The Basic's To Outlook

There are lots of options that you can make use of in Outlook Express.  Here are a few of them.

Click on TOOLS on the top row, and then Click on OPTIONS

CHANGE YOUR FONT (TYPE STYLE)

Now Click on COMPOSE from the selection of tabs across the top.

Here you can change the default (automatic) setting for the font style (type style) that will appear on your email.

On the top row you have MAIL with a description of your default font.

Click on FONT SETTINGS alongside this and you have a great choice there.  Play around with it.  You can have any font you like.  Have it in Bold or Italic and any colour that you like.

Once you have decided on something then click on OK and that box will close.

Now on the box left up click APPLY and then OK and your new settings will apply to every email that you bring up.

REQUESTING READ RECEIPTS

Have you ever wondered whether someone has received your email?  You can automatically request a receipt for every email. 

Again in OPTIONS click on RECEIPTS and just click in the box alongside the words - Request a read receipt for all sent messages.

Click APPLY and then OK.

Now every time one of your emails is received you should get a receipt telling you, providing the recipient hasn't instructed his computer to do otherwise.

And this leads onto the second part of this box - where you have options to always send a receipt - never send a receipt or be notified when a receipt request comes through.   Again it is just a matter of clicking in whichever box you want.

AUTOMATIC SPELL CHECK

Click on the SPELLING tab and if you click in alongside the words - Always check spelling before sending - then the computer will go through your email and check your spelling for you.

Always click APPLY and OK if you have changed any settings in any box otherwise they may now take effect.

 

There are a mass of different Options that you can find by simply going to Tools/Options.   Take a look at each section carefully and try altering it and see what happens, but always keep a note of what the settings were before you started so that you can change them back again.

If there are any particular options that you would like to know about please email me and I'll be happy to add it to this list.

 

MAKING YOUR OWN STATIONERY

Stationery is a background image on top of which you type your email.  It can take many forms - a repeat pattern of images across the top, a repeat pattern of images down the side, a completely tiled image all over (not recommended as it is confusing to read the text)  or a single image in the background.

To get the idea of how to produce the stationery first of all right click on the picture of the animated cat, click on SAVE PICTURE AS and then your hard drive will come up.  Name it something memorable and save it in MY DOCUMENTS.   You may want to create a picture folder within My Documents to keep all your images in one place.  

 

 
 

Go to Outlook Express.

To to Arrow behind NEW MAIL and click on it.  Go down to SELECT STATIONERY and click.  Now click on the button marked CREATE NEW, located on the bottom row on right hand side.

A Wizard will now appear to help you create the Stationery. Click NEXT

Click beside the word PICTURE so that it is ticked and then click on BROWSE.   Your Hard Drive will now come up so go to wherever you saved the picture of the cat and click on that, and then click OPEN

You now have a choice of positioning the picture wherever you want.  I would suggest you leave it at TOP and LEFT for now.

Next Click the Arrow beside the word TILE and choose to tile it Vertically.

Now Click in beside the word COLOUR so that a tick appears.  Now click the arrow beside the word DEFAULT and a choice of background colours comes up.  Just for this exercise scroll down and choose Silver.   Click the NEXT button.

On this box you have a choice of what FONT (type style) you want to use and also what size you want it to be.   You can also choose what colour you want it to be and whether you want it Bold or Italic.   Once you have decided on each of these options click the NEXT button.

This box now gives you the opportunity of not having your writing overhanging the images.   It is automatically set at '0' pixels for the left hand margin.  Usually if you alter this to 150 or 200 pixels you will see the writing move clear of the image.  Set it at what looks good to you.

Click NEXT and now you have the easy bit.  Decide on a name for your Stationery.

Click FINISH.

You have now produced your first piece of individual Stationery which you can access in the same way as any other Stationery that you have on your hard drive.

You can use any image you like to produce Stationery.  I have put a list of Animation Sites on the LINKS page if you would like to take a look, or you can use any of your own pictures or drawings.  Just one point, if you are using your own pictures make sure that they are no more than 2.5" wide if you are planning to tile them vertically or 2.5" deep if you are tiling horizontally.   Also make sure that the pictures are set around 70 pixels per inch otherwise your email will take a long time to download onto the recipients computer and you wont make yourself popular!

