Using Evolution for Email A Guide to the Evolution MailerEvolution email is like other email
programs in all the ways you would hope:
It can sort and organize your mail in a wide variety of ways with
folders, searches, and filters.
It can send and receive mail in HTML or as plain text, and
permits multiple file attachments.
It supports multiple mail sources, including IMAP, POP3, local
mbox and
mh files, and
even NNTP messages (newsgroups), which aren't technically
email.
However, Evolution has some important
differences. First, it's built to handle very large amounts of
mail without slowing down or crashing. Both the filtering and searching functions
were built for speed and efficiency on gargantuan volumes of
mail. There's also the Evolution
Virtual
Folder, an advanced organizational feature not found in
many other mail clients. If you get a lot of mail, or if you keep
every message you get in case you need to refer to it later,
you'll find this feature especially useful.
Reading Mail
You can start reading email by clicking
Inbox in the shortcut bar. The first
time you use Evolution, it will
start with the Inbox open and show you a
message from Ximian welcoming you to the application.
Your EvolutionInbox will look something like the one in
.
If you find the view pane too small, you can resize
the pane, enlarge the whole window, or double-click on the
message in the message list to have it
open in a new window. To change the sizes of a pane, just click
and hold on the divider between the two panes. Then you can drag
up and down to select the size of the panes. Just like with
folders, you can right-click on messages in the message list and
get a menu of possible actions.
Evolution MailInboxEmail Viewer
This is where your email is displayed.
Email List
The Email List lists off all the emails that you
have. This includes all your read, unread, and email that is flagged
to be deleted.
Most of the mail-related actions you'll want to perform are
listed in the Message menu in the menu
bar. The most frequently used ones, like
Reply and
Forward, also appear as buttons in
the toolbar. Almost all of them are also located in the
right-click menu and as keyboard shortcuts, which tend to be
faster once you get the hang of them. You can choose
whichever way you like best; the idea is that the software
should work the way you want, rather than making you work the
way the it does.
Take a look at the headers
To look at the entire source of your email message, including
all the header information, select
ViewSourceSorting the message list
One of the ways Evolution lets
you choose the way you work is the way it lets you sort your
message lists. To sort by sender, subject, or date, click
on the bars with those labels at the top of the message
list. The direction of the arrow next to the label indicates
the direction of the sort, and if you click again, you'll
sort them in reverse order. For example, click once on
Date to sort messages by date from
oldest to newest. Click again, and
Evolution sorts the list from
newest to oldest. You can also right-click on the message
header bars to get a set of sorting options, and add or
remove columns from the message list. You can find detailed
instructions on how to customize your message display
columns in .
You can also choose a threaded message view. Select
ViewThreaded
to turn the threaded view on or off. When you select this option,
Evolution groups the replies to a
message with the original, so you can follow the thread of a
conversation from one message to the next.
Deleting Mail
Once you've read your mail, you may want to get rid of
it.
To delete a message:
Click the message to select it
Press delete button or right click and click on
Delete.
Deleted but still here?
When you do this, your message is marked to be deleted. It is
not until you expunge the message that the message is gone.
Click
ActionsExpunge
or press
CtrlEUndeleting Messages
To undelete a message:
Click a message marked for deletion to select it
Click
ActionsUndeleteWhat does Undelete actually do?
Undelete doesn't bring back messages that have been expunged.
Undelete simply unmarks messages for expunging.
Checking Mail
Now that you've had a look around the Inbox, it's
time to check for new mail. Click Get Mail in the
toolbar to check your mail. If it's the first time you've done so, the
mail setup assistance will ask you for the
information it needs to check your email.
The druid will give you several dialog boxes where you setup:
Setup your personal information
Setup your outgoing email server information
Identity Name
To check your email, press the Check Mail button.
If this is your first time checking mail, or you don't have
Evolution setup to store your password, you'll
be prompted for the password. Enter your password and your email will be
downloaded.
Can't Check Mail?
If you get an error message instead of mail, you probably need to check
your network settings. If you. To learn how to do that,
have a look at , or
ask your system administrator.
