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FAQ 1010. Windows Messaging, AKA: Microsoft Exchange, AKA: Microsoft Outlook...
For the purpose of this document (especially so I don't have to re-write the whole thing!!!) I will refer to "Exchange" as either the MS Exchange E-MAIL front end that comes with Windows 95 and NT Workstation 4.0, or the Exchange Client update from Microsoft, or the Windows Messaging Client update from Microsoft. "Exchange" in this document does NOT refer to Microsoft's Exchange Server product. Visit Sue Mosher's FAQ at http://www.slipstick.com/exchange/msgfaq.htm for additional Windows Messaging information. All the way from Moscow! She has her latest updates and highlights up there at http://www.slipstick.com/exchange/. This document may help users of NT Workstation 4.0 as well, as the Windows Messaging client for NT works exactly like the Win95 version. However, I haven't tried. E-MAIL me back for accuracy checks please. They may also apply to MS's Outlook product which comes with MS Office 97. 10.1 Exchange basics, and why I recommend Exchange for first time E-MAIL users The bloody thing comes with the operating system, for one, so it's free! Exchange acts as a front end for pretty much any mail client, so it lets the developers worry about mail delivery, while it worries about the interface. Basically, you start with four folders, and all your personal mail comes in your Inbox folder. Stuff you send stays in your Outbox folder until a "Delivery" happens, either when you select "Deliver now" or one of the Exchange clients (such as Internet Mail) decides it's time to deliver mail, scheduled in time intervals you can control. Within the Exchange window you can drag messages between folders, shared folders if available, or directories in Explorer. Another big reason: it's interface matches the Windows Explorer so closely. You can copy & paste messages between it and other Explorer windows. You don't need to learn a whole new interface just to use a second, or third mail system. Yet another big reason: You get all your mail in one place! Internet mail, CompuServe mail, faxes, MSN, MS-Mail, and whatever anyone else decides to make for it. All big apps that support MAPI (those with a "Send Mail..." menu in their File menus), even Win 3.1 apps, work with it. Send a Word document to your buddy at nowhere.com, without fussing with saving, running your other mail program, and attaching. Exchange also stores mail on the user's hard drive or Home directory, so the mail server need not be running to view mail. Many users and developers are just beginning to grasp what Exchange is capable of, and most of us make many, many, mistakes, and abandon it in favor of "standard" mail apps. Please don't give up; Exchange has serious potential, and many of the features you think are missing, might just be in there... maybe even improved on! 10.2. How do I send and receive... Easiest way, is download Microsoft's Internet Explorer and install it, then run the Internet Setup Wizard. Feed the wizard all the info it needs; get it from your provider. Alternately, download MS's stand-alone Internet Mail Client for Exchange, if you don't want to use Internet Explorer. Then add Internet Mail to your Exchange Profile, or let the setup wizard do it. If you use a dial-up connection, be sure to enable Remote Mail otherwise it will dial up your provider every 15 minutes. The Internet Setup Wizard automatically turns on Remote Mail. When you write your messages, enter addresses as you would for any other Internet mail program, in the To: Box of the Send Message requester. Separate multiple addresses with semicolons (a ";") instead of commas. Hit File/Properties to change the sending options of this message if you wish; you can send attachments MIME or UUEncoded, use a different character set if you're sending messages overseas, and such. Finally hit the "Send" button. Notice, however, it does not deliver the message immediately. It will not deliver the message until you run a Remote Mail session, or you hit Tools/Deliver Now Using/Internet Mail. Automatic sending doesn't happen unless you turn off Remote Mail and have it check for mail automatically. Microsoft's Internet Mail client only works with a POP3 server and an SMTP server for outgoing mail. In Internet Mail properties, you can specify a different server for outbound mail by hitting "Advanced", and typing in the name of the outgoing mail server. I'm hoping for an IMAP4 client some time soon, but 90% of providers don't use IMAP4. Sad. There are also many more replacement Internet mail clients popping up, including from Netscape, Corel, and Delrina. NEW Toolkit: Anthony Humphreys (anthony@istar.ca) has kindly bundled the best Exchange add-ons, including Internet Idioms, into one installable (and uninstallable) package. Get them from ftp://ftp.inforamp.net/pub/win95/exchange/widgets.zip. If you use MIME to encode messages and attachments (the default), set the character set to your appropriate choice. Most of us should set it to US-ASCII. Select Internet Mail properties, hit Message Format, hit Character Set, and select US-ASCII. This will remove equal signs and "=3D" codes in messages. If you turn off MIME, either in the properties of your message or in the Character set here, it will send attachments UUEncoded. 