Take Control of Apple Mail

185 Pages·2014·2.75 MB·English

by  Joe Kissell

Take Control of Apple Mail (1.0)

Joe Kissell

This book is for sale at http://leanpub.com/tco-apple-mail
This version was published on 2014-02-26
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© 2014 alt concepts inc.
ISBN for EPUB version: 9781615424337
ISBN for MOBI version: 9781615424337
Table of Contents
Read Me First
Updates and More
Basics
Introduction
Apple Mail Quick Start
Learn What’s New in Mavericks and iOS 7 Mail
Mail Changes in Mavericks
Mail Changes in iOS 7
Learn about Email Protocols
POP
IMAP
SMTP
IMAP and POP Misconceptions
Switch from POP to IMAP
iCloud
Exchange
Gmail
Fetch, Push, and IMAP IDLE
Master Mail Concepts
Account Setup
Decoding the Mail Sidebar
Special Mailboxes
Hidden Interface Elements
Addressing
Archiving
Notifications
Customize Mail
Sidebar
Toolbars
Message Header
Views
Favorites Bar
VIPs
Signatures
Keyboard Shortcuts
Plugins
Use Gmail with Mail
Understand How Mail Works (or Not) with Gmail
Set Up Mail to Use Gmail
Avoid Gmail Problems
Find Your Messages
Perform a Basic Search
Search for a Phrase
Use Boolean Expressions
Search by Date Range
Search within the Current Message
Work Smarter with Smart Mailboxes
Take Control of Your Inbox
Take Responsibility
Consolidate Your Accounts
Optimize Your Mailboxes
Use Rules
Control Spam
Develop an Email Strategy
Become a Better Correspondent
Don’t Be Part of the Problem
Choose Formatting Wisely
Avoid Attachments
Quote Effectively
Sign and Encrypt Messages
Learn When and Why to Sign or Encrypt Messages
Use S/MIME Encryption
Use GnuPG for Mail
Sign and Encrypt Messages in iOS 7
Fix Mail Problems
Fix Incoming Mail Problems
Fix Outgoing Mail (SMTP) Problems
Untangle Special Mailboxes
Fix Mailbox Problems
Fix Searching Errors
Use Mail in iOS 7
iOS 7 Mail vs. OS X Mail
12 Things Every iOS Mail User Should Know
Troubleshoot iOS Mail Problems
About This Book
Ebook Extras
About the Author
About the Publisher
Copyright and Fine Print
Featured Titles
Read Me First
Welcome to Take Control of Apple Mail, version 1.0, published in February 2014
by TidBITS Publishing Inc. This book was written by Joe Kissell and edited by
Dan Frakes.
This book helps you understand the most effective ways to use Apple’s Mail app
in OS X 10.9 Mavericks and iOS 7, including customization and
troubleshooting. It also helps you manage your incoming and outgoing email
efficiently.
If you want to share this ebook with a friend, we ask that you do so as you would
with a physical book: “lend” it for a quick look, but ask your friend to buy a
copy for careful reading or reference. Discounted classroom and Mac user group
copies are available.
Copyright © 2014, alt concepts inc. All rights reserved.
Updates and More
You can access extras related to this ebook on the Web (use the link in Ebook
Extras, near the end; it’s available only to purchasers). On the ebook’s Take
Control Extras page, you can:
Download any available new version of the ebook for free, or buy any
subsequent edition at a discount.
Download various formats, including PDF, EPUB, and Mobipocket. (Learn
about reading on mobile devices on our Device Advice page.)
Read the ebook’s blog. You may find new tips or information, links to author
interviews, and update plans for the ebook.
If you bought this ebook from the Take Control Web site, it has been added to
your account, where you can download it in other formats and access any future
updates. However, if you bought this ebook elsewhere, you can add it to your
account manually; see Ebook Extras.
Basics
Here are a few fundamentals that will help you read this ebook:
Links: All blue text in this ebook is hot, meaning you can click (or tap) it,
just like a link on the Web. If you click a link that takes you to a different
part of the ebook, you can return quickly to where you were if your ebook
reader offers a “back” feature. For example, if you use iBooks to read the
EPUB version of this ebook, you can tap the “Back to” link at the lower left.
Or, if you use Preview on the Mac to read the PDF version of this ebook, you
can choose Go > Back or press Command-[.
Menus: Where I describe choosing a command from a menu in the menu
bar, I use an abbreviated description that puts the name of the menu ahead of
the command. For example, at the end of the previous paragraph, “Go >
Back” means “choose the Back command from the Go menu.”
Mail preferences: I frequently mention preferences in the Mail app for
Mavericks that you may want to change. You open Mail’s Preferences
window by choosing Mail > Preferences, and within that window, you
choose a pane representing the category of preferences you want to change
(such as Accounts). You may need to navigate still deeper in a pane—for
example, by selecting an account from a list and then choosing a view such
as Account Information or Advanced.
To simplify the instructions for getting to such a specific location, I extend
the method I use to describe menu commands. For example, if I say “go to
Mail > Preferences > Accounts > Account Name > Advanced,” that means
“choose Preferences from the Mail menu, click the Accounts button in the
toolbar, select the account you want to adjust from the list on the left, and
then click the Advanced button.”
System Preferences in OS X: Besides preferences within Mail, I sometimes
discuss settings in OS X’s system-wide System Preferences app. To open
System Preferences, click its icon in the Dock or choose System Preferences
from the Apple menu. When the System Preferences window opens, click
the icon of the pane whose settings you want to change, and then, if
necessary, navigate to a view within that pane. I typically abbreviate all this
in the same way as I do Mail preferences—by saying, for example, “go to
System Preferences > Internet Accounts > iCloud.”
Path syntax: I occasionally use a path to show the location of a file or folder
in your file system. For example, OS X stores most utilities, such as
Terminal, in the Utilities folder. The path to the Terminal utility is:
ApplicationsUtilities/Terminal.
The slash at the beginning of the path tells you to start from the root level of
the disk. Some paths begin with ~ (tilde), which is a shortcut for the user’s
home directory. For example, if a person with the username joe wants to
install fonts that only he can access, he would install the fonts in his
~/Library/Fonts folder, which is just another way of writing
Usersjoe/Library/Fonts.
User Library: The library folder mentioned in the previous paragraph,
~/Library, is normally invisible in Mavericks. To see it, hold down the
Option key and choose Go > Library in the Finder.
Settings in iOS: I sometimes tell you to adjust options in the Settings app on
an iOS device. By default, this app appears on the first page of the Home
screen.
iOS navigation: To describe moving around in the interface of an iOS
device, I sometimes use a shortcut. For example, if I wanted to tell you to
open the Settings app, tap the Photos option at the left, and then—in the
Photos pane—tap Play Each Slide For, I might instead tell you to “tap
Settings > Photos > Play Each Slide For.”