Coping with Emails

Here are my notes on how you can take advantage of email and electronic communications. Please let me know what you find helpful or missing here.

Sound of Jim Carrey saying “Well when you figure it out email me”

Take the Brainbench certification test on MS Outlook 2000 Fundamentals and MS Outlook Express 5.0 Fundamentals.

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Emoticons and Abbreviations

AFAIK = As Far As I Know AKA = Also Known As ASAP = As Soon As Possible BBL = Be Back Later BRB = Be Right Back BTW = By The Way CU = See You FAQ = Frequently Asked Question FWIW = For Whatever It's Worth FYI = For Your Information IIRC = If I Remember Correctly IMO = In My Opinion IMHO = In My Humble Opinion IOW = In Other Words IRL = In Real Life LOL = Laughing Out Loud NRN = No Reply Necessary OTOH = On The Other Hand PEBKAC = Problem Exists Between Keyboard and Chair ROTF = Rolling On The Floor RTFM = Read The Field Manual TIA = Thanks In Advance TTFN = Ta Ta For Now (from Winnie the Pooh)

Emoticons Smileys :-) Happy First suggested by Scott Fahlman on September 19, 1982 ;-) Winking :-( Sad :-@ Screaming :-O Surprised :-< Mad

You've got mail, baby, yeah!(voice by El Edwards) Mail Add-ons Joan Stark's ASCII Art Gallery Everythingemail.net Subject Text Avoid beginning emails with Subject: “Recall:” because some systems filter out email recall commands and reject such email. Spammers use these subject lines to lure you into opening their mail: Important: Sensitive Info. Order Confirmation Your shipment status Problem solved Message Delivery Error A nice game [this has a virus] Eager to see you How are you Check this out! Congratulations Thank You! RE: Application Re: Details Re: My Details Re: Wicked screensaver What happened? To avoid being filtered out, avoid these trite titles. Begin subjects with an identifier, personally relevant info, and date in your email titles. Example: [CSEX] Followup from our lunch at Coco's 12/2/03

Tag Lines on Emails for The Paranoid

This electronic mail message and any attached files contain information intended for the exclusive use of the individual or entity to whom it is addressed and may contain information that is proprietary, privileged, confidential and/or exempt from disclosure under applicable law. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any viewing, copying, disclosure or distribution of this information may be subject to legal restriction or sanction. Please notify the sender, by electronic mail or telephone, of any unintended recipients and delete the original message without making any copies.

Disclaimer: The information contained in this message may be privileged and confidential and protected from disclosure. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, or an employee or agent responsible for delivering this message to the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution, or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify us immediately by replying to the message and deleting it from your computer. Thank you.

In Word 2000, signature entries are defined in Tools > Options > General tab > Email options

Email Client Software:

• Mail2web retrieves your POP mail if you give them your password. It also lets you delete items.
• Mailstart.com retrieves your POP mail if you give them your password.
• WebBox.com retrieves attachments, too.
• Keyflow claims to be the "leading client/server-based document management and workflow application for Microsoft Exchange."
• Pegasus Mail is free.
• Qualcomm's Eudora Lite can also be downloaded for free.
• Pocomail works much like Outlook but avoids some script bugs because it uses its own HTML rendering engine.

  Bulk-mail spammers use Send-Safe.

Microsoft Outlook

Scott McNeely of Sun calls Microsoft's Outlook e-mail software "Look Out," the virus-prone "petri dish of choice on the Internet."
• From Microsoft's Internet Explorer, you can get mail by pressing the "Go Mail" icon or menu item.
• From Microsoft's Outlook, you can get Internet Explorer by pushing the blue "e".

  This product provides a lot of options, especially the look of your mail viewing screen.

  It's personal choice, but here is how I ended up configuring my MS Outlook:

• From View Layout:
  • Uncheck all the Basic items: Outlook Bar, Folder List, Folder Bar, Tip of the Day.
  • In the Toolbar Layout: I unchecked "Show text on toolbar buttons" because this text pops up as I position a cursor on an icon anyway. You can change this later by right clicking on the toolbar.
  • In the Preview Pane: I checked "Use preview pane" because I don't need to look at a whole page when I work on one message at a time. I unchecked "Show preview pane Header" because that information is highlighted on the list window.
• You could Sort just by clicking on the field name at the top of the screen. Click on "From" and the list is sorted by the From address.