10. WINMAIL.DAT attachment (attaches a "Rich text format" message; turn off "Use Rich Text Format" in Internet address book entries, or type in target addresses directly (such as "gordonf@vcn.bc.ca" rather than "[SMTP:gordonf@vcn.bc.ca]") 9. Can't insert a .signature 8. Funny codes show up when using MIME encoded messages (Set the charset to US-ASCII to fix) 7. It insists on deleting mail off my mail server (Use Remote Mail to transfer mail instead) 6. It keeps dialing up my ISP every 15 minutes (Tell it to work off-line and use Remote Mail instead) 5. It won't automatically send my mail (You'll have to do a Tools/Deliver Now or use Remote Mail, or tell it to check mail every so often) 4. I can't set it up for more than one user (Create multiple Exchange Profiles or User Profiles) 3. It won't do Blind Carbon-copy (Just turn on "BCC Box" in the View menu of any new message window) 2. It won't do a bulk mailing (Use your Personal Address Book and make a group up for your bulk mailing. Personally, I don't like bulk mail (SPAM) anyway!) 1. It won't take commas between multiple recipients (That's an MS-Mail throwback; use semicolons instead) Add Microsoft Mail Services, in Add/Remove Programs/Windows Setup, if it isn't already in there. Then add it to your Exchange profile. It will ask you for the network path to your MS-Mail server, either full version or WFWG type server, and will let you select your name from a list of names. The Mail Administrator has to add you to the user list before you can pick from here, though. This is an important difference compared to the older WFWG mail client. MS-Mail under Exchange has all the original benefits of MS-Mail's original 3.2 program, and Exchange will let you import your old .MMF files and address book into your Personal Folders. Select File/Import. Exchange's original MS-Mail client didn't support shared folders, but download Microsoft's Exchange Update, which includes an MS-Mail client update, to get them back. Install it through Add/Remove Programs/Windows Setup/Have Disk. After you install it, you will need to re-boot, then remove and re-add MS-Mail to your Exchange Profile. Once you do, the MS-Mail Shared Folders will show up as a separate folder tree in your folder view window. You can then copy mail back and forth between folders on it, and your personal folders, and create new shared folders. Absolutely not. Microsoft Mail is one of many messaging services you can keep in an Exchange Profile. In fact you could have a profile which only has Personal Folders and Personal Address Book, but then you couldn't send or receive anything. A basic profile has these two basic services and as few as one messaging service, such as Internet Mail. First, pick some central server, or a computer that's always turned on. Then in Control Panel / MS Mail Administrator, instruct the machine to create a New Workgroup Post Office. Instruct the Administrator program where you want the directory tree, or post office, to reside. If you're using all Win95 machines you can specify a UNC path (\\server\share). If it's on a NetWare or other server, just give it a regular DOS path, but try to specify a UNC path if you network client allows it. It will then build the directory tree and allow you to create an Administrator account, and other accounts. On all the machines in the network, tell MS Mail to use that UNC or DOS path to the post office. The Inbox Setup Wizard will let you pick an existing username from the list on the post office, but you can also hand-configure it through MS Mail settings. Once done, this machine can send mail to the other users on that post office. The Administrator can administer that post office from any computer that has the MS Mail client on it, through the very same control panel. Just select "Administer existing post office" and give it the Administrator mailbox name and password. This is a big money saver, because it lets you manage your mail off line, but it requires you already installed the CompuServe Information Manager on your computer (The Win 3.1 or DOS version works fine). If you already haven't installed CIM, do so, and feed it your account information. First, download the CompuServe Exchange client, or look on your CD-ROM for DRIVERS\OTHER\EXCHANGE\COMPUSRV. Next, run the Setup program. That will install the CompuServe mail client and it will run the Inbox Setup Wizard for that client. Tell it