APPLE MAIL ESSENTIALS · best support your work flow. Some strategies to consider: ★Create...

APPLE MAIL ESSENTIALS

by Ruth Davis Mac2School

Customizing Apple Mail Preferences 5 ....................................................General 5 ..........................................................................................Accounts 6 ........................................................................................Mailbox Behaviors 7 ............................................................................Server Settings 8 ...............................................................................Junk Mail 8 ........................................................................................Fonts and Colors 9 ..............................................................................Viewing 10 ........................................................................................Classic Layout 11 ...............................................................................Conversations (previously called Threaded Messages) 12 .........................Composing 12 ....................................................................................Signatures 14 ....................................................................................To create a signature 14 ......................................................................Rules 15 ............................................................................................Customizing the Toolbars 16 ................................................................Mailboxes 17 ......................................................................................The Inbox 17 .....................................................................................The Drafts Mailbox 18 .........................................................................Junk Mailbox 18 .................................................................................Your Own Mailboxes 18 .......................................................................Suggestions for New Mailboxes 18 ........................................................To Create a Mailbox 19 ........................................................................Smart Mailboxes 19 ............................................................................To Create a Smart Mailbox 19 ..............................................................To Delete a Mailbox 20 ........................................................................To Rename a Mailbox 20 ......................................................................Favorite Mailboxes 21 ..........................................................................Moving Messages into Mailboxes 21 ......................................................Searching in Mail 22 ...........................................................................Flagging Messages 22 .........................................................................Using Color to Highlight Important Emails 23 .........................................Addressing Emails 23 ..........................................................................BCC 23 .............................................................................................Cleaning Out Incorrect Addresses 24 .....................................................Marking an Email As Urgent 24 .............................................................The Formatting Toolbar 24 ...................................................................Editing Shortcuts 25 ...........................................................................Cut and Paste 25 ................................................................................Changing Caps to Lower Case 25 ..........................................................Checking Spelling 25 ...........................................................................How To Add Numbered Lists in an Email 25 ............................................Using Stationery For Fancier Emails 26 ..................................................The Fastest Way to Email a Photo 27 .....................................................The Fastest Way to Send An Attachment 28 ...........................................Saving Photos You Get in an Email 29 ...................................................Saving Emails into the Documents Folder 30 ..........................................Exporting Entire Mailboxes 31 ..............................................................The Lowdown On Downloads 31 ...........................................................

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Troubleshooting 31.............................................................................


Face it. Not everyone is born to have a zero count Inbox. That’s why Apple Mail is packed with tools and features to help you find and create what you need when you need it.

It also helps to know how you usually sort and find things in your life so you can work the same way with your email.

WHAT KIND OF ORGANIZER ARE YOU IN LIFE? The Folder Maven: You have a filing cabinet drawer full of manila folders, alphabetical and organized and you can open the drawer and find exactly what you need when you need it. Now you want to replicate this sense of order on your Mac.

The Piler: Everything is in a big stack, or maybe even several stacks on your desk, the floor, the kitchen table. When you need something, you start with the first pile and keep looking until you find it. Or you give up and wait for it to show up again.

The Once A Month Sort of Sorter: You have folders for the important stuff but everything else is in a pile that you sort once a month or whenever you can get to it.

Once you figure out how you work, you can choose which tools in Mail will best support your work flow.

Some strategies to consider:

★ Create Mailboxes for pending projects, orders, organizations...things that you need to currently reference and find easily

★ Create Smart Mailboxes to automatically put emails into designated mailboxes

★ Save archivable emails into folders in your Documents folder--NOT in email

★ Save photos that people email to you into Photos and then delete the email


But first, let’s customize Mail so that it looks, feels and sounds the way you like it.