  What's New in Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 for Developers February 2004 article by MVP Randy Byrne notes that "IMAddress" field is a "Blocked" property. Therefore, it cannot be exported or imported into Outlook. This means that if you export an Outlook Contacts list, you cannot import it back in without loosing the IMAddress field. That's why I use Email3Address (E-mail 3) to store Messenger addresses and leave the IMAddress field blank.

  Also note that the default mapping of import fields does not include email fields, so you must drag them over yourself.

  Outlook 2003 does not import birthdays without year (such as "12/31").

File Locations

Note: The C: in folder locations can be substituted for the drive you use on your machine. 

Internet Account Files:

• Outlook Express has an .iaf for for each account in
  C:\Program Files\Common Files\System\MAPI\1033\95\

Address books:

• Outlook Express stores its Address Book file in
  C:\Windows\Application Data\Microsoft\Address Book\user.wab
  Where user is your user name. 
• .wa~ file extensions are back-ups of each .wab file before current changes.
• Outlook, by default, stores your Personal Address Book as file MSOutlo.pip within
  C:\Windows\Application Data\Microsoft\Office.

  On Windows NT4 machines, a different Application Data folder exists for each user under
  C:\WINNT\Profiles\%USER%\

  On Windows 2000 machines, the Documents and Settings folder is on the same level as WINNT.
  C:\WINNT\Profiles\%USER%\

MS Outlook Email message file:

Are stored in a proprietary format.
• Outlook Express 95 stores outbox.mbx and outbox.idx files in folder
  Program Files\ Internet Mail and News\ %user%\ mail
• Outlook Express 5 (installed with Office 2000) :
  1. stores its files under the operating system folder.
     • On Windows 9x, the default is C:\Windows
     • On Windows 2000, the default is C:\WINNT\Documents and Settings\%username% \Local Settings (Where %username% is Administrator.WILSON or something else).
  2. keeps a .dbx file for each folder and subscribed newsgroup within folder:
     ... \Application Data \Identities \{###} \Microsoft \Outlook Express
     The {###} represents the long GUID string for each mail user.
• Outlook Express 5.5 (installed with update to IE5.5) has the same behavior as OE5.
  These plus Outlook 2000 & 2003 keeps messages and calendar entries within one (usually large) outlook.pst file within
  C:\Documents and Settings\username\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\Outlook.pst

  To find this path within Outlook 2003:

  1. Right-Click on Outlook Today (either in the Outlook bar, Shortcust, or the Folders list).
  2. Select Properties from the pop-up menu.
  3. Click on the Advanced... button

  Copy and paste just the file path to quickly access it in Windows Explorer:

  1. Select the path excluding the file name (usually this will be "outlook.pst") with your mouse.
  2. Press Ctrl-C to copy the path
  3. Select Run... from the Start menu.
  4. Press Ctrl-V to paste the path
  5. Backspace to remove the "Outlook.pst" to obtain just the file folders (otherwise you will open the file itself)
     If, for example, the path listed under Path: is "C:\­Documents and Settings\­email.guide\­Application Data\­Microsoft\­Outlook\­outlook.pst", you'd select and copy "C:\­Documents and Settings\­email.guide\­Application Data\­Microsoft\­Outlook\".
  6. Hit Enter to open your Outlook data folder in Windows Explorer.

Transfers

Note: The C: in folder locations can be substituted for the drive you use on your machine. 

Address books:

• You can share address book entries in a card ???

Email messages:

• If you export a message (by dragging and dropping it on the desktop or a Windows Explorer folder), the file extension for the file created depends on the mail program:
  • .eml for Outlook Express Mail Messages, or
  • .msg for Outlook items

Slipstick provides many programs for enhancing Outlook


Microsoft Outlook Programming - Jumpstart for Administrators, Developers, and Power Users (Digital Press, 2004) by Sue Mosher of outlookcode.com explains how to code in VBA


Professional Outlook 2000 Programming (Wrox) by Ken Slovak (Outlook MVP), Chris Burnham, and Dwayne Gifford
Chapter 7 on COM add-ins


Programmer's Guide to Internet Mail (Digital Press;January 15, 2000) by John Rhoton

1-57231-500-8 Developing Applications for Microsoft® Exchange with C++ (Microsoft Press: Redmond, Washington, 1996) by Ben Goette

Virus Protection

You can get a malicious virus from email. But please check out hoaxes before you forward warnings and end up looking like a fool to those who know how computers really work.