Using Evolution for News
Newsgroups are so similar to email that there's no reason not
to read them side by side. If you want to do that, add a
news source to your configuration (see ). The news server will
appear as a remote server, and will look quite similar to an
IMAP folder. When you click Get Mail,
Evolution will also check for news
messages.
Attachments and HTML Mail
If someone sends you an attachment, a
file attached to an email,
Evolution will display the file
at the bottom of the message to which it's attached. Text,
HTML, and most images will be displayed within the message
itself. For other files,
Evolution will show an icon at
the end of the message.
To Save an Attachment to Disk:
Open up the desired email
Click on the down arrow at the bottom of the email for the desired
attachment.
Select Save to Disk.
Choose the directory and filename you wish.
Click OK
To automatically view an attachment inline, press the arrow button next
to the attachment.
To Open an Attachment in a Program:
Open up the desired email
Click the down arrow at the bottom of the email for the desired
attachment.
Click Open in Program where program is the
program that is assigned to open that file type.
Evolution can also display
HTML-formatted mail, complete with graphics. HTML
formatting will display automatically, although you can
turn it off if you prefer.
Writing and Sending Mail
You can start writing a new email message by selecting
FileNew
Mail Message, or by pressing the
Compose button in the Inbox toolbar.
When you do so, the New Message window
will open, as shown in .
New Message WindowEvolution Main Window
Enter an address in the To: field. If you wish
enter a subject in the Subject: and a message in
the big empty box at the bottom of the window. Once you have revised
your message, press Send.
Saving Messages for Later
Evolution will send mail immediately unless you tell it to
do otherwise by selecting FileSend
Later. This will add your
messages to the Outbox queue. Then,
when you press Send in another
message, or Get Mail in the main
mail window, all your unsent messages will go out at once.
Many times, one might want to use "Send Later" becuase it gives
you a chance to change your mind about a message before it
is sent. This way, you may not say something you may regret.
To learn more about how you can specify message queue and
filter behavior, see .
You can also choose to save messages as drafts or as text
files. Choose
FileSave
or Save As to save your message
as a text file. If you prefer to keep your message in a
folder (the Drafts folder would be the
obvious place), you can select FileSave In
Folder.
Advanced Mail CompositionEvolution is meant to not only handle large
amounts of incoming mail, but helps you manage all the tasks of having
an email account.
In the next few sections, you'll see how
Evolution handles additional features,
including large recipient lists, attachments, and forwarding.
Attachments
To attach a file to your email:
Push the attach button in the composer toolbar
Select the file you want to attach
Press OK
You can drag a file from your desktop into the composer window to
attach it as well.
To hide the display of files you've attached to the
message, select ViewHide
Attachments; to show them
again, choose Show Attachments.
When you send the message, a copy of the attached file
will go with it. Be aware that big attachments can take a
long time to download.
When receiving a message that has an attached image,
Evolution gives you the choice
whether to view it or not. You can choose to have it
always shown, load images only if the sender is in your
addressbook, or never load images.
Types of RecipientsEvolution, like most email
programs recognizes three types of addressee: primary
recipients, secondary recipients, and hidden ("blind")
recipients.
The simplest way to direct a message is to put the email
address or addresses in the To:
field, which denotes primary recipients. To send mail to
more than one or two people, you can use the the
Cc: field.
Hearkening back to the dark ages when people used
typewriters and there were no copy machines, "Cc" stands
for "Carbon Copy." Use it whenever you want to share a
message you've written to someone else.
Using the Cc: field
When Susan sends an email to a client, she puts her
co-worker, Tim, in the in the
Cc: field, so that he know
what's going on. The client can see that Tim also
received the message, and knows that he can talk to
Tim about the message as well.
Using the Bcc: field
Tim is sending an email announcement to all of his
company's clients, some of whom are in competition
with each other, and all of whom value their
privacy. He needs to use the
Bcc: field here. If he puts
every address from his address book's "Clients"
category into the To: or
Cc: fields, he'll make the
company's entire client list
public. However, but putting his "Clients" addressbook
into the Bcc: section, that will cause them to be hidden
from the competition. It seems insignificant, but it can
make a huge difference in some situations.