Customizing Apple Mail Preferences Under the Mail menu, choose Preferences

General • Click on the General icon to

• Set the frequency for checking mail • Set the sounds for sending and receiving mail • Choose where to download files (I recommend choosing the Desktop)


Accounts • Click on the Accounts icon to

• Create or delete Mail accounts with the + and - buttons • Click on the Account Information tab to change the name of the

account as it is listed in the Sidebar


Mailbox Behaviors • Click on the Mailbox Behaviors tab to choose how often Junk Mail is

erased, and how often Deleted Messages are erased • This is also where you can choose to save Sent and Drafts either On

Your Mac, or within that email account’s Mailboxes so that it is available on all devices


Server Settings • Click on the Server Settings tab to confirm all of the settings. You

shouldn’t have to change anything here, but if you are talking with tech support, this is where they may ask you to go.

Junk Mail • Click on the Junk Mail icon to

• Enable junk mail filtering • Set rules for what is junk • To set advanced actions, such as Label it as Junk and Move to Trash,

click Perform custom actions, click Advanced, make the desired choices


Fonts and Colors • Click on the Fonts and Colors icon to

• Make choices for the colors used when you reply and quote emails • Choose the font and size of the text for the list of emails in the Sidebar,

and also for the emails that you write: • Click Select to see your choices • To see a preview of the font, hover your cursor on the horizontal line

separating the darker gray area that includes the search box, and the columns of choices. When you see a four arrowed tool, drag it down to reveal the font preview pane.


Viewing • Click on the Viewing icon to

• Choose the familiar Classic layout (see below) • Make choices about Conversations (see below) • Set how many lines you see in the preview pane of each email • If you want the emails that you delete to be moved to the Trash to be

permanently deleted, or moved to Archive, where they are forever stored on the server, and, therefore, findable and retrievable.

• Choose to display unread messages in Bold so they stand out • Choose to display or hide people’s names and address when you

address an email • Set your preferences for how you use Conversations


Classic Layout The current version of Apple Mail uses a vertical column to display email messages with a preview panel on the right side. You can widen and narrow the columns, change the sort order, even choose to read only unread messages.


In earlier versions of Apple Mail, you viewed Mail in rows. You could still sort by From, Subject, Date Received, etc, and adjust the column widths, and, if you wanted to see the email, you could either double-click it to open in a new window, or shorten the list of email messages and use the preview pane at the bottom of the window. To use this old, familiar layout, click to Use Classic Layout.

Conversations (previously called Threaded Messages) By default, all emails that are related with the same subject from the same person are grouped together in your Inbox, instead of being listed as individual emails. This is called a Conversation. This may be great for organizing but, many users miss incoming messages because they forget to look in the grouped conversation.

In Mail Preferences, you can customize how you use the features of Conversations. Even if you choose to turn off Conversations, you can still click Show Related Messages in the Inbox Toolbar to see all related emails grouped together when needed.

Composing • Click on the Composing icon to

• Set preferences for spell checking • Include a person’s text when you reply to their email • Choose which email account to use for your default return address • Choose whether you want to include (quote) the text of the original

email in your reply. You can also choose to only include some text in the reply, so that you can copy a section of the person’s email and then click reply and only that text will be included in your email reply.



Signatures • Click on the Signatures icon to create an automatic text that will appear

at the bottom of your emails.

To create a signature 1. First, create a new email message so you have a place to type 2. Type everything you want to appear, including choosing the font, size,

color 3. Highlight it all 4. From the Edit menu, choose Copy 5. Then, under the Mail menu, choose Preferences 6. Click on the Signatures icon 7. Click the “+” sign at the bottom of the middle column to create a new

signature 8. Title it in the middle column where it is highlighted in blue 9. In the right column, delete the text that appears there 10.From the Edit menu, choose Paste Your typed text will appear.


To actually USE the signature, you have to now assign it to an email account. 1. Drag that named signature from the middle column to on top of the email

address in the left column that you want to use it with. 2. Click on that email address and, at the bottom, under Choose Signature,

decide whether you always want that signature to appear or, if you choose None, then you can select the signature when you want to use it in a particular email.

Rules • Click on the Rules icon to create your own filters, ie., if the subject of an

email contains certain words, or is from a certain person, you can teach Mail to move it to a different folder, etc.

• Click to create a new rule, then choose your conditions.


Customizing the Toolbars Each window in Mail has its own toolbar. The Inbox Toolbar is different than the toolbar you see when composing a new message, and different than the toolbar you see when reading an email, and replying to an email. You can choose which tools you use most in each window and add them.

