and save your changes.
8. Click on the “Close” button in the remaining dialog box.

In Windows Mail (Vista)

1. Open Windows Mail.
2. Click on “Tools” in the menu bar, then click on “Accounts”.
3. Click on your mail account (it will display your email address), then click on the “Properties button on the right.
4. Click on the “Advanced” tab of the properties window.
5. Click to place a check mark in front of “Leave a copy of messages on server”.
6. Click “OK” to close the window and save your changes.
7. Click the “Close” button in the Internet Accounts dialog box.

In Windows Live Mail (Windows 7)

1. Open Windows Live Mail.
2. Right Click on the heading for your e-mail address in the left column.
3. Click on “Properties” in the context menu that appears.
4. Click on the “Advanced” tab of the properties window.
5. Click to place a check mark in front of “Leave a copy of messages on server”.
6. Click “OK” to close the window and save your changes.

Elizabeth

Thanks so much. Karen

Dear Karen,

It sounds like you have your messages grouped by conversation. Here is how you can change it.

1. Open Windows Mail, and click on any folder.

2. Click on “View” in the menu bar, and point to “Current View”.

3. At the very bottom of the sub-menu, you should see a check mark in front of, “Group Messages By Conversation”.

4. Click on “Group Mesages By Conversation” to remove the check mark, and turn off that option.

Elizabeth

Dear Computer Lady,

I am running Vista on a laptop. When I open my photos folder to email a picture, I right click a photo and click “Send to email recipient” and the computer wants to open Outlook, but I want to use Windows Mail. 

How can I send the photo via Windows Mail (I like to choose “make my pictures smaller”)? I enjoy your email and get a lot of useful information from it. 

Thank You! Grace

Dear Grace,

Your computer wants to use Outlook because Outlook is set up to be the default email program.

You should be able to change that quite easily, here is how:

1. Open Windows Mail.
2. In the Windows Mail menu bar, click on “Tools” and then “Options”.
3. On the “General” tab of the Options dialog box, find the, “Default Messaging Programs” section.
4. Click on the “Make Default” button where it says, “This application is not the default Mail Handler.

These steps should make Windows mail your default email program. If, however, that doesn’t work, you can also change some settings in Outlook, or if you don’t use Outlook, you can even un-install the program.

Here is how to change the settings in Outlook.

1. Open Outlook.
2. In the Outlook menu bar, click on “Tools” and then “Options”.
3. In the Options dialog box, click on the “Other” tab and locate the “General” section.
4. Remove the check mark from the box that says, “Make Outlook the default program for e-mail, contacts, and calendar.”
5. Click the “OK” button to save your changes and close the dialog box.

You might have to repeat the first set of steps again.

I hope this solves your problem.

Elizabeth

Dear Computer Lady,

I really enjoy your newsletter and have learned so much! Thank you!

We got a new laptop for Christmas and it’s running Vista. One problem that I am having is that Windows Mail does not allow you to add a second identity. I was able to do that with Outlook Express and I really enjoyed that. Is there a way that I can receive mail from the other account using Windows Mail?

Thanking you in advance,

Dianna

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Dear Dianna,

When Microsoft created Vista, they wrote a completely new program for email instead of just adding to Outlook Express. They did this because it was the only way to resolve some of the problems that Outlook Express has.

There are a few features from Outlook Express that Microsoft did not include in Windows Mail. Most of the missing features were not very widely used and the ability to have multiple identities was one of those features. Since your computer allows you to create as many Windows Identities as you want, they figured you would not need to also have identities in your E-mail.

The official way to create identities is to create separate users in Windows for each email address. This works fine if the addresses are being used by different people, but not so good if one person is using multiple email addresses.

You can have multiple email addresses in Windows Mail without the identities. Your messages will all be together in your mail inbox unless you  set up mail rules to move messages from each address into a different folder.

Elizabeth

Dear Computer Lady,

I read your column all the time and appreciate your good advice and answers to questions. 

My question is this. 

When I send an e-mail with Outlook Express, I don’t always want people to know my full name, only my e-mail address, how can I keep my full name from showing?

Thanks, Lucia 

Dear Lucia,

It is easy to remove your full name from outgoing e-mails.

1. Open Outlook Express and click “Tools” then “Accounts” in the menu bar.

2. In the Accounts window, click on your e-mail account in the list. You might have to click on the Mail tab first, and then click the “Properties” button on the right.

3. In the account properties window, click the “General” tab and then in the Name section, delete your last name, or clear the whole thing and put in whatever you want.

4. Click “OK” and you will be all set.

For people using Windows Mail:

1. Open Windows Mail

2. Click on “Tools” then click on “Accounts” in the menu bar.

3. In the Internet Accounts window, click on your mail account. (it should have the word, (default) at the end of the name.)