Choosing Recipients Quickly
If you have created address cards in the contact manager,
you can also enter nicknames or other portions of address
data, and Evolution will transparently
complete
the address for you. If you enter a name
or nickname that can go with more than one card, Evolution
will open a dialog box to ask you which person you meant.
Alternately, you can click on the
To:, Cc:, or
Bcc: buttons to get a list —
a potentially a very long one — of the email addresses
in your contact manager. Select addresses and click on
the arrows to move them into the appropriate address
columns.
For more information about using email together with the
contact manager and the calendar, see and .
Replying to Messages
To reply to a message, press the
Reply button while it is selected,
or choose Reply to Sender from
the message's right-click menu. That will open the
message composer. The
To: and Subject
fields will already be filled, although you can alter them
if you wish. In addition, the full text of the old message
is inserted into the new message, either in italics (for
HTML display) or with the > character before each line
(in plain text mode), to indicate that it's part of the
previous message. People often intersperse their message
with the quoted material as shown in .
Reply Message WindowEvolution Main Window
If you're reading a message with several recipients, you may
wish to use Reply to All instead of
Reply. If there are large numbers
of people in the Cc: or
To: fields, this can save substantial
amounts of time.
Using the Reply to All feature
Susan sends an email to a client and sends copies to Tim
and to an internal company mailing list of co-workers.
If Tim wants to make a comment for all of them to read,
he uses Reply to All, but if he
just wants to tell Susan that he agrees with her, he
uses Reply. Note that his reply
will not reach anyone that Susan put on her
Bcc list, since that list is not
shared with anyone.
You may want to reply to a whole mailing list. For this, you would
use the Reply to List instead of the standard
Reply or Reply to All.
Whats a Mailing List?
Mailing Lists are one of the most popular ways in which group
collaboration on the Internet works. They allow people to send one
message to one server. The server then knows who is subscribed to the
mailing list, and sends a copy of your email to all the people on the
list. As a matter of fact, mailing lists are one of the main ways in
which Evolution was developed.
There are two different types of mailing lists. The first is a
general submission list. That means that anyone can write to the
list. The second is a managed list. The managed lists have
someone running them. They can do as little as limit who
subscribes to the list or as much as moderate which emails get on
the list.
Searching and Replacing with the Composer
You maybe familiar with search and replace features,
and if you come from a Linux or Unix background, you
probably know what Find Regex
does. If you aren't among the lucky who already know,
here's a quick rundown of an important section of the
Edit menu.
Find Enter a word or phrase, and
Evolution will find it
in your message.
Find Regex
Find a regex, also called a
regular
expression, in your composer window.
Find Again
Select this item to repeat the last search you performed.
Replace
Find a word or phrase, and replace it with
something else.
For all of these menu items, you can choose whether or not
to Search Backwards in the document
from the point where your cursor is. For all but the
regular expression search (which doesn't need it), you are
offered a check box to determine whether the search is to
be Case Sensitive when it determines
a match.
Embellish your email with HTML
Normally, you can't set text styles or insert pictures in
emails, which is why you've probably seen people use far
too many exclamation points for emphasis, or use
emoticons to
convey their feelings. However, most newer email programs
can display images and text styles as well as basic
alignment and paragraph formatting. They do this with
HTML, just like web
pages do.
HTML Mail is not a Default Setting
Some people do not have HTML-capable mail clients, or
prefer not to receive HTML-enhanced mail because it is
slower to download and display. Some
people refer to HTML mail as "the root of all evil" and
get very angry if you send them HTML mail, which is why
Evolution sends plain text
unless you explicitly ask for HTML. To send HTML mail,
you will need to select Format
HTML. Alternately, you can set
your default mail format preferences in the mail
configuration dialog. See for more information.
