Sometimes when you pick up email with your email client (email software) you would like to be able to also pick it up from another computer but still be able to pick it up from your main computer.

Scenario:

During the day you work at your main location of your business (job). In the evenings and weekends or even on days when you wish to work from home you would like to check your email but still be able to download it to your main computer at work.

You could pick up the email at home then email it back to yourself at work. This is a hassle plus could get confusing if you forget to do it.

What you can do, which is easier and less confusing, is set up your home email client to leave a copy of the emails on the email server. This way, when you return to work, all the emails can be downloaded to your main computer at work.

This tutorial is written using Outlook Express or Outlook but the principles are the same for other email clients (email programs).

Set Up Email Client to Leave a Copy of Email on Email Server

We are going to set up your home (or mobile) computer to check your email and leave the original copy on the email server.

1. Set up your email client for the email account you wish to check email for from your home computer (or mobile computer).

   See Create Email Account Outlook Express-Outlook if you haven’t set up the email account yet on this machine.

2. Left click the Tools menu item in the top menu bar.

   The menu will expand to show more items.

3. Left click the Accounts menu item in the list that has appeared.

   The Internet Accounts screen will appear.

4. Left click the email account name under the Account column you wish to set up to leave a copy of emails on the email server.

   When selected, the Account name will be highlighted.

5. Left click the Properties button on the right.

   The email account’s Properties screen appears.

6. Left click the Advanced tab at the top of the screen.

   The Advanced settings for the Account appear.

7. In the bottom section of the Advanced tab screen, under Delivery, there is a check box beside “Leave a copy of messages on server”.

   Left click inside the check box.

   Some more Advanced settings will now be available. You can make a decision about these settings now or later.

8. Left click the Ok button at the bottom when you have finished.

   Internet Accounts screen is visible again.

9. Left click the Close button in the bottom right.

   The Internet Accounts screen will close.

That’s it, you are done.

Now, when you pick up email from home or on the road with your laptop a copy of the emails will be left on the email server. On your return to the office you can pick up your email including the ones you already looked at while on the road.

Warning:  Added June 15, 2006

If you are going to be away from your main computer for an extended amount of time or if someone sends you a very large file while you are away from the office, your mailbox on the server could become full and emails will start to bounce. It might be a better idea in this case to have your mobile computer pick up mail while you are away or have someone in the office pickup your mail to clean out the mailbox.

Tip provided by PCDOC.

Outlook Express and Outlook can be setup to pickup the mail from your different email accounts including your web based accounts (if permitted by the web based mail provider).

To set up Outlook Express and Outlook to pick up email from your different email accounts you use the Tools menu item at the top of the window.

What You Need to Set Up an Email Account in Outlook Express or Outlook

To create an Email Account in Outlook Express or Outlook you will need:

• Your account login information
  1. Your account name.
  2. Your password.
• Incoming Mail Server Information

  Your web based email account, ISP (Internet Service Provider) or web hosting company provides this.

• Outgoing Mail Server Information

  As with the Incoming Mail Server information, your web based email account, ISP or web hosting company provides this.

  Note: Your ISP may not allow you to send email for another account from your location. Have your ISP Outgoing Mail Server information handy, you may need it.

Create Email Account

1. Open Outlook Express (Outlook).
2. Left click Tools in the top menu bar.

   The menu will expand.

3. Left click Accounts from the menu that becomes exposed.

   Internet Accounts dialog box will appear.

4. Left click the Mail tab.

   Switches to the list of Mail accunts you have set up.

5. Left click the Add button on the right.

   Menu is exposed with list of options.

6. Left click the Mail option for the list of options.

   Internet Connection Wizard screen appears.

Fill in Account Details

1. The first screen of the Internet Connection Wizard is the Your Name screen.

   Insert the name you wish to appear in the From portion of the email.

   This name will appear in the From of the email and in the From column when emails are viewed in Outlook Express (Outlook).

   You can have your name and your company name if you wish. e.g. My Name, My Company Name.

2. Left click the Next button when you are finished.

   Internet Email Address screen appears in the Internet Connection Wizard.

3. In the Internet Email Address screen of the Internet Connection Wizard is where you enter the email address you are adding to your Accounts list.

   Enter the email address you are setting up. You need to enter the complete email address. e.g. yourname@mycompany.com

4. Left click the Next button when you are finished.

   Email Server Names screen of the Internet Connection Wizard appears.

5. The top dropdown menu is the type of email account. The default is POP3 which is usually the type of email account you would have.

   If your email address uses a different type of incoming email server, select the type from the dropdown list.

6. Next is the Incoming Mail Server text box.

   Your ISP, web based mail account or web hosting company would provide this information. This is the email server that receives your incoming mail. It might look something like this:

   pop.company.com

   Enter the Incoming Mail Server information you were given.

7. Outgoing Mail Server is the email server used to send your email.

   Even though your web hosting company provided the Outgoing Mail Server information for your website your ISP (Internet Service Provider) may not allow you to use this server.

   Some ISP’s have set up their system to force you to go through their email servers when sending email. This is their attempt to catch spammers using their servers to send spam.

   At this point you have a choice. You can either use the Outgoing Mail Server information your web based mail or web hosting company gave you and see if it works or use the Outgoing Mail Server information your ISP gave you.

   If you use the information provided by the web based mail or your web hosting company and it doesn’t work you can always go back into your Account setup and change it later to the ISP Outgoing Mail Server information.

   Enter the Outgoing Mail Server information you chose to use. It should look something like this:

   smtp.company.com

8. Left click the Next button to continue.

   Internet Mail Logon screen of the Internet Connection Wizard appears.

