Email explained

This short article explains, in straightforward terms, just how the email system works.

Many of you will have heard terms like mailbox, mail server, email client & the like, & wondered exactly what it all means.

When someone sends you an email, it goes to our mail server.

It then sits there waiting for your email client or email programme, which might be;

• Outlook

• Outlook Express

• Windows Mail

• Windows Live Mail

• Thunderbird

• Apple Mail

• Eudora

• Incredimail

• Or any one of many others

to check to see if there are any emails.

When your email client contacts our mail server, our mail server then tells it how many

emails there are & then delivers them to your email client

Depending on how your email client is set up, our mail server may;

1. delete the messages once they have been delivered

2. keep the messages for a specified number of days

3. keep the messages until you delete them from your email client

Because there is limited space on our mail servers, be careful when selecting option 2 or 3 above. You might find that you run out of space on the mail server if selecting these options.

It helps if we think of the email system like this

• Our mail servers are like a post office.

• In the post office we have a letterbox for each email account

• When we receive a letter for you, it goes into your letterbox

• When you click “get mail”, or “send/receive” in your email client, it contacts the post office to see if there are any new letters for it

• The post office says – yes there are X new letters

• & then your email client collects the letters

• If you have your email client set to “leave copy of messages on server for X days”

• This means that the letters will be delivered, but a copy of them will also sit in the box in the post office. After the specified number of days, that copy will be shredded.

• If you have your email client set to “leave copy of messages on server” then a copy will stay in your box, & never be shredded. Your letter box will fill up very quickly & then you will start not receiving messages.

• If your letterbox in the post office is full, & we can’t fit anymore letters into it, any new letters will get sent back to the sender with a message saying that your letterbox in the post office was full & the letter couldn’t be delivered

• The Post Office is the incoming mail server

• The letterbox is your email address

• Each letterbox is locked, that’s your password

• If your letterbox & password are the same it is very easy for someone to guess, steal your letters, & use your letterbox to send spam emails