10 Minute Guide to Lotus Notes Mail 4.5 - 2 - How Lotus Notes Mail Works In this lesson, you learn about e-mail, Lotus Notes Mail, and e-mail etiquette. Sending and Receiving Mail: Company-Wide and World-Wide E-mail is short for electronic mail. Simply put, it`s mail that you create on your computer and send to someone over a network. With Lotus Notes, you create a mail memo. When you click the Send button, the mail travels to the server and into the mailbox of the addressee(s). When they open their mail, they see the mail you sent. With Lotus Notes, the Domino server stores all the mailboxes of the users on the Domino server. Your Domino server may have access to the Internet. If it does, then you can send mail to people on the Internet. You need to make sure that you address the mail properly (as described in Lesson 6). Mail that you send to the Internet first travels to your Domino server and then to the Internet from the server. This might happen immediately or it might be on a scheduled basis depending upon how your administrator configured your Domino server. It's possible that you can send e-mail to other people who have Lotus Notes Mail or cc:Mail but are not using the same server as you. This depends upon the way your administrator sets up the Domino server. This doesn't necessarily mean that if you have Lotus Notes Mail at work you can send e-mail to your cousin across the country, even though she has Lotus Notes Mail at her job. However, if your company and her company have reason to send mail back and forth, they can have their servers call each other and send and receive mail. If that's the case, you can send mail to your cousin. It's more likely that you work in a large company that has several Domino servers located in several different departments. In order to have mail distributed company-wide, those servers must talk to each other and exchange mail messages. Then you can send mail to someone on another Domino server. Using E-mail Etiquette Because so many people use e-mail, it's necessary to have certain "rules" that all users follow. E-mail began in corporations and businesses whose employees needed to communicate with each other quickly and efficiently. Since e-mail was originally a business program, the people who used it developed business rules and guidelines: What's proper; what's not. What's acceptable; what's grounds for getting in trouble. This is e-mail etiquette. Some of these ideas and concepts will make perfect sense to you; with others, you may ask "Why?" Check out these points of etiquette so you can responsibly and effectively use Lotus Notes Mail. Remember that many large corporations have company policies regarding e-mail; ask your company for a copy of these policies. Breaking of company policies can, in some situations, result in loosing your job. Always Include Information in the Subject Line Don't send a piece of e-mail without including something in the Subject line. Why not? When you look in your Inbox to see your list of mail, you'll see a list that includes who the mail is from, the date of the mail, and the subject. If you leave your subject line blank, it will be blank in the recipients Inbox. Figure 2.1 A blank subject line provides little information to the recipient. Do you have voice mail? Or an answering machine? Say you've been out of the office for a day or so. You return to find 10 voice mails waiting for you, and somewhere in the middle is a message from someone saying "Hi, it's me; give me a call." You don't know the time, date, or subject of the call--or the name of the caller. So, how can you return this call? When you leave telephone or e-mail messages, be thoughtful and efficient; avoid leaving meaningless messages. When you send messages by e-mail, fill in the e-mail Subject line. Make that line of information clear and concise. Beware of the Written Word If you're not willing to post your message by the water cooler, maybe you should think twice about e-mailing it. Although e-mail is fairly secure, it's not entirely secure. Someone might forward your message to others. Sarcasm doesn't translate well from the spoken word to the written word. You might be taken seriously or offend someone when you were only joking. And if you fail to spell check your e-mail, you may be thought of as something less than the brilliant person you know you are. Send E-mail That Has Meaning Some companies do not allow any personal use of e-mail. Maybe your company doesn't mind you using e-mail to ask someone to join you for lunch or to ask if she's going to the company softball game. Be thoughtful, however, about the number of messages you send people and the importance of those messages. People who use e-mail extensively for work might not appreciate unsolicited jokes, thoughts for the day, gossip, and cartoons. E-mail is a tool to help people work more productively. Don't Print Out Your Inbox This is not exactly an etiquette issue, it's more a common sense issue. If you print your e-mail for reading purposes, aren't you defeating the purpose? Why not have people send everything to you on paper to begin with? Avoid being counterproductive. Give Thought to Sending Attachments You can send attachments of other files from other programs within your Lotus Notes Mail. This is a fantastic tool, but don't forget that within Windows products you can cut, copy, and paste information from one program to another. If you attach a file, then the recipient has to start another program to read that file. That can take time out of his working day. Send an attachment only if the recipient needs to make changes to or have a copy of that file for his records. Also send an attachment if the information you are distributing is a large amount of information. For paragraphs, and small tables, and small amounts of text, use cut, copy, and paste to put that information directly into the body of your mail memo. When sending attachments, include information so the receiver knows what the file contains before he opens it. A simple line such as "Please read the attached" is not descriptive enough. A simple line such as "This is the spreadsheet for the third quarter budget" is much more descriptive and helpful. Don't Send E-Mail to the World Don't create large distribution lists. If you're responsible for sending out policy changes, you can store those policy changes in a Notes database. If you need to send the same e-mail message to massive distribution lists, ask your Notes administrator for their advice. You might need a discussion database application or a repository application. These types of databases might be better than using the Mail database for sharing information. DON'T USE ALL CAPS That title seems too strong, doesn't it? That's because typing in all uppercase letters implies that you're shouting. Most computer users think shouting is impolite. Use Reply to All When you answer an e-mail message, you can reply to the sender, or reply to the sender and all of the people that the sender included in the original mail. Maybe the sender cc'd (copied) several people or had several names in the To: field. If your answer would be of use to the others in the original list, please remember to use the Reply to All feature. Otherwise, the poor person who sent you the e-mail may have to take your reply and resend it to the others they were trying to include from the start. Keep Your Messages Short The shorter the better. Some people often skip over an e-mail when the message contains more than a screen full of information. They might think, "I'll read this later when I have more time." E-mail is often forgotten because of exactly that thought, so keep it short and your message will be read. Figure 2.2 This message needs a "Reply All." Remember That You Are Using Company Property Your company purchased the computer on which you are working. Your company purchased the software you are using to send mail. And your company (hopefully) is paying you during the time you spend to write your mail messages. Sounds as if this is company property, doesn't it? It's a good idea to treat your mail like company property. If your topic is too personal, not work related, or highly confidential, it might not be an appropriate piece of e-mail. In this lesson, you learned some pointers for proper use of e-mail. You also learned not to "shout" and to keep your messages short, but meaningful. In the next lesson you'll learn about the workspace.

©Copyright, Macmillan Computer Publishing. All rights reserved.