where your CIM directory is (usually C:\CSERVE), tell it your access phone number including country code and area code (even if it's local; this follows TAPI spec), and access type (Direct, DATAPAC, whatever). I'm not sure why it wants to use your CIM directory though; maybe for copying its address book perhaps? When finished, and after you re-start Exchange, you can send mail to addresses in CompuServe's format (xxxxx.yyyy) or make Personal Address Book entries with CIS addresses in them. Now, to deliver CIS mail, select Tools/Deliver Now Using/CompuServe Mail. It will dial up your local CIS access number, prompt you for a password (unless you gave it your password), then deliver your mail. Regardless of whether you have mail or not, the CIS client will generate an event log and post it in your Inbox.. Remote Mail also works with CIS mail, letting you keep mail on the CIS server, etc, as will Internet Idioms. Add Microsoft Fax services, from Add/Remove Programs/Windows Setup. Then add Microsoft Fax to your Exchange profile. It will ask you for your name, fax number, and other such items that would belong on a fax cover sheet. Of course, it will ask you what fax modem you want to use. You can then send faxes like any other kind of E-MAIL, including .signatures if you installed Internet Idioms. But far more useful than the regular message requester, is the "New Fax" wizard, which lets you specify a nice cover page (even let you create a new one from scratch), a nice short message, and a proper phone number with area code (following Win95's TAPI spec). And yes, you can print to a fax (or send mail to a Fax address) from any Windows app. Fax Setup adds a Win95 printer driver for faxing. No need to make cover pages in your documents though; you can use the built-in cover page editor to make new ones, or use the four built-in ones. If you want to send a message to both E-MAIL and FAX addresses, use the Fax Address Wizard to insert a Fax address while in any Send Mail requester. Select Tools/Fax Address Wizard. This will let you choose a cover page and insert a proper TAPI phone number in to the fax address. After the wizard completes you can continue to add more E-MAIL or FAX addresses. Attachments will get sent too; Exchange will launch the attachment's associated program and tell it to print to the Microsoft Fax driver. Faxes vs E-MAIL: MS Fax is one of the Exchange messaging services, so it (in many ways) treats faxes like any other kind of e-mail. If you're sending to another MS Exchange Fax recipient, it can even be a real e-mail (if you have "Editable, if possible" selected as the fax format). It does this by encoding the e-mail (and any attachments) into a fax image that the other end can interpret and decode back into an e-mail message. Only MS Fax and Delrina WinFax Pro 7.0 understand this strange format, so you're better off using "Not editable" as the fax format. However, this strange handling of faxes makes you treat "normal" faxes like "attachments" in e-mail. You can even use [FAX:xxx-yyyy] as an e-mail address. Don't be afraid to. NOTE: MS-Word for Win95 has a mail merge bug though; It will crash if you attempt a mail-merge from Word to multiple fax addresses. I don't have all the details but this was pointed out and verified in KB article Q139465. I also forgot who pointed it out to me, sorry. Set aside one computer to share the fax modem, and see to it that it runs Exchange all the time (By placing a shortcut to Inbox in its Startup group). Get Inbox Properties (Or your Exchange profile properties) and get Microsoft Fax properties. Select the Modem tab, and select, "Let me share my modem on the network". All the file sharing rules apply, including User Level security if you enabled that, and you will need a file sharing service installed on that computer. You can't cheat and use a network drive on another server this time, unlike WFWG FAX let you do; the system will use your C: drive and create a FAX share on it. Now, in the Modem tab on everyone else's fax properties, change the modem type to "Network Fax". Give it the UNC or DOS path to the shared directory on the fax server. Users can then send (but not receive... awwww) faxes through the network. Someone will still have to sit at the fax server to route and print faxes as necessary. Routing faxes is a simple matter of forwarding the fax attachment to E-MAIL addresses in the network. Win95 fax servers won't work with WFWG clients or vise-versa. I know, sad. I vaguely remember MS releasing a patch to MS Fax to let Win95's Fax client access WFWG fax servers, but I can't find any reference to it on MS's web site anymore. 10. It can't do broadcast faxes (Yes it can; just feed it a bunch of fax addresses in your personal address book and BCC: them as a group. If I find I'm part of one of your lists, though, heh heh heh...) 9. It won't automatically print faxes (You like junk faxes wasting your paper?) 