Welcome to Windstruck's Learn Windows 98 Advanced Internet and Email, the easiest way to learn
how to take advantage of the online world.
Hi, I'm Julie Liden, and today we're going to show you how to use the Internet tools
that are included with Windows 98, namely the Internet Explorer web browser, Outlook
Express for email, NetMeeting, which lets you have conferences across the Internet,
and MediaPlayer, which lets you play video on your PC.
Our training experts are Tom Jaffe and Raina Chudnovsky.
Tom is the president of Windstruck, previously he spent six years as a product manager at
Microsoft, traveling all over the world lecturing and training Microsoft's sales force and over
50,000 Microsoft customers.
Raina is the president of Next Step Technologies.
She has a master's degree in educational technology from Harvard University, and she regularly
trains key employees at some of the largest U.S. corporations.
So welcome Raina and Tom, what do you have to tell us about the Internet?
We have some great things in store for you, and we'll start by showing you some of the
advanced features of Internet Explorer that will turn you into an Internet power user.
And we're going to show you how to do some really amazing things, like doing a video
conference over the web.
We're also going to show you how to be a power email user with some of the advanced features
of Outlook Express.
But if you're not familiar with the basics of Internet Explorer and Outlook Express,
I'd recommend you start with our Learn Windows 98 Getting Started video.
Okay, are you ready?
Let's get ready to hang ten and start power surfing with Internet Explorer 4.0.
Tom and Raina are going to show us how to use the advanced features of Internet Explorer,
also known as IE, so you can do things like surf the web while you sleep.
Raina, Tom, you have the stage.
Great, thanks Julie.
Let's start by pulling up a cool website.
So Julie, where do you want to go today?
Very funny, Tom.
Actually, I do have a site in mind.
How about gamesville.com?
Okay, so I'll type in the address, and as the site is coming up, notice that the status
bar on the bottom is showing us that it's opening the page.
If the web page has a lot of graphics, the status bar will tell you how many items are
still being downloaded to the computer.
When it finishes downloading the page, it says done.
So now that we're on the site, I can click on some of the links to check out the games
that they're offering.
After all those clicks, I'm not sure where you've taken us.
So how do we get back to the home page?
Most websites have a link to their home page, which is usually at the top or bottom of all
the other pages on the site.
Or if you click the down arrow next to the back button, you can find all the pages that
you've looked at recently and go directly to the page you want.
That's a quick way to get to the page you want, and it seemed like the page came up
more quickly than the first time you loaded it.
It did come up faster, because once you visited a page, IE stores that page on your hard drive
so it can pull it back up much more quickly than downloading it again from the internet.
Well, what if the page has changed since the last time we looked at it?
If you want to make sure that you have the latest copy of a web page, you can press the
refresh button.
For example, the Microsoft Investor website updates stock information about every 20 minutes.
So if I want to get the latest tick on the stock market, I can press the refresh button,
and you can see that the page reloads with any new information.
Another button that's useful for navigating the web is the stop button.
Sometimes when you try to download a web page, it seems like the browser gets stuck.
This can happen if the computer that you're trying to connect to isn't working properly
or maybe the internet is running slowly.
Why would the internet run slowly?
It's kind of like the highway during rush hour.
Sometimes there are so many people trying to use the internet at the same time that
it literally fills the capacity of the wires.
Or sometimes, if you're trying to connect to a popular web page, there might also be
a lot of other people trying to connect to that same site at the same time, so essentially
you have to wait in line.
If this happens and your page seems to be taking forever to download, you can press
the stop button and try again later.
Next, let's take a look at the home button.
You probably know that clicking on home takes you to the page that you see when you first
start Internet Explorer.
I have Microsoft star page as my home page, but if you'd rather start with a different
web page, you can customize IE to bring up any page you want.
For example, let me show you how to make Yahoo your home page.
First, load Yahoo into IE, which is www.yahoo.com.
Now click on the view menu and choose Internet Options to open the Internet Open dialog box.
The dialog is already open to the general tab, and at the top, there's a section called
Home Page.
You see here that home.microsoft.com is my current home page, but since Yahoo is loaded
into IE right now, we can click Use Current to make Yahoo the home page.
Or if you want IE to load really fast every time you start it up, you can choose not to
have any home page by clicking the Use Blank button.
But let's choose Use Current to set Yahoo as the home page, and I'll click OK.
Now if I click to a different page and then click on the home button, it takes us back
to Yahoo.
It's good to know how to reset your home page because some programs can switch your home
page without even asking you.
So if you find a new home page that you don't like, you can always switch back to the one
you want.
Moving down the button bar, the button that I use most is Search, but sometimes I get
so many responses from my searches that it's hard to find what I really need.
Well, we could show you a few tricks that will help you find what you need more quickly.
First, I'll click the Search button, and it connects us to the Yahoo Search service in
the left pane.
I could choose another service by clicking on Choose a Search Engine at the top of the
search page, but let's stick with Yahoo for now.
Julie, is there anything that you've been trying to find on the web?
Well, can you use the web to find things for kids to do?
Yeah, there are lots of websites for kids, including a great Disney site that's in the
channel bar.
But let's see what else we can find by using some of the power searching techniques.
On most search engines, you can refine searches by using quotations around phrases or by including
words like and or not with your search.