This stems from a decision Microsoft made in structuring their operating system.

1. Go the way Sun took with Java: make it impossible to affect "core functions" by limiting what a program could do in a "sandbox".
2. Allow programs on the Internet to do anything it wants to (including erase files). But provide a way to track the source of programs. We can then choose to not accept programs we don't trust or can't trace to a verifiably trusted source. From within Internet Explorer, go to View, Internet Options, Security tab. You can select one of several Zones.

   From a theological point of view, Microsoft took the approach that our God took: Anyone has in our power to do good and evil. We have to be discerning about whether the source of our ideas is good or evil. We have to learn to know what we can trust and not trust.

Products: McAfee/Network Associate's WebScanX. Norton's Anti-Virus.

Secure Electronic Communications

Since the internet is an open public channel ...
• If you want to make it difficult for others to read your message if they are able to obtain it en route, encrypt the message text.

• If you want to detect whether data sent to you has been changed or tampered en route, ask the sender to provide you a hash of the message text.

• If you want be sure that a message being sent to you really came from the person, ask the sender to sign the message text with his/her public key.

There are two approaches to sign and encrypt files you send via email or FTP, both being standardized by different groups of the Internet Mail Consortium:

• PGP (Pretty Good Protection), defined by RFC 1991 and 2015, is now a product of Network Associates. OpenPGP is the IETF Proposed Standard version of PGP.

  PGP is a hybrid cryptosystem. It encrypts original plaintext with a single-use session key created randomly using a seed that is randomly generated based on random movements of mouse and keyboard keystokes. The session key is encrypted with the recipient's public key. The encrypted message sent to the recipient contains both the ciphertext and the encrypted session key. The recipient then decrypts the encrypted session key and uses it to decrypt the ciphertext.

  PGP is focused on self-administration and control because it is based on a “web of trust” to establish transitive relationships, “like allowing individual users in a corporation to decide who gets a key to the main gate.”

  Red Hat Linux uses an application named gpg, the Gnu version of PGP from pgp.com

• S/MIME (Secure/MIME) is preferred by large organizations over PGP. Support for S/MIME is now built into virtually all major email client products (Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express, Netscape Communicator, Novell GroupWise, Lotus Domino/Notes). This is becuase it uses X.509 public key certificates, the foundation of Internet PKI (Private Key Infrastructure) and its use of Certificate Authorities to establish trust relationships.

S/MIME and OpenPGP — Internet Mail Consortium's article comparing the two protocols.

Emailman

The Entrust.com Entelligence client transparently (to users) encrypts files and appends the .cpt file extension to the original file's name. Those who receive the encrypted file also need the same client program, which automatically decrypts the file and restores the original file name.

Xrayapp runs on desktops to intercept outgoing SMTP emails and alter headers for privacy and for switching among mail and newsgroup servers.

PEM (Privacy Enhanced Mail

PEM is an application-layer protocol finalized in 1993 by the IETF to add in a way that is compatible with existing mail systems.
• MIC-CLEAR messages provide confidentiality and authentication
• MIC-ONLY messages also supports come gateway implementations
• ENCRYPTED messages also provide integrity (from alteration).

Instant Communications

Each service has their own protocol. So to go through firewalls, configure:

Service	Max Contacts	TCP Port In	TCP port In/Out
AOL Instant Messenger	200	15191	5191
MSN Messenger, formerly NetMeeting. Windows XP Messenger 4.7	150	11863	1863
Yahoo Messenger	150	15050	5050
ICQ (pronounced "I seek you") has become the most downloaded program on the internet.	600	15190	5190

Close MSN Messenger before surfing the web if you do not want email addresses or MSN names to be viewed by sites you visit.
Also, check registry keys in "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\ Microsoft\ MessengerService\ Policies\ Suffixes" to make sure other applications are not adding sites to the access list.