To change what’s on each Toolbar 1.Go to that window, either the Inbox, or a New Message or open an email

that’s been sent to you 2.From the View menu, choose Customize Toolbar 3.You can rearrange existing icons in the Toolbar, drag unused icons off, and

drag additional ones into the Toolbar. And you can choose to see only the icons, only text or both.

4.Click DONE when you’re done.


Mailboxes Mailboxes look like folders and serve as the containers for emails. Each of your email accounts has its own Inbox, Sent, Drafts and Trash mailbox. You can also create your own Mailboxes to sort and organize emails.

You can Show or Hide the column of Mailboxes by clicking the Mailboxes icon in the Favorites Bar.

Your Inbox is one mailbox and, if you have more than one email account, there will be a triangle to the left of the Inbox. Click it to reveal all of your Inboxes.

In the left Sidebar, above the Inbox is Mailboxes. Further down, in the same light gray font is On My Mac. Below that, iCloud, and any other email providers you use. Hover over each of these and click Show to reveal the Mailboxes that are stored on the servers of each of these locations.

The Inbox Unread messages have a blue dot next to them. They might also be bold if you’ve made that choice in Preferences.

To see only Unread Emails, click the circle with horizontal lines in it, next to Sort by Date, and above the first email listed.

Messages are, by default, sorted by Date Received. You can change the sort order by clicking on Sort by Date above the first email listed, and making a new choice.

You can widen and narrow the columns by hovering the cursor to the right of the scroll bar of each column until you see an arrow tool. Drag the vertical line that separates the columns.


The Drafts Mailbox If you are working on an email and want to save it to finish later, you can save it as a Draft. In the newest versions of Mail, there is no longer an obvious Save As Draft option. Instead, simply close the email you are in the middle of working on, and THEN you will be asked if you want to save it as a Draft. A Draft Mailbox that looks like a dog eared piece of paper will now appear.

To continue working on an email in Drafts 1. Click once on the Drafts Mailbox 2. Double click on the mail you want to work with to open in

Junk Mailbox If you have turn on the Junk Filter in Preferences, an email that is considered Junk is brown. If it’s labeled as junk and, in fact, is not Junk, click on the NOT JUNK icon. If it’s in the Junk Mailbox, after you set it to be Not Junk, drag it onto the Inbox to keep it.

Your Own Mailboxes In addition to these Default Mailboxes, you can also create your own Mailboxes. But before you start creating Mailboxes for every topic or person, consider why you need to separate them. With the Search tools, you can quickly find an email by Sender, Subject, etc, so you don’t need to physically separate emails like this.

Suggestions for New Mailboxes • Create an Orders Mailbox to track open and pending things you have

ordered but not received • Create a Travel Mailbox for easy access to reservations, tickets, etc • Keep track of RSVP emails for an upcoming event • Create a Pending Projects mailbox for all emails relating to a particular

project so you can quickly find them all at once • Create Priority Action Mailboxes so you know what to address first

For emails that you need to keep forever, for reference, for tax purposes, etc., consider, instead of creating Mailboxes within Mail, save the emails into folders on your Mac.

This way, they are saved as files, which can be grouped in folders with related items that aren’t necessarily emails. For example, if you’re working on a project that also includes Word documents, maybe a spreadsheet, or a collection of photos, and you also want to have easy access to the email correspondence related to the project, save them all on your Mac in one folder. (See Saving Emails Outside of Mail)


To Create a Mailbox 1. Hover to the right of the word Mailbox above the Inbox and click the +

or, from the Mailbox menu choose New Mailboxor, Right-Click or Control-Click on Inbox and choose New Mailbox

2. Title it 3. Select WHERE you want it--On My Mac or in the iCloud so that is available

on all of your devices 4. Click OK 5. It will appear at the bottom of the list in that location

Smart Mailboxes A Smart Mailbox will automatically put items into it that meet specific filter rules you create. Instead of you, manually dragging emails into a Mailbox folder, Mail will do it for you.