8. It won't dial 1-(area code) for long distance within my area code (Add that fax number to your personal address book, and turn on "Dial area code, even though it's the same as mine" and check out other TAPI dialing help in Modems and TAPI) 7. It displays a dumb window when it sends a fax (Right-click on the little Fax icon in the Taskbar, then turn off "Display when active") 6. It gives me a junk mail message from SPRINT whenever I install it (Big deal; delete it, it only happens once) 5. I can't use the modem when Exchange is running (Auto-answer won't interfere with other Win95 apps trying to use the modem; you can use HyperTerminal at the same time, for example. Check out the Modems and TAPI section.) 4. I can't print to the fax modem without changing my default printer (That's a dumb MS Office 4.x bug; just use "Send..." instead, and specify a fax address. Yes it does work.) 3. It processes faxes locally and wastes my processing time 2. It keeps trying to make E-MAIL format (Set the fax type to "Not editable" in Fax Properties/Message) 1. It's cover page editor sucks (But it's functional, isn't it?) Delrina (AKA: Symantec) getting the Designed for Win95 logo for this program is a miracle. Listen. Give up on WinFax and wait until they earn that Win95 logo. For about 99% of us faxing, MS Fax will do all we need to do, and it's free. Terry Harrigan at http://www.ihub.com/ now (finally) has a MHS messaging and address book service for Exchange. it's part of their Connect2 series for Windows. I haven't had the chance to properly review it because I don't have access to MHS post offices anymore, but if anyone out there can try this out and let me know how it works, I'd appreciate it. Many people, including Olaf Berli and Frank Carius tell me that Ihub's Connect2Exchange is a very good MHS client and you should consider them for additional MHS utilities. It's a fine compliment to the MHS services included with NetWare servers. Note to Terry: I still didn't appreciate you writing me a second time... I had to repost the FAQ in March because of other tech details and didn't have the chance to include your info. Please give me a chance at least. There's a cc:Mail client for Exchange at http://www.transendcorp.com/ under the title ConnectWare for cc:Mail. They have a 30 day trial version available for download and a commercial version. You also need updated VIM .DLL files, which you can get from Lotus via ConnectWare's site. From what I read about it, ConnectWare for cc:Mail is a proper Exchange client, with Remote Mail support. MSN Setup automatically adds an MSN mail client for Exchange, and you can grab user lists off MSN directly, and store local copies. If you already have BillNet software installed, you will have a "Microsoft Network Online Service" client you can add to your Exchange profile. It grabs your user info from the rest of BillNet, so there's no additional setup needed. This is pretty much the easiest client to set up. BillNet Mail lets you send to BillNet or Internet addresses, so when you create address book entries and you use both BillNet and Internet Mail, make sure you select the type of Internet Mail address you want to use. Your least expensive bet is to always use direct Internet Mail, rather than Internet Mail via BillNet, if you have a choice. Yes it's real. Sue Mosher confirmed it for me and others have heard about it, and you can also read about it on Microsoft's web site if you do a search on it. MS Phone is a voice mail add-on for Exchange that will receive voice messages and store them as .WAV attachments in your Inbox. You can also call your voice mail box from another telephone and have MS Phone play voice messages back. And here's the real killer: it will also read off the headers of any non-voice messages, like your regular E-MAIL and faxes! It does this with a voice synth included with it. Alas though... MS Phone only comes with the newest voice modems (Phone Blaster from Creative is one of them). The rumor mill suggests that MS will ship it with the next Office 95 release, though. Personally I'm hoping for it to come out as a retail product so I don't have to endure Delrina CommSuite. Thphth. 