If you don't want to install any program on your machine, or if you're behind a firewall, use the eMessenger website to access MSN using a JavaScript enabled browser.

If you have AOL Internet Messenger running, send a message to it using protocol
href="aim:goim?screenname=Screenname&message=..."

Screen Name:
Enter Your Message Here!


If you have Yahoo Messenger open: ymsgr:sendIM?screenname
But I don't because of its security vulnerability

Interoperable and secure instant messenger clients:

• Pidgin was renamed from GAIM to emphasize that it talks to all IM services, not just AIM. GAIM was the most downloaded program among the 70,000 open source programs at SourceForge.net.
• Rival Messenger is a freeware "windows based instant messaging client based roughly on everything good that's available in the different commercial Instant Messaging Clients."
• Bantu Interoperable with MSN, Yahoo! and ICQ (not AOL?)
• Jabber Interoperable with MSN, Yahoo (not AOL & ICQ?)
• People Link
• Pow Wow from Tribal Voice
• mercuryprime.com offers encrypted chat.
• ceruleanstudios.com offers blowfish encryption support between Trillian clients running over ICQ and AIM (not MSN).
• Spy Shield for MSN Messenger from Command Code uses your existing PGP keys for encryption.
• Encrsoft
• WinJab
• SILC (Secure Internet Live Conferencing) uses its own protocol specifications submitted to the IETF.
• Secway secures MSN, Yahoo!, ICQ and AOL instant messenger clients.

Microsoft's Live (Real-Time) Communications Server 2003 (code named “Greenwich”) Communications Server first shipped Sep. '03 at an initial cost of $929 to install plus $34.95 per employee. It integrates closely with Microsoft's Outlook.

Social networks

• Orkut (by invitation only) written in MS Visual Studio .NET by a Google employee in his spare time,
• Friendster,
• Tribe.net
• LinkedIn, Lycos.

  spIM

  Unsolicited commercial messages sent via an instant messaging system. usually by bots.

Email Addresses

Email addresses are a hassle to change. I don't want to have to send out announcements, miss out on mail, or other hassles associated with changing addresses.

One good reason for having an AOL account: Because there are a lot of complaints about AOL messing up the formatting of web pages, I need to have AOL just to see how badly it messes up web pages.

I use Internet Service Provider (ISP) Earthlink to work on the Internet. Here are some considerations:

1. With AOL I cannot swap between Netscape or Microsoft browsers while connected to Earthlink. With AOL, you're stuck with Microsoft. This may not last long since AOL now owns Netscape.
2. I can get mail using a POP3 client. This means that I could get all my mail in one place if I ask my company to automatically route company email to my personal mail account. mail server for private mail with friends and family.
3. They have more 56K modems than anyone.
4. I seem to get faster response on Earthlink servers. Their servers are near me (in Pasadena, which I suppose doesn't seem wise considering the earthquake risk here).
5. They have the best phone support people I have experienced, even though they're only paid $8 an hour. Their 800 number answered quickly by friendly, knowledgable people. (I've waited an hour for AOL tech support).
6. Earthlink charges a $25 setup charge.

comparing ISP's at TheList and Epinions

E-mail sent to any papernapkin.net address returns the following bad news: "Nice to hear from you. Ha ha, just kidding. Actually, this is a rejection letter. The person who gave you this email address does not want to have anything to do with you."

Free Email Addresses

Read about Email freebies Business Week article on the many free email options:

Feature	Yahoo	Hotmail	Juno	pobox
Cost	Free	Free	Free	$15-20 / Year	Free
Access from any browser?	Yes	Yes	No*	Yes
Junk E-mail detection?	No	Yes	?	?
built-in spellchecker, dictionary, and thesaurus?	No	Yes	?	?
Forwards mail?	?	?	?	Yes
Pager notification	Yes	?	?	$$
Space	?	?	?	?	?

* Juno requires a separate program (which takes up 15 MB of hard disk) that displays ads while you do your emailing. That's why it's free dial-up.