Keep in mind, when you manually put an email into a Mailbox, you are MOVING it from the inbox INTO a mailbox.

Everything in a Smart Mailbox will ALSO STILL be in the Inbox.

If you delete it from the Inbox it will be GONE from the Smart Mailbox too. And if you delete it from the Smart Mailbox, it will also be deleted from the Inbox.

To Create a Smart Mailbox 1. From the Mailbox menu, choose New Smart Mailbox 2. Title it 3. Set the criteria for what you want to automatically go into this Mailbox 4. Click the plus sign to add additional criteria 5. Click OK


VIPs A new kind of Smart Mailbox is the VIP, where you can designate a person as a VIP and then all emails from that person automatically go into a separate Mailbox with their name on it.

To set someone up as a VIP 1. Open an email from that person 2. Hover over their name in the From header 3. Click the down-facing triangle to the right of their name 4. Choose Add to VIPS 5. A new Mailbox appears in the left column with a big star next to it 6. Click the triangle next to the VIP mailbox to reveal who’s in there 7. Click on any name to see their emails

To remove their VIP status 1. Open an email from that person 2. Hover over their name in the From header 3. Click the down-facing triangle to the right of their name 4. Choose Remove from VIPS

IMPORTANT! If an email is in a VIP mailbox, the original is still in the Inbox. If you delete it from the Inbox it is also deleted from the Smart Mailbox!

To Delete a Mailbox 1. Click once on it 2. From the Mailbox menu, choose Delete Mailbox

or, Right-Click or Control-Click to reveal choices 3. All emails in that Mailbox will also be deleted

To Rename a Mailbox 1. Click once on it 2. From the Mailbox menu, choose Rename Mailbox

or, Right-Click or Control-Click to reveal choices and choose Rename Mailbox


Favorite Mailboxes The Inbox, Sent, Flagged, and Drafts Mailboxes are considered favorites, since we tend to use them most frequently. They appear across the top of the screen below the toolbars as Favorite Mailboxes.

To remove a Mailbox from this bar, simply drag it off. It will poof. The original is still in the Mailboxes column.

To add your own Mailboxes to this Favorites Bar for easy access, first create the Mailbox, then drag it onto the bar.

Moving Messages into Mailboxes You can manually drag an email on top of a Mailbox to put in inside. You can also select the email and From the Message menu, choose Move To and make your choice Or Control-Click or Right Click and choose Move To and make your choice Or Click on the Move icon in the Toolbar and make your choice


Searching in Mail Use the Search feature in Mail to find anything you are looking for. Whether you have 100 or 1000 emails in your Inbox, this is the most efficient way to find something.

1. In the Search box in the top right, begin typing what you are looking for. If you don’t see the Search box, position your cursor on the edge of the window until you see the double arrow tool, and drag to make your window wider.

2. A list appears. With each letter you type, the list will get more specific, showing all emails containing that text as a person, subject, content, etc.

3. Click on the one you want

Flagging Messages You can use Flags to mark an email as Important, so it’s easier to find. You can assign different colored flags for different subjects. All emails that you have flagged will appear in the Flagged Mailbox, in addition to being listed in the Inbox. If you move a Flagged email, or delete it, it will still be in the Flagged Mailbox, until you Unflag it.

To Flag an Email 1.Click once on the email 2.In the Toolbar, click on the Flagged icon or the down triangle to choose a

special flag color. Or, Right-Click or Control-Click on the email to reveal choices.

3. To clear a Flag, click on the email, click on the Unflagged icon or Right-Click or ControlClick and click the X next to the flag color choices.


Using Color to Highlight Important Emails When Flagging an email isn’t enough for it to stand out in the message list, consider using Color. 1.Select the email 2.From the Format menu choose Show Colors 3.You can simplify the color choices by clicking on the crayon box 4.Choose a color 5.Unselect the email and you’ll see it is now that new color

If you use this feature often, consider adding the Color tool to the Toolbar.

Addressing Emails If a person is in your Address Book or if you have recently received an email from them, their email address with automatically fill in when you begin to type their name in the TO box. Their full name or their email address will appear, depending on the settings you’ve chosen in Preferences.