10.3. Remote Mail basics for MS Mail, Internet Mail, CIS Mail, and Microsoft Network Mail users If an Exchange client supports Remote Mail, it will allow you to work interactively with your mail server. This means manually logging in, hand-selecting the messages you want to move, copy, or delete, and then transferring. Normally, when you select "Deliver now using..." or if you set up your client for a LAN or other continuous connection, it runs the chosen service, logs in, moves all of your mail from the server to your Inbox, transmits anything in your Outbox, then disconnects. This is quite blatant and quite efficient. Remote Mail however, in the same Tools menu, lets you fully control mail delivery, provided you enabled Remote Mail in your clients. NOTE: In the original Exchange product, you had to use several buttons (Connect, Update Headers, Transfer Mail) to complete a remote task. The Windows Messaging update combines these three buttons into one (Transfer Mail). This one click will send anything in your Outbox, download anything you marked in the headers list, and update the headers list, all at once. It will NOT copy, move, or delete mail unless you explicitly marked any mail for doing do. This is much simpler and it takes nothing away from Remote Mail functionality! In MS-Mail, using Remote Mail depends on your connection type. You can set different Remote Mail options for LAN and for Dial-up networking sessions, so if it's on the LAN it'll work one way, and if it's on a phone line it will work another. You will only get a Remote Mail choice for MS-Mail if you enabled it for whatever your current connection is. Slow machines will benefit if you enable Remote Mail for LAN connections, as the mail checks eat up processor time and load down the system. Internet Mail only has one place for defining the Remote Mail behavior: The Connection tab in Internet Mail properties. You either enable Remote Mail, or disable it and check for mail every so often (15 minutes by default). The latter works best if you have a POP3 server right on your LAN, otherwise, keep Remote Mail enabled. You can always do a Deliver Now if you want to do a batch mail delivery. CIS Mail always has Remote Mail enabled, but you can instruct it to dial out and check every so often as well. BillNet (TM) Remote Mail is also always enabled, and it will log you in to BillNet when you perform a delivery, either using Remote Mail, or Deliver Now. Enable Remote Mail for whatever client you're using. This will let you view all the mail in your server by selecting "Update Headers", and hand-select pieces of mail for copying, moving, or deleting. To keep mail on the server, select the option "Mark to receive a copy" rather than "Mark to receive". Remote Mail always keeps a local copy of the mail list, so you needn't be attached to the server to maintain your list. It will attach to the server only if you tell it to, or if you perform any transfers, and it will update the list whenever a transfer occurs. It distinguishes read mail from unread mail by bolding unread mail. 10.4. How can I keep a separate Inbox or address book for each user? (Exchange Profiles) Say you send MS Mail and Internet Mail from work, but you want to use the same copy of Exchange (and the same machine) for you home Internet Mail too. You can't load multiple copies of Internet Mail in one profile, but you can create a second (or third, or fourth) profile, add Internet Mail to it, and use different settings. All Exchange user settings go in the active Exchange profile. To make a new profile, bring up Inbox properties and hit "Show Profiles". Then select "Add". The Inbox Setup Wizard will run a second time, prompting you for a new profile name, and prompting you through all the setups of all installed mail clients. You can enable or disable whatever mail clients you wish. Then, when you get to the Personal Address Book and Personal Folders setup screens, be sure to specify a unique filename for the address book and mailbox, different from any previous profile. The wizard will create new files for you if they don't already exist. You CAN use the same address book (.PAB) and mailbox file (.PST) in multiple profiles, but why cause confusion? Then, in Tools/Options within Exchange, enable "Prompt for a profile to be used". This way when Exchange runs, you can choose the profile to run. You need to exit and re-start Exchange to swap between profiles. Be sure to allow it to completely exit (at least wait until the fax icon disappears) so it logs off from the services in the first profile. Profiles are cool for Exchange-enabled apps, because the apps will store their user settings per-profile. Internet Idioms, for example, can keep a unique signature for each profile. Schedule Plus for 95 also keeps unique schedule books and contact lists per profile. You don't even need to have a mail client; a profile only needs the Personal Folders and Address Book services. Exchange stores profiles in the user portion of the Registry, so User Profiles apply here as well. Each user can have their own set of Exchange profiles, of if you don't want to be bothered with the "Prompt for profile to be used" requester, use a single profile for each user. This is especially useful of you have roving users that use Schedule Plus for 95; if you keep the schedule and message files in your home directory, all of the books will follow you around the network. Now that's cool. 10.5. Quick background on the Personal Address Book If you want to make