The following also provide free email:

• Mailcity, part of WhoWhere.
• Geocities
• Rocketmail
• Netaddress
• Valise charges a one-time $20 fee.
• la.com

Spam Proofing

1. Don't respond to spam! That's the first piece of advice. Yet, open rates can reach 15-75%!
2. Avoid using common names to avoid being the victim of “dictionary attacks” in spammers guess every possible user name in a domain.
3. If you don't want or expect a reply, send emails anonymously through anonymizer.com
4. If you want a limited number of replies to a posting, post using one-time use addresses from SpamMotel or Mailshell or emailias.com, which, for $4.95 per month or $19.95 per year, provides a plug-in sitting in a browser's "favorite links" or task bar that provokes a pop-up window with a specialized address.
5. Receive emails filtered through an intermediate ISP who Spam Gourmet.com only show you mail from senders who have manually responded to a confirmation email. Other client-side products: Cloudmark, Sunbelt
6. Install a gateway filter program on your Exchange server, such as Trend Micro, Tumbleweed and CMS's Praetor, SurfControl's Super Scout SMTP filter, Sybari antigen. (see PCMag's article on gateway filters). They save time all your employees' time deleting junkmail.
7. Report spam to Larry Kilgallen's SpamCop which, for $3 per month, filters emails from black-listed sources, much like the Mail Abuse Prevention System and filtering company BrightMail. If you are on AOL, report it to screen name “TOSSpam” so AOL can investigate it and document abuses.
8. If you include an email address in HTML on a webpapge, first use encoder to format the e-mail address in a way that is more difficult to read by website crawler robots spammers use to “harvest” email addresses from web pages.
9. Don't do business with those known to harbor spam gangs. Steve Linford of spamhaus.org tracks Spam-Friendly ISPs as well as Spam Hosts and Register Of Known Spam Operations (ROKSO) database of Spammers (spam gangs).
10. Some state laws, including those in California and Washington, give consumers some legal recourse against junk mailers.
11. Write to your national and state Senators and Congressmen to request that they support tough anti-spam legislation with strong enforcement provisions and stiff penalties.

• DMOZ anti-spam
• The Spam Boycott Page
• Dealing with junk mail
• How to Handle Spam mail
• The First Suit from Washington State's Spam Law Enacted 7-22-98
• Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial E-mail
• Spamcop.net
• Anti-spam techniques
• JunkBusters maintained by the Voters Telecommunications Watch (VTW)
• JunkEmail.Org of the Center for Democracy and Technology.
• Spamware

  How to Make Your Exchange Server Relay-Secure. From windows 2000 Magazine.
  Microsoft Exchange and relay - (badly miss-configured, or deliberately miss-configured mail servers that strip the sender's IP address to thawrt spams being traceable back.

Web Bugs

Spammers can track which subject lines are most effective. They do this by inserting in their emails a “web bug” -- an invisible one pixel image or identification in a link back on the spammer's server. Each image has a different name associated with the text being used. When a user opens the page, the retrieval of that image

Since a an image can be easily created for each email address and each subject line, a sophisticated spammer can determine which subject line is effective and which email address are “live”.

Here's what you can do:

1. Read more about this at the web bug demonstration page.

2. never preview the text of an email message. Go in Outlook Options and uncheck the preview window.

3. Delete messages from the window containing the list of your messages.

4. After downloading your mail, disconnect your machine from the internet before reading your email.

   You can't do this with internet-based email services such as hotmail, but you can use an SSL service such as Visto.com.

5. Install a firewall such as ZoneAlarm and block the IP addresses of known spammers. Examples: emailhello.com

Spam Words

Here are some email Subject lines that have enticed me to read spam mail:
• RE: Application
• Re: Movie
• RE: Your wallet
• RE: Money we may owe you.
• Re: Here is that sample
• Fwd: Did you take it?
• You blockeced my ICQ
• Hows work?
• Please call me back... It's Important!
• still trying to reach you
• Registration
• Information you requested
• new photos from my party

Let me know the subject lines that got you to open spam mail.

Videophones

• ILS Servers is at Netmeet.net

Be aware that a large percentage of the users of this technology focus on "adult" (pornographic) subject matter. Avoid them. Don't waste your time (and possibly you job and morality) with them.