Also if you don't like any Stationery that you have prepared you can always delete it by right clicking on the name of the Stationery whilst it is still in the file and clicking Delete.

There is obviously a lot more you can do in producing Stationery.  I will do a Stage 2 version of these instructions when I get time to give you more flexibility on the things you can do.

SOUNDS ON EMAILS

 

If you want to put music on your email the best file type is ‘MIDI’.   There should be some Midi Files already installed on your computer and I suggest you try using these first to get used to putting the sound on the email.

 

Don’t worry about where your Midi Files are located at the moment.  They can be found as you go along.

Bring up a new email form.

Along the top of the form are a series of options to click on starting off with File.  Go along until you come to FORMAT and click on that.

A drop down box will appear.  Now click on ‘BACKGROUND''

Three options now come up.  Click on ‘SOUND’.

A new instruction box appears called ‘BACKGROUND SOUND’

Alongside the section marked File is 'BROWSE'. Click on that.

A new box appears.  At the bottom of this box is a description showing ‘Files of Type’.   Click on the arrow to the immediate right of the description of files and another drop down list will appear.  Click on Midi Files.  

(***)You should now have the option of several Midi Files to use, which are already installed on your Computer.

Highlight the Sound of your choice and Click the Word ‘OPEN’.    You now have the choice of having the sound played as many times as you want or of being played continuously.  I would recommend that you either have the sound played once in which case click in the box to the left of that instruction or played continuously.

Once you have done this Click ‘OK’   You will now automatically return to your email form and your music should be playing – well as long as you have got your speakers turned on ROFL!

Once the fascination of the existing Midi Files on your computer has worn off you will want to put some new Midi Files on your computer.   These are available on the internet for free download and I have put a list of sites in our Links Section for you to visit.   When you visit these sites you can generally click on a sound that you fancy and it will play for you on the Windows Media Player.  Make sure that the sound is good all the way through before you decide to download it.  Some of the Midi Files on the internet are not too good quality wise.   In order to download a Midi File if there are no instructions on the site try right clicking on the title of the sound you want to download and then click on Save Target As.   Your hard drive will show up and you can save it anywhere you want to.  I suggest you create a Sounds Folder in My Documents prior to doing any downloading and save all your Midi Files in there.

If you cant download the Midi File by right clicking on the name of the File then try right clicking on your Windows Media Player and Saving it that way.

Now when you want to use this downloaded music on your emails go back to the previous instructions and follow them until you come to my (***) sign.   It is at this point that you will have to search for your Sounds Folder.  If you already have your ‘My Documents’ as a short cut on your desktop then the easiest way is to click on the icon at the top of the box that is currently open – the one that looks like an angled shovel!   That will bring up the list of shortcuts on your desktop and from there you can click on ‘My Documents’ and then your ‘Sounds’ folder and finally select the piece of downloaded music you want to use.

These instructions look muddily when you just read through them, but print this page off and then follow it one step at a time.  Once you get used to putting sounds on it is as quick to do as putting the address on an email.  

COPYING STATIONERY

You can save any simple stationery that someone sends you.

Bring up the email that has a stationery on it that you like.

Go to File (top button left hand side) and then click on SAVE AS STATIONERY and a Stationery Folder will come up .  Name the Stationery something you will remember easily and click  Save.

Now to get that Stationery up click the arrow just to the right of  NEW MAIL and  then go down to SELECT STATIONERY , click on it, and the same Stationery File will come up. 

Highlight the named Stationery and  click OK and an email form will come up complete with the Stationery on it.

This doesn't work with more complex stationery but it is a good way of starting to expand your stationery collection.  Also it does not save any sounds that may be with the Stationery.  You have to put that on individually as explained on another page.

DOWNLOADING STATIONERY

There are lots of wonderful sites on the internet offering various different types of stationery and they are well worth a visit.

I have listed several of them on the Links page, and this page is just to give some guidance on downloading them.

Using Cloudeight Website as a guideline, when you click to download a piece of Stationery always set the box that comes up to - Run this programme from its current location.   When it asks you do you want to install always click Yes.  With the next box click the Start Button to start installing, you will then have a box come up telling you that a number of files have been extracted.  Just OK that and your new Stationery is installed.  It is similar with Stationery Heaven only you click the Exe. option to install the same way as above.