up that bulk mailing list or that broadcast fax, here's where to do it. Hit Tools/Address Book and hit the blank card button (or File/New) to create an entry. The entries end up becoming a contact database of sorts, complete with full addressing should you choose to fill in all the blanks for each person. Then, when you send letters, you can add names from this address book directly. The most important entries to add to a new entry are the Name and E-MAIL address. The name entry shows up as a "friendly" name, but there are lots of spaces to fill in (like home mail address, work mail address, home & work phone & fax numbers, etc). The E-MAIL address actually has two components; the E-MAIL type and the E-MAIL address. Examples of Exchange E-MAIL addresses include [FAX:+1 (604) 555-1212] and [SMTP:gordonf@vcn.bc.ca]. You specify the address type when you create a new entry, so you don't need to memorize the bizarre formats I gave examples for, though they do work in the TO: boxes of letters. One special type of address book entry is the "Personal Distribution List", which is where you create groups of people to mail to. These groups can contain any number of people from your address book, even with different E-MAIL formats. To create a distribution list, first create all the entries you want in it, then create a distribution list and add the entries to it. When you send mail, use this distribution list as the destination address. MS Schedule Plus for 95 uses a similar address book for contact management, so be sure to fill in all the blanks when making up entries. This is actually another good reason to stick with Exchange; when you do get MS Office you will already have a powerful contact manager with a list of contacts ready to use. To make the Schedule+ contact list match the Exchange address book, visit Microsoft's "Application farm" which has this page (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/resource/downloads/exchange/default.htm). A better Schedule+ address book service exists at http://www.thinkage.on.ca/~kadorken/schabp.htm which completely REPLACES the Exchange address book service. Now you can keep ONE contact database for both Exchange AND Schedule+ (Makes me wonder why MS didn't do this in the first place!) Other Designed for Win95 apps will look for the address book for their own purpose (like Word 7's cover letter wizard). Exchange can only directly import address books from the original MS Mail. Sue Mosher's web site (http://www.slipstick.com/exchange/) contains many programs that can import (and export) entries into the personal address book. 10.6. Top ten misconceptions about Exchange 10. Exchange is a pig (OK so it's 4.2 MB, but that includes all the interface, remote mail, and address book! I'd like to see you run four mail programs and a fax program all at once in less than 4.2 MB) 9. It won't work with Win 3.1 Mail-enabled apps (Yes it does. Apps call MAPI.DLL to send mail) 8. It requires Win95 networking to work (Not if all you're doing is faxing or CIS mail) 7. It won't work with MS-Mail Remote (OK so it won't. But it does work with dial-up networking and the regular MS-Mail server, so use that instead) 6. It's a poor Internet Mail client 5. It won't work with MS-Mail shared folders (Download the Exchange Update to fix) 4. You need Exchange to run Schedule Plus for Win95 (Not. Only for workgroup functions) 3. You need Exchange Server to use it (Not. Exchange Server is a very different beast) 2. No one's writing clients for Exchange (well... Microsoft's writing clients... heh heh... just keep bugging software vendors, and visit Angry Greycat Designs) 1. It's only MS-Mail re-vamped (OK, but it's DRASTICALLY re-vamped!) IMAP4 client (With optional folder store on the mail server, a'la MS-Mail) FidoNet point client (Store echoes as external folders a'la MS-Mail, send and receive echo mail) Quicker fax manipulation (Actually it's not bad, but I'd dump the E-MAIL format option for more speed; set the format to "Not Editable") Exit QUICKER! For some reason, an Exchange component (MAPISP32) stays resident for up to 30 seconds after exit! 10.8. Exchange's other names, incarnations, versions, etc
10.9. How to get the spell checker to work Early versions of Win95 had some kind of spelling checker options built into Exchange, but these never worked. These options require a spell-check subsystem, such as the one included into MS Office 95, MS Works 95, and other MS products featuring spelling checkers. Normally, if you install a Designed for Win95 app that includes a spell checker, it adds the needed Registry entries to enable spell checking in Exchange. Some installers don't do this, however. MS's KB article Q137178 describes how to patch your system to include spell check capability. Thanks to syc@ibm.net for pointing this to me. |
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