4. Click on the “Properties” button on the right.

5. In the properties window, make sure you are viewing the “General” tab and locate the “User Information” secion.

6. In the “Name:” section, remove the information you don’t want to show.

7. Click the “OK” button to save your changes and close the window.

If you are using Microsoft Outlook:

1. Open Outlook.

2. Click on “Tools” then “Account Settings…” in the menu bar.

3. Make sure you have the E-mail tab selected, then click on your email account and click “Change” in the space above.

4. In the “User Information” section, change your name as desired.

5. Click the “Next” button, then click “finish”.

Elizabeth 

Dear Computer Lady,

Every time I turn my computer on I get anywhere from 10 to 38 junk e-mails  trying  to sell me something or  inform me that I have much money coming, or won thousands of dollars    

I have given up trying  to get them  to stop and have gone through the unsubscribe me portion and nothing works, and it takes too much time to  delete them.

Is there  any way I can get to stop this foolish  business?

Thank You, John B

Dear John,

You are not alone! You are experiencing one of the most common problems in modern email! You might be asking yourself a few questions about these messages like, “where do they come from?” and “how did they get your email address?”. I will try to answer those questions and give you some solutions that will get rid of the messages, or at least reduce them.

I get quite a few of those junk email messages every day. Some of them offer me medicines that will increase body parts that I don’t have, and some of them say they are from young women looking for a date. In my situation, the easiest way that I have found to deal with all the junk messages is to hit the delete key on my keyboard. There are other solutions, but as you will see, not all of them work for everyone.

So, how did you come to be on the receiving end of these foul messages? There are many ways that your address can end up in the hands of a spammer, I am going to list some of the most common ways. 

1. Your email address is listed on a website somewhere. When you leave a comment on a site, sign a guestbook, or have your own site and list your email address as a form of contact, (like I do) your email address becomes public record. Spammers know that there are thousands of email addresses listed on websites across the internet, and they have written software that will search the internet and “harvest” any email address that they find. It really is pretty easy for that software, all it has to do is find a string of text that includes an @ symbol in the middle and that ends with .com or .net. The software creates a list of all the addresses it finds, and those people will soon be getting more junk email than they could have imagined. 

When you sign my guestbook, or leave a comment on my website, the only person who will see your email address is me, and I will never sell or give away your email address.

2. Your email address was used to enter to “win” something. Almost everything you come across on the web is there for a reason, and the reason is usually to make money. My website is no exception. The difference between my website and some others is that I don’t use tricks to make money. There are many sites online that tell you they will make your computer faster if you only fill out this form, or that you are guaranteed to win some great prize if you only sign up here. Unfortunately, the only person who is winning is the website owner who can then sell your email address to the highest bidder. 

3. Your email address was included in a “forwarded” message that ended up in the mailbox of a spammer. I recently read an excellent description of how this can happen on the Ask-Leo website at:

http://ask-leo.com/how_does_using_bcc_help_reduce_spam.html

Once your email address is included on a spammers list, and you have responded to their emails in some way (including your attempts to unsubscribe) your email address will be sold to any spammer willing to pay for it. The fact that you have tried to unsubscribe from the spam messages, lets them know that there is a real person reading their messages, which makes your email address even more valuable to them.

Now that you have an idea of how you came to be on the receiving end of all these junk messages, we can discuss ways to stop getting them. Since we can’t hack into the spammers computers and take our names off their lists, we need to look at ways to block the incoming junk message.

The most drastic way to completely (at least for a while) stop all the junk messages is to change your email address. Yes, this is drastic and you would have to notify all your friends, family, email lists you belong to (like this one) and business associates that your address has changed. Even though it is drastic, this is the fastest way to stop the spam. 

If changing your email address is not an option for you, you will need to find a way to filter out the messages.

If the email program that you are using has a junk email filter, you can turn it on and use it to filter out the offending messages.

Windows Mail:

1. Open Windows Mail.
2. Click on “Tools” in the menu bar, then click on “Junk E-mail Options”
3. In the Junk E-mail options window, select the “Options” tab.
4. On the Options page, select the level of protection that you want.
5. Click the “OK” button at the bottom of the page to save your selection.

Outlook Express:

Outlook Express does not have a junk mail filter built in, but you can create your own filters. The process is too long to describe here, but Microsoft has a great tutorial on their website here:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/IE/community/columns/junkmail.mspx

Microsoft Outlook:

1. Open Microsoft Outlook
2. Click on “Actions” in the menu bar, point to “Junk E-mail” and click on “Junk E-mail Options”.
3. In the Junk E-mail options window, select the “Options” tab.
4. On the Options page, select the level of protection that you want, and check off any additional settings you wish to use.
5. Click the “OK” button at the bottom of the page to save your selection.

Mozilla Thunderbird:

1. Open Thunderbird.
2. Click on “Tools” in the menu bar, then click on “Account Settings”
3. Click on “Junk Settings” under your email address.
4. Click on the settings that you want to use in the Junk Settings window.
5. Click “OK” to save your changes and close the window.

Another way to use a great filter, is to open an online email account at google,

www.gmail.com

You can either use the new gmail address that you create, or you can use it to access your regular email account (You can do this by clicking “Settings” in the upper right of the gmail window, then click the “Accounts” tab.) The Gmail filter is automatic, very thorough, and very accurate.

Your last option would be to purchase a spam filtering program.

I will have to talke about this type of program at a later date.

Elizabeth