When you are downloading be sure to make a note of the name of the Stationery and then you will be able to find it in your Stationery Folder when you want to use it for an email.

There are one or two differences between different sites, but they all seem to offer good Help Files on their sites, so if you are uncertain go to those for individual help.

MAKING MORE STATIONERY

DIFFERENT COLOURED BACKGROUNDS TO STANDARD

To do this you need to have Front Page installed on your computer.  It may well work with alternatives but I have only ever used Front Page.

The range of coloured backgrounds available when creating stationery is very limited and it often looks better if you  'tone' the background with the images that you have inserted as your stationery.

If you have Front Page installed on your computer this is very easy.  First of all make sure that you have Front Page as your default editor.  To do this open Internet Explorer and go to TOOLS and then from the drop down list click on INTERNET OPTIONS.  Click on the Tab marked PROGRAMMES and see if you have Front Page listed as your html editor.  If it is not click the arrow beside the programme currently listed and Front Page should be an option that you can click on.   Once you have done this click APPLY in bottom right hand side of box and then click OK.

Go to your Stationery File in Outlook Express and highlight the piece of stationery that you want to alter the background on.   Now click EDIT - right hand side towards the bottom.    Front Page should automatically open now with the Stationery on it.  Go to FORMAT and then from the dropdown list click on BACKGROUND, you should then be looking at a box like the one shown below.

  

From this you can see the name of the image that you have already put in as a background picture.  If you go down to COLOURS and then click the downward arrow next to the colour shown a selection of colours will come up.  Now click on MORE COLOURS  and you will have a wide choice of colours.  Also there is a drawing of a 'dropper' towards the right hand side of the box, if you click on this and then take the dropper over to a colour on your Stationery Page and click you will see that the same colour will be represented as your background.  The choices are endless.  Once you have decided you have the right colour click OK and then close Front Page.  It will ask you if you want to save the changes.  Click YES and you will then have your new colour background on your stationery.

 

  

CREATING A TEXTURED BACKGROUND FOR YOUR STATIONERY

To do this you will need a photo editing programme installed on your computer.

It is possible to obtain all different types of textured backgrounds for your stationery.  You can 'lift' these off of the internet just simply if you see a nice background to a page when you are surfing (To do this you simply right click on the background and then click on Save Background As and save it to your hard drive), or you can download backgrounds from various graphics site.  I have several of these listed in our LINKS page.

Once you have a background saved that you like, open your photo editing programme. Obtain a new template which should be 18" (46 cm) wide and at least 1.8" (4.6cm)  deep (the depth can vary as you will see once you have completed one template and used it).    Now also open up the file that has the background in it.   Now copy the background onto the template - this may take a number of repeats as frequently the background that you have lifted is quite small.  It becomes a bit like a jigsaw fitting the sections together.  Once you have the template completely covered save the template as a JPEG at 70 pixels to an inch.  

Now bring that template back out and also bring out any image that you want to place - say - on the left hand side of what will be your new stationery.

Drag the image and place it onto the Template.  Once again save this complete work as a JPEG, but rename it, that way the original background template remains and can be used again.

Now when you go to Outlook Express, Stationery File and click on Create New, locate the last JPEG you saved and insert it.  You will see that it covers the whole of the top of the page.  Now simply tile the image vertically and you have your stationery ready to complete with Font etc as you have done previously.

When you are working this way you will find that there are lots more options open to you.  Because you are working in a photo editing programme you can crop pictures so that they appear to float on your stationery and you can even design your own images if you have a paint programme included with your photo editing programme.   Just play and you will be amazed at what turns out.

CREATING A FULL PAGE BACKGROUND FOR YOUR STATIONERY

  
 

To do this you need a picture that does not have too much contrast in it.  Bring the picture up in your photo editing programme and 'fade' it a bit with the tools.  The idea is to create something one step up on a watermark.  If it is too strong then the writing on the email wont show up.

Now resize the picture to 3.4" wide and set at a resolution of 300 pixels.

Save the picture as a JPEG and then go to Outlook Express and again create new Stationery.   Once you have located the picture whilst creating the stationery remember to still tile the image vertically and that way if you type a long email the image will simply repeat itself.

 

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