BCC When sending an email to more than one person, it is best practice to put all of the addresses in the BCC (blind carbon copy) line, instead of the TO line, so that others do not see each other’s email addresses. The exception to this is if you are sending to people and they need to see that each person received the same email.

If you don’t see a BCC line, from the View menu, choose BCC Address Field.


Cleaning Out Incorrect Addresses If an incorrect address keeps appearing as a choice, even after you have corrected it in Contacts: 1. From the Window menu, choose Previous Recipients. Mail remembers

everyone you’ve ever sent and received from, even incorrect addresses 2. Find the bad address and click on it 3. Click Remove From List You’ll notice that many names in the list have an icon of an index card next to them. These people are in your Contacts.

You can go through the list, select people who don’t have the card next to their name and click to Add to Contacts.

Marking an Email As Urgent You can set the priority of an email, though every recipient may see the setting. 1. Create a new message 2. From the Message menu, choose Set Priority 3. Choose a priority for the email

The Formatting Toolbar When writing a New Message, you can click on the A tool in the Toolbar to Show and Hide the Formatting Toolbar so that you can easily change fonts, size, color, alignment of any text.

Remember to highlight the text you want to change before you make your changes.


Editing Shortcuts To highlight a single word, double click in the middle of the word To highlight an entire paragraph, triple click within it To highlight a section (a sentence, paragraph, long section, click at the beginning of the section, hold down the SHIFT key and click at the end of the section

Cut and Paste 1. Highlight the text you want to work with 2. From the Edit menu, choose Cut (or Right Click the mouse and choose

Cut) 3. Click your cursor where you want to put the text 4. From the Edit menu, choose Paste (or Right-Click the mouse and choose

Paste)

Changing Caps to Lower Case 1. Highlight the text you want to change 2. From the Edit menu choose Transformation 3. Choose Capitalize to make the first letter of the word uppercase and all

others lowercase

Checking Spelling If you do not have the Spell Checking feature turned on in Mail Preferences, you can still Spell Check individual emails. 1. In the email, from the Edit menu choose Spelling and Grammar 2. Slide over to reveal more choices 3. Choose to check your spelling

To correct words underlined in red: 1. Hold down the control key and click in the middle of the word (or right-

click in the middle of the word) 2. Choose the correct suggestion from the list 3. If the word is correctly spelled you can have Mail learn the word by

choosing Learn Spelling

How To Add Numbered Lists in an Email Sometimes you may want to add a list in an email and you’d like to number or bullet the list so that it stands out and indents and lines up perfectly when it wraps. 4. In a new email message, begin typing your regular text. 5. When you’re ready to start your list, press return for a new paragraph 6. In the Formatting Toolbar, click on the Lists icon and choose either a

Bulleted List or a Number List. Begin typing. 7. Mail will automatically number or bullet each line when you press Return. 8. To stop the numbering, press Return a second time.


Using Stationery For Fancier Emails Yes, you can change your fonts and colors, even the color of the page using the Formatting Toolbar. But there is a built-in Stationery feature that can make your emails really stand out.

1. Create a new Mail message 2. In the top right corner click on Show Stationery. If you don’t see it, make

your window wider 3. A collection of categories and thumbnails appear 4. Look through the different choices and then choose one to play with 5. You can highlight the placeholder text and type over it with your own

message 6. You can drag photos from the Photo Browser into the photo placeholders 7. You cannot change the background colors or the stationery objects


You can create your own stationery and save it for frequent use 1. Create a new Mail message. 2. Type in all of the text, format it, bring in the photos you want so that you

have the completed stationery 3. From the File menu choose Save As Stationery 4. The next time you want to use it, click on Show Stationery 5. Scroll down the list on the lest of the various categories and click on

Custom 6. All of your saved Stationery is shown here. 7. Click one to use it. 8. To delete a custom Stationery, click on it, then click the X in the top right

corner of the thumbnail.

