Yahoo!, Hotmail, and Gmail made doing e-mail through a web interface a commonplace thing, and some people prefer doing e-mail that way all the time. Others rely on web interface to their mail while they are traveling and local e-mail client software at the office. This document describes web based e-mail options for NetPresence clients.
SECURE ACCESS: To manage your mail over the web, visit the address of your mail server, which typically would be something like http://yourdomain.com:2095. Whichever browser you use, this site should show up as secure Web access in your browser. Typically this is indicated by a padlock image on the browser itself. Additionally, the address bar should show the site protocol as “https” not “http.” Otherwise, your access may not be secure.
LOGGING IN: When you are challenged for your user name and password, you must give your entire e-mail address as your user name. Enter your password in the appropriate field, and you will be taken to a screen that gives you three choices for your Web interface: Horde, RoundCube, and Squirrel Mail.
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WHICH INTERFACE? So which interface should you choose – Horde, RoundCube, or Squirrel Mail? The three interfaces are listed in decreasing order of complexity. All three programs support address books. Horde is actually an organizer; it not only does mail and manages contacts, but it also has calendaring features, task management, and notes. Horde supports HTML mail with images, and has a wide range of options. Squirrel Mail is at the opposite end of the spectrum of robustness and complexity. It is simply text, and does not support images in-line nor different typefaces. While this may seem somewhat boring, this has the advantage of being the most secure of the three online mail clients and tends to be the fastest. RoundCube is something of a compromise. It handles images inline and HTML mail, but it does not facilitate all the other features, such as task management and calendaring, that Horde does.
CHANGING YOUR PASSWORD: When you first log in to web mail, at the screen that asks you which interface you would like, a link provides you the opportunity to change your password. Should you change your password to something friendly to you, select a password with at least a “high” security rating.
TRASH AND EMPTYING IT: When you read your email through a Web interface, the individual messages stay on the server unless you move them to the trash AND take one of two additional steps. You must either download all messages to your local computer (and delete from there) OR you must purge all deleted messages from the server. If you elect to do all your mail management through web access, you must “purge” your deleted mail (Horde) or empty your trash (RoundCube).
If you use web mail in conjunction with a local email client, you may purge deleted mail in one of two ways, depending on whether you manage your desktop mail through POP mail or IMAP. For further information, see the page on Using Mail Clients.
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