Yahoo Email Tutorial

Just a quick note before we get started... your messages will still take up space as they come in to your account online until you download them into Outlook Express so you need to keep a check on how much space the messages are taking up and download them before you hit your limit.

I'm using a yahoo account in this tutorial but it will be very similar for other web-based email accounts (except Hotmail) that have POP3 available - the screenshots will just look slightly different and you may need to look in slightly different places for the options in your account online but everything in Outlook Express will still be the same.

Sign in to your yahoo account, you just need to check something out first to see if it's set up to download into Outlook Express and then we can get you started! :o)

When you're signed in, you need to go to the box on the left and just above where it says "helpdesk" it will have a link called "options". Click on that one to take you to a page with lots of different things you can do.

On the page you've just gone to, there are 3 columns... Personalisation, Mail management and Delivery Services. Click on the link underneath Delivery Services that says "yahoo delivers"

On the screen you've been taken to, it's got a bit of gumpf at the top about what it is and stuff, then underneath that, it says "sign up" with an option for yes or no. Click in the "yes" option.

Now, to stop you getting spam, this bit is important. Where it says "select your interests" there's a box that says "only send me offers for categories I select below" - tick that box.

Then make sure that you take out any ticks that are in any of the boxes and you take out the tick in the box that says about yahoo sending you surveys. The only boxes that should be ticked on that part of the form are the one where it says to sign you up and the one where it says only send you the categories you've got ticked.

On the bottom part of the form it says "select your email delivery settings" - you need to make sure you've got your yahoo email addy in there. In the next box that says about frequency, say "once a week" (don't worry, if you've made sure that you haven't ticked any of the categories you won't get any spam). In the next box it says "email client can read" - in there, tick HTML and then click on "finished" then click "continue" on the next page

When you get back to the screen with the 3 columns you need to go to the "mail management" column and at the bottom it says "POP access and forwarding". Click on that link.

On this page, under step one, choose the "web and POP access" option and for step 2 choose "HTML" then click on submit

On the page that's just come up it gives you all the details you need to know to set up your account in Outlook Express. It says to print it off but because I tend to loose things I usually find it easier to open up another window and send myself an email with all the details on then I've got it handy if I need to see it again.

If you can, it might be a good idea to print this next part of the tutorial or write it
down or something 'cos you may not be able to switch between windows for
some of it.

First off, you need to fire up Outlook Express

When that's chugged and whirred into action, there'll be a menu bar at the top that says things like file, edit, view etc. One of them will say "tools". Click on that one and then go down the list to where it says "accounts" (almost at the bottom).

You should now have a box in front of you that says "internet accounts". On
the right hand side, right at the top, there will be a button that says
"add" with a little arrow next to it. Click on that button.

On the menu thing that pops out, choose "mail".

This will take you into a wizard that makes it really easy to set the account up.

In the first box it asks for your name... that's the name that you want
people to see when they get an email from you, so on mine it says Mandy.

Click "next"

The next screen asks you for your email address. You need to put your full
yahoo email address in there and then click on "next"

The next screen asks for your POP and SMTP settings. They're just things that the computer needs to know to be able to send and receive messages through OE.

In the drop down box at the top, make sure it says "POP3"

The next box asks for your POP3 settings. In there, you need to put the information that was on the last screen in yahoo so it would be "pop.mail.yahoo.com" or "yahoo.mail.yahoo.co.uk" or whichever ending you have on your yahoo email address, without the quotation marks and it's case sensitive.

In the box underneath that you need to put "smtp.mail.yahoo.com" or "smtp.mail.yahoo.co.uk" or whichever ending you have on your yahoo email address, without the quotation marks and it's case sensitive.

Click "next"

On the next screen it asks for your account name and password. This is where you put the same info as you use to log into your yahoo account on the web so it would be your email address before the @yahoo.com and the password you've got on your account. Click on the box that says "remember password" so you don't have to keep typing it in every time you send or receive email.

Click on "next"

Then click "finished"

When you've got this far you might want to go and grab a drink or something just to give yourself a break for a few minutes... we're nearly there now! :o)

We're just gonna do a bit of fine tuning now to make sure everything works hunky dorey :o)

In Outlook Express, go back to the "tools" menu and then "accounts"

Highlight the account you've just set up then click on "properties". You don't need to worry about most of the stuff that's in there.

This is where you've got a few decisions to make depending on how you use your email.

If you're connected to the internet for long periods of time, you can get Outlook Express to download your email automatically while you're online. If you want to do that, click on the "include this account when receiving or synchronising". If you don't want it to check your mail automatically, just leave it unchecked.

Go to the "servers" tab. It should have your account name and password in there as you typed it in just now. There's a box in the middle that says about secure password authentication - leave that one unchecked. The one underneath that says "my server requires authentication" - tick that one and click the "settings" button next to it.

You should now have a box come up with 2 options - you need to choose the 2nd one (the one that says "log on using:") and then type in your account name and password into the boxes and click on "remember password". Leave the other box blank. Click OK.

Now it's decision time again. Do you want to leave a copy of all the messages on yahoo or do you want them to be deleted online when you download them into Outlook Express?

If you want to delete them from the internet as you download them then just hit "OK"

If you want to keep a copy online (it'll keep on using up your 6mb of space if you do this as well as any new messages that come in) then you need to go to the "advanced" tab and right at the bottom it says "leave a copy of messages on server" - tick that box

You can either leave it like that or have a play around with the boxes and settings below to set it up however you prefer.

DO NOT CHANGE ANYTHING ELSE IN THIS TAB!

I've got all my accounts set to delete the messages from the server as I download them 'cos then it free's up more space for new messages but it's totally up to you what you prefer to do :o)

Just a couple more things you need to make sure of now :o)

Go back to the "tools" menu and then go down to "options".

On the "General" tab, in the send and receive section (the middle one), set how often you want Outlook Express to go off and check for your email when you are online and make sure you choose "do not connect" in the drop down box underneath. My personal preference is checking every 1 minute but that's cos I get a *lot* of email (several hundred a day at the time of writing) - you can set it to however often you prefer :o)

Click on the "send" tab and right at the bottom there are 2 options - one for email and one for newsgroups. Make sure the first one (email) is set to HTML and the second one (newsgroups) is set to Plain Text (most newsgroups get arsey if you post in HTML but there *are* some exceptions).

That's your account all set up and ready to go. It's all pretty easy from now on - OE takes care of itself most of the time :o)

There are lots of ways you can personalise Outlook Express - adding signatures, playing sounds, making and using stationery... all that kind of stuff. I'm going to be writing a few more tutorials over time so keep on checking back, but if there's one you want that I haven't written yet, just let me know and I'll write it and put it online for you as soon as I can :o)