HTML formatting tools are located in the toolbar just above
the space where you'll actually compose the message, and
they also appear in the Insert and
Format menus.
The icons in the toolbar are explained in tool-tips, which appear when
you hold your mouse over the buttons. The buttons fall
into four categories:
Headers and lists
At the left edge of the toolbar, you can choose
Normal for a default text style
or Header 1 through
Header 6 for varying sizes of
header from large (1) to tiny (6). Other styles
include preformat, to use the HTML
tag for preformatted blocks of text, and three types
of List Item for the highly
organized.
Text style
Use these buttons to determine the way your letters
look. If you have text selected, the style will
apply to the selected text. If you do not have text
selected, the style will apply to whatever you type
next. The buttons are:
Push B for bold textPush I for italicsPush U to underlinePush S for a strikethrough.Alignment
Located next to the text style buttons, these three
paragraph icons should be familiar to users of most
word processing software. The leftmost button will
make your text aligned to the left, the center
button, centered, and the right hand button,
aligned on the right side.
Indentation rules
The button with the arrow pointing left will reduce
a paragraph's indentation, and the right arrow will
increase its indentation.
Color Selection
At the far right is the color section tool. The
colored box displays the current text color; to
choose a new one, click the arrow button just to the
right. If you have text selected, the color will
apply to the selected text. If you do not have text
selected, the color will apply to whatever you type
next.
The Insert gives you three opinions which let you
spruce up your email to make it more interesting:
Insert Link
Lets you link some text to a website. Use this tool to put hyperlinks in your HTML
messages. If you don't want special link text, you can just enter the address
directly, and Evolution
will recognize it as a link.
Insert Image
Lets you put an image alongside text.
Insert Rule
Inserts a horizontal line into the text to help divide two
sections.
To add a hyperlink to your HTML message:
Select the text you want to link from
Right click on text and select
Link
Enter the address you wish to link to in the
URL field.
Press OK.
To add an image to your HTML message:
Click
InsertImage
Click Browse
Select the image you want
Press OK
Press InsertA Technical note on HTML Tags
The composer is a WYSIWYG
(What You See Is What You Get)
editor for HTML. That means that if you enter HTML
directly into the composer— say,
<B>Bold Text</B>, the
the composer will assume you meant exactly that string
of characters, and not "make this text bold," as an HTML
composition tool or text editor would.
Forwarding Mail
The post office forwards your mail for you when you change
addresses, and you can forward mail when you get a letter by
mistake. The email Forward button
works in much the same way. It's particularly useful if you
have received a message and you think someone else would
like to see it. You can forward a message as an attachment
to a new message (this is the default) or
you can send it inline as a quoted
portion of the message you are sending. Attachment
forwarding is best if you want to send the full, unaltered
message on to someone else. Inline forwarding is best if
you want to send portions of a message, or if you have a
large number of comments on different sections of the
message you are forwarding. Remember to note from whom the
message came, and where, if at all, you have removed or
altered content.
To forward a message you are reading, press
Forward on the toolbar, or select
MessageForward. If you
prefer to forward the message inline
instead of attached, select MessageForward
Inline from the menu. Choose an
addressee as you would when sending a new message; the
subject will already be entered, but you can alter it.
Enter your comments on the message in the
composition frame, and press
Send.
Seven Tips for Email Courtesy
I started with ten, but four were "Don't send
spam."
Don't send spam or forward chain mail. If you must,
watch out for hoaxes and urban legends, and make sure
the message doesn't have multiple layers of
greater-than signs, (>) indicating multiple layers
of careless in-line forwarding.
Always begin and close with a salutation. Say "please"
and "thank you," just like you do in real life. You
can keep your pleasantries short, but be pleasant!
ALL CAPS MEANS YOU'RE SHOUTING! Don't write a whole
message in capital letters. It hurts people's ears.
Check your spelling and use complete sentences.
Don't send nasty emails (flames). If you get one,
don't write back.
When you reply or forward, include just enough of
the previous message to provide context: not too
much, not too little.