9. The Internet Mail Logon screen is where you enter your email account information.

   Your web based mail or web hosting company will have provided the information you are to enter as your logon information.

   Enter the account name information you were given.

   Enter the account password you were given to use.

   If you leave Remember password checked then you will not be asked for the account password when you pickup your email.

10. Left click the Next button when finished.

    Congratulations screen of the Internet Connection Wizard appears.

11. You are finished!

    Left click the Finish button at the bottom of the screen to complete the Email Account setup process.

    Internet Connection Wizard closes and the Internet Accounts screen is visible.

The email account you just added will be in the list accounts and it will be highlighted in grey. Use the scroll bar to move down the list if you have a number of accounts already setup and can’t see this.

The default of Outlook Express (Outlook) is to insert the Incoming Mail Server information as the Account name.

If you have one email account at the email provider the default account name of the Incoming Mail Server might be ok for you. If you have a number of email accounts at the same email provider (e.g. Your company website has different email accounts for different purposes/people) then this default Account name isn’t going to be very useful for you.

Next, Editing Email Account Name Properties Outlook Express-Outlook.

When you set up an Outlook Express or Outlook email account the program, by default, uses the Incoming Mail Server information as the Account name. This isn’t very useful plus if you have a number of email accounts at the same email account provider it can be confusing.

In this tutorial we will look at the Email Account Name Properties of the email accounts you have set up in Outlook Express (Outlook).

Edit Email Account Name Outlook Express (Outlook)

By default, Outlook Express and Outlook use the Incoming Mail Server information as the account name when you add an email account. This isn’t very useful as when you are a beginner computer user you might not remember which email account this is. You may have set up different email accounts for your family members at the same ISP (Internet Service Provider).

If you have a website it is quite possible you have a number of email accounts set up for different purposes.

How are you going to know which account is which?

It is possible to change the Account name for your email accounts in Outlook Express (Outlook).

1. Open the Internet Accounts sceen if it is not already open.

   Left click the Tools menu item at the top of the screen, left click the Accounts menu item if this screen is not already open.

2. Select the email account you wish to edit by left clicking it in the list of accounts.

   Use the scroll bar if it is not visible.

3. Left click the Properties button on the right once you have selected the account you wish to edit.

   The account’s Properties window opens.

4. Left click the General tab if it is not already selected.

   The General tab shows the Mail Account and User Information

5. Under the Mail Account section there is a text box with the Account Name that Outlook Express (Outlook) is using for this account.

   Change the name to something more meaningful to you. e.g. Info-My Website if it’s an account for your website or a family name if it’s for one of your family members.

6. Left click the Ok button at the bottom of the screen once you have entered the new Account name you want Outlook Express (Outlook) to use.

   Internet Accounts screen reappears.

   Left click the Close button at the bottom right of the screen if you are finished.

   The Internet Accounts screen disappears.

Now your email Account name is meaningful to you.

The same methods above can be used to rename your News and Directory accounts (just left click the appropriate tab in the Internet Accounts screen.)

Do you like how your mail is sorted in Outlook Express or Outlook?

Need to find a particular email from a certain person?

Want to have your mail sorted by date received with the most recent at the top?

The mail in any of your Inbox folders can be sorted any way your wish.

When you open Outlook Express or Outlook and have the Folders View enabled your emails will appear on the right side. Across the top of the right side are the labels for the columns (From, Subject, Received… Yours may have more or less columns, depending on how you have the Mail folders set up.)

Note: The order of your columns may differ from mine. I’m writing this tutorial with the default locations that Outlook Express and Outlook put them in.

Sort Mail by Who It Is From

1. The From column should be the farthest left column in the right panel of the Mail folder (after the 4 small columns for mail symbols).

   If you have mail in the folder you will see people’s names in the column. These names are the names of the people who have sent you email.

2. If you left click the From column name the mail will be sorted by name alphabetically in decending order.

   The Z’s will be at the top of the list and the A’s will be at the end of the list.

3. To sort the mail by name in accending order, left click the From column name again.

   Now the A’s are at the top of the list and the Z’s are at the bottom of the list.

Sorting email by the From column can be handy even if you have organzied your incoming mail into folders. You know the email you are looking for is in the XProject folder but you are looking for a particular email from the President of the company.

Using this technique of sorting mail by the From column will put all the email from the President together. Now you just have to look through those emails for the one you are looking for.

If you had an idea of when the email was sent, just look at the dates in the Received column.

I want to sort all the emails with the same Subject together! You can do this too.

Sort Email by Subject

The Subject column should be next to the From column in the right pane when in Folders view.

1. Left click the Subject column label and the emails will be sorted in decending order.

   The Re: portion of the subject is ignored and the emails are sorted with the last email on that subject first.

   For multiple emails on the same date with the same Subject the last one received that date is at the top of the list.

2. To sort by Subject in accending order, left click the Subject column label again.

   The emails are now sorted in accending order with the A’s first and Z’s last.

   Again, the dates are sorted in the order of last received first. If you have multiple emails with the same Subject on the same date the earliest one for that date is at the top of the list for that date.

You can also sort by date Received and your Account name.

Sort Mail by Date Received

1. Left click the Received column label and the mail will be sorted in decending with the most recently received mail at the top of the list.
2. Left click the Received column label again and the mail will be sorted in accending order with the most recently received mail at the top of the list.

Sort Mail by Account Name

1. Left click the Account column label and the mail will be sorted by Account name in decending order.
2. Left click the Account column label again and the mail will be sorted by Account name in decending order

Sorting mail by the column labels in Folder view is an easy way to find emails based on the From, Subject, Received and Account columns.

If you have other columns of information in view the same techniques explained here can be used on those column labels also. Experiment.