E-mail: the Basics
Electronic mail is the most popular feature of the Internet. For most people
this is the first and perhaps the only activity they engage in. Basic e-mail
is text-based and therefore easy to generate. To date, this medium of communication
has become more versatile through MIME capabilities and Web-based e-mail
that allow users to send and receive binary files as attachments like graphics,
spreadsheets, presentations, videos, sounds, Web pages and executable programs.
E-mail messages can also carry hypertext links that will lead to Web pages
with the click of the mouse button.
How it works
E-mail messages are transmitted the same way as most Internet data using
the TCP/IP protocols. The message is broken down into packets and sent
through different routes in the Net and decoded back into whole form upon
reaching its destination. The beauty of the e-mail is that more often than
not it actually works although people use different e-mail software. This
is unlike most application software where the sender and recipient need
to have the exact same program to write and read messages. Most e-mail
software will automatically decode the message.
E-mail messages are usually in ASCII text format. This is a universal
standard where each character in the English language has a corresponding
number code, for example A=65, and !=33. Text editors and word processors
like Notepad, Word, and Word Perfect can translate ASCII so the codes appear
as letters or punctuations in the screen.
Anatomy of E-Mail Message
The basic e-mail message contains the following parts:
| To: |
e-mail address of recipient |
ex. jdoe@email.com
ex. "John Doe" <jdoe@email.com>
ex. jdoe@email.com,johnd@email.edu,jodoe@email.gov
(if you have more than one recipient) |
| From: |
e-mail address of sender |
|
| Subject: |
Topic of message |
ex. Meeting Next Week |
| Date: |
will appear in recipient's e-mail and sender's file copy, but not in
compose message format. |
ex. March 16, 2000 2:36:57 PM EST
ex. Mon, 20 Mar 2000 23:15:44 -0600 |
| CC: |
"carbon copy" - adopted from business communication protocol when typewriters
ruled the day |
e-mail address(es) of other people who are furnished a copy of the
message |
| BCC: |
"blind cc" - when recipient does not need to know who else got a copy
of the message. May or may not appear in sender's file copy depending on
e-mail software used |
|
| Attachments |
In some e-mail readers (software) this appears as a paper clip symbol |
ex. logo.gif
(gif indicates this is a graphic)
ex. photo1.jpg
(the extension identifies this graphic as a JPEG file)
ex. primer.doc
(doc is the extension for a Word document)
ex. happy.exe
(when in doubt DON'T open any exe attachments, these are notorious
carriers of viruses. This particular example is a worm or Trojan Horse). |
| Body |
this is where the body of message goes |
ex.
We look forward to hearing your ideas about the School Safety Program
at the faculty meeting on Monday, March 20 at 10:00 a.m. at the faculty
conference room.
As you have requested we are attaching some photos and background information
about our school. |
| Signature |
personalized information about sender |
ex. John Doe
Principal
Somewhere Elementary School
Tel (123) 4567-8910
ex. "I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have. "
- Thomas Jefferson
ex. "Excellence in Education!"
ex.
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