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FAQ
: Sending and Receiving Email
What
is email?
Email,
also often seen written as "e-mail", stands
for electronic mail. The simple definition is that email
is an electronic message sent from one computer to another.
An email address is written in the form of username@hostname.
The hostname would be something like "aol.com"
or "klbwebsolutions.com". It refers to the
mail server, the computer where the recipient has an
electronic mailbox.
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Why
use email?
Well,
for starters, it is a much faster way to communicate
with others, especially those who live far away from
us. To save time and money, more and more people are
using electronic mail. It's fast, easy and much cheaper
than the using the post office.
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What
can be sent by email?
The
main requirement is that it has to be something electronic.
You can't send a batch of grandma's famous brownies
over email. You can send or receive personal and business-related
messages with attachments, such as pictures or formatted
documents. You can even send music and computer programs.
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How
does the email get to my computer?
The
way email gets from one place to another is similar
to how a letter gets from one place to another. You
type up the email note and hit "Send". It
then goes to your "mail server" which is like
your local post office. From there it gets sent to the
destination mail server, which would be the recipient's
post office. When it gets to that mail server, it is
stored in an electronic mailbox until the recipient
retrieves it.
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What
is needed to receive email?
To
receive email, you must have an account on a mail server.
This is similar to having an address where you receive
letters. One advantage over regular mail is that you
can retrieve your email from any location. Once you
connect to your mail server, you download your messages.
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What
is needed to send email?
To
send email, you need a connection to the Internet and
access to a mail server that forwards your mail. The
standard protocol used for sending Internet email is
called SMTP, short for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol.
It works in conjunction with POP servers. POP stands
for Post Office Protocol. When you send an email message,
your computer routes it to an SMTP server. The server
looks at the email address (similar to the address on
an envelope), then forwards it to the recipient's mail
server, which stores it until the addressee retrieves
it.
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Is
there a limitation on who can receive email?
You
can send email anywhere in the world to anyone who has
an email address. Remember, almost all Internet service
providers and all major online services offer at least
one email address with every account. So if you are
able to go on-line to read this FAQ, you probably already
have an email account!
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I
tried to send email to someone with an attachment, and
the person I sent it to said it was all garbled. Do
you know why?
At
one time, email on the Internet was good only for short
notes. You couldn't send attachments, such as formatted
documents. Yet when they invited various encoding schemes,
you can now send more complicated types of attachments.
You just have to be certain that the person to whom
you are sending the email with the attachment has the
software capable of decoding it.
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