The Fastest Way to Email a Photo Instead of going into Photos to find the pictures, use the built-in Photo Browser. 1. Create a new message 2. Click on the Photo Browser icon of a stack of photos in the Toolbar 3. Scroll through that window to look through your entire Photo Library or

limit your search by clicking on a moment or album in the list 4. Drag the desired photos one at a time into the body of your email 5. Set the photo size using the Image Size menu on the right side of the

window, below the addressing fields

Adding Text to a Photo You’re Emailing Now you can add text right on a photo 1. Click on the down facing triangle in the top right corner of the photo 2. Choose Markup


A toolbar appears, with several new tools 1. To add text, click the Text tool, the T in a box. It will place a text box on

the photo 2. Type your text 3. To reposition the words, drag in the middle of them 4. To change the color, size, font, double click on the words to highlight

them, then click on the Format tool, the A, and make your choices 5. To delete a text box, click once on it and press the Delete key

You can experiment with the other Markup tools to freehand draw, add shapes and borders, even create and insert your signature.

The Fastest Way to Send An Attachment You could create a new email message, click on the paper clip icon in the toolbar, navigate to find the thing you want, and attach it.

But here’s an easier way: 1. Find the item or items you want to attach and select them 2. Drag them on top of the Mail icon in the Dock 3. A new email will automatically be created with the items already attached


Saving Photos You Get in an Email If you are saving certain emails because they contain photos you want to keep, consider saving the photos into the Photos app so you can delete the email.

If an email has a photo attachment, hover over the horizontal line between the address header information and the body of the email. You’ll see icons: arrows to delete, reply, reply all, forward and, if you click on the paperclip with the number on it, you have options to Save the photo someplace or Export to Photos. Choose Export to Photos. After you put it in Photos, confirm it’s there before deleting the email.


Saving Emails into the Documents Folder To save an entire email or an email AND the attachment into your Documents folder Simply drag it to the Desktop and then drag it into your Documents folder (or wherever you want to put it) or 1. From the File menu, choose Save As, 2. Title it with a useful name 3. Navigate to where you want to save it and choose Save

To save only the Attachment(s) in the desired folder: From the File menu, choose Save Attachments or 1. Hover the mouse on the horizontal divider line between the address fields

and the email contents to reveal the shortcut buttons 2. Click on the icon with the paper clip and choose where to save it


Exporting Entire Mailboxes If you have Mailboxes filled with emails that you want to keep just in case but maybe don’t NEED them cluttering your mail program, consider Exporting the entire Mailbox into your Documents folder. It will save the mailbox in mbox format that you can always Import it back to Mail if needed.

The Lowdown On Downloads By default, all things you download from Mail go into a hidden Mail Downloads folder. You can change this setting in Preferences to Save everything to the Desktop so you can then work with it or move it to a particular folder.

In Mail: 1. Under the Mail menu, choose Preferences 2. Click the General tab 3. Next to Downloads folder, click on Other 4. Choose Desktop

To see what has been previously downloaded in to this secret folder: 1. In the Finder, hold down the Option key and click on the Go menu 2. Choose Library 3. Find the Mail Downloads folder and open it 4. Sort through what’s in here, deleting what you don’t need, filing things

you want to keep.

IMPORTANT! If you receive a attachment that you need to edit and then send back, DO NOT just double click it and start typing. If you do you won’t have a copy for yourself.

Instead, first save it to the Desktop, THEN open it so that you are working on your own copy. Save it. THEN email that version back.

Troubleshooting • If you are suddenly unable to send or receive mail, first check to see if it is

an internet issue. Can you go online with Safari? • If it is an issue with all emails, quit Mail, restart the computer, and try

again. • If it is an issue with sending to a particular email, double check the

person’s address, and make sure you typed it correctly. You may have to re-write a new email with the new address.

• From the Help menu, choose Mail Help and click on Troubleshooting at the bottom of the list.

• You may need to contact Apple or your internet provider for further assistance.


Learn more great tips, strategies and shortcuts with the other

Mac2School printable e-books:

iPhone Essentials Mac Essentials Photos for Mac Safari for Mac

Apple Mail Essentials and, coming soon, All About Contacts

www.mac2school.com/learn

_____________________________________________________________

Ruth Davis, Mac2School helping people love their Macs since 1987

http://www.mac2school.com


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