Happy mailing! Subscription ManagementEvolution lets you handle your
IMAP and newsgroup subscriptions with the same tool: the
subscriptions manager.
Click on the folder you wish to subscribe to in the
Store section.
Click the Subscribe to add it to the
subscribed list.
Close the window.
EncryptionWhat is Encryption?
Encryption is an ancient method of changing readable text to unreadable
text that dates back to Egyptian times. Encryption takes the statement
"Evolution" and turns it into something which cannot be read without help
through decryption.
Encryption Example
Kevin orders an Evolution t-shirt from
Ximian, Inc. over the Internet. He puts in his credit card number
which is 1234-567-8901. For security, his computer encrypts the
credit card number so it can be safely transmitted over the Internet.
The number now is @#$23ui7yr87#@!48970fsd, which holds no intentional
resemblance to the initial number. When the information gets to
Ximian, Inc. it'll be decrypted into the initial number.
Encryption can be used in email in two ways: to verify that the sender is
the real sender, and to hide the message while in transmission.
Evolution has the capability to do both.
Generating your PGP key
First, you need to create a PGP key. To do this, you'll need GPG
installed.
GPG Versions
This manual covers version 1.0.6 of GPG. If your version is different,
this may not be entirely accurate. You may find out your version number
by typing in: gpg --version.
You can start by typing in: gpg --gen-key. At the
first question, select 1. The next question asks you about key length.
The longer the key, more stronger it is. However, the longer the key, the
longer it takes to generate. This is your choice. However, 1024 bits
(default) should be adequate. The next question asks you if you want your
key to expire. Expiring keys make your key invalid after a certain amount
of time, so old keys don't float around active. This is the same concept
as a coupon at a supermarket. Next, you'll type in your Real name, your
email address, and a comment. You should not forge this information, as
it is used later to verify who you are. Assuming that all your
information is correct, press "O" to continue. GPG now asks you for a
passphrase. This is a password which you will need to decrypt and encrypt
messages. This can be any length, with any characters in it. It is case
sensitive, which means that it does know the difference between capital
letters and lower-case. Now your key is generated. It is recommend you
surf the Internet, read your email, or write a letter in a word
processor. This help creates randomness in the key.
Once this is completed, you'll be dropped back to the command line.
Now you can view your key information by typing gpg
--list-keys. You should see something similar to this:
GPG Listing Keys
/home/bob/.gnupg/pubring.gpg
----------------------------
pub 1024D/32j38dk2 2001-06-20 bob <bob@bob.com>
sub 1024g/289sklj3 2001-06-20 [expires: 2002-11-14]
You'll now need to upload your public key to a keyserver, so that your
friends can use your key. You'll need to know the ID of your key, which
is after the 1024D on the line beginning with pub. For this example, it
is 32j38dk2. You now type in gpg --send-keys --keyserver
wwwkeys.pgp.net 32j38dk2. Substitute your key ID for 32j38dk2.
You will be prompted to type in your password and your key will be uploaded for your
friends to download.
Setting up Evolution's Encryption
You'll need to open
ToolsMail Settings
Once there, select the account you'd like to associate the key to and click
the Edit button. In the
Security tab is a section labeled Pretty
Goog Privacy. Enter your key ID and click
OK. Your key is now integrated into your identity
in Evolution.
Sending Encrypted Messages
You can either sign or encrypt a message. When you sign a message, verify
that you were the one who sent it, and that no one is forging your
identity. Encrypting a message makes it impossible for someone with
prying eyes to view it while it's in transmission.
Signing a Message
To sign a message, you simply click
SecurityPGP Sign
. You will be prompted for your PGP password. Once you enter it,
click OK and your message will be signed.
Encrypting a Message
Encrypting a message is very similar to signing a message. You simply
click the menu item
SecurityPGP EncryptUnencrypting a Recieved Message
Sometimes, a friend will send you a message which is encrypted. In order
for you to read it, you need to unencrypt it.
When you view the encrypted message, Evolution
will prompt you for your PGP password. You type in your PGP password and
the message is then decrypted.