But the most important search technique is to use words that are specific.
Let's say your kids are into tennis, and you want to find out if there are any tennis tournaments
in the Boston area so that they can play in them.
Now, if I type in tennis and click the Search button, it comes back with about a million
sites that relate to tennis.
If I search for tennis tournaments, it will look for the sites that have the words tennis
and tournaments somewhere in the site.
So now we have about 20,000 sites to look through.
Now, I can refine the search even further by typing quotations around tennis tournaments,
and this will return a couple of thousand sites that have the exact phrase that's in
the quotes.
But to get it to a manageable number, I'll type and Boston, which means that the site
also has to have the word Boston in it.
And I'll add not professional, meaning that it will avoid sites that have the word professional.
Now when I press Enter, we get a more manageable list of sites that we can look through and
find what we need.
Now it's possible that your search engine uses a different system to refine the search.
But for most search engines, using quotations and and not will help you refine your searches.
That should help us get to the page we want.
But once we're on a web page, is there a fast way to find the information that we want?
There is.
Here's my home page, which has lots of information on it.
Let's say I want to find out how the weather is going to be today.
I can click down the page to look for the weather section, but a faster way is to press
control F to bring up the find dialog box.
Here I can type in weather and press find next.
And it takes us directly to the weather.
So anytime you want to find something on a web page, you'll press control F. But Tom,
once you found a website you want to go back to, Internet Explorer doesn't make you go
through that whole search again, does it?
No, not at all.
In fact, IE has a feature called favorites where you can store links to all of your favorite
sites.
Once you've set one of these links up, you can return to it by just clicking its button
in the favorites list here in IE, or you can also access these links from the favorites
list in the start menu.
I definitely want to learn how to set up a favorite link.
But first, let's take a look at the history button.
Basically, the history list records all the pages that you've been to during the last
few weeks.
And like the other buttons we've looked at, it presents them in the left pane of the browser.
If you want to see which websites you looked at last week, just click on the button for
last week and the list of sites appears.
Click the top button again and the list is retracted.
Let's see the sites I looked at yesterday.
Notice that the icon next to the site is a folder icon.
That's because it includes a list of all the pages that we looked at within the site.
So when I click on one of these sites, all the pages that we visited have the IE icon
next to them.
And of course, to open up one of these sites, just click on it.
Another easy way to get to a site you've been to is by clicking the down arrow in the address
field.
This lists the sites you've been to since the last time you opened IE.
And here's a cool tip.
If you enter a site that you've surfed around on, like boston.com, and press the control
key while clicking the down arrow, it will show you a list of all the pages on that site
you've been to.
And if you want to go to one of these pages, just click on it.
Being able to jump directly to the websites you visited is certainly useful.
I suppose the channel button gives us even more sites to choose from.
Exactly.
There are all kinds of channels to choose from.
And typically, they're well-designed sites that take advantage of the technologies in
Internet Explorer, like being able to work offline.
And this leads us to our next module, where we're going to show you how you can download
any website so you can surf it without being connected to the Internet.
Raina, did you say we can surf any website without being connected to the Internet?
You got it.
When you set up a channel to work offline, it means that your computer will automatically
connect to the Internet, download the web pages, and then disconnect.
So when you're ready to browse these pages, you don't have to connect to the Internet,
and the pages will load more quickly because they've already been stored on your hard drive.
This can be especially useful if you have a laptop computer, because it lets you surf
your favorite websites while you're on the road.
Oh, so if I like to read the morning news, I can have my favorite newspapers already
downloaded and waiting when I wake up.
Let's take a look at how to set this up.
Sure.
In fact, there are two ways to store web content for working offline.
You can subscribe to regular web pages using the favorites list, or you can subscribe to
channels.
Both methods will automatically connect you to the sites that you specify as often as
you want and check for any new content.
If there is anything new, then Internet Explorer can download that information onto your hard
drive.
Let me start by showing you how to subscribe to a regular website using the favorites list.
For example, let's subscribe to the New York Times page on the web so you can have the
morning news waiting in your computer when you wake up.
First, I'll type in the web address in the address bar.
Except, instead of typing out www.NewYorkTimes.com, a much faster way to enter the address is
to type in NY Times and then hold down the control key and press enter.
Notice that it adds the www to the beginning and the dot com to the end.
And when I press enter, it starts to download the page.
Okay, so now that the page is loaded, I'll go to the favorites item in the menu bar and
click on add to favorites.
The add favorite dialog box pops up which gives us three options.
By default, the first option, no, just add the page to my favorites is selected.
The second option says yes, but only tell me when this page is updated.
In other words, when the New York Times has new information in its website, Internet Explorer
will let us know, but the actual content of the page won't be downloaded onto my computer.
Okay, but how does Internet Explorer tell you that the webpage has changed?
It will put a little red gleam like this on the upper left hand corner of the pages icon
in the favorites list whenever there's new information on that page.
This is a great feature because it allows you to stay current with lots of websites
without having to download them all the time just to see if there's any new information.
And believe me, if you like a website, it's easy to waste time checking it several times
a day to see if there's anything new.
But what about the third option that says notify me of updates and download the page
for offline viewing?
If you choose that option, Internet Explorer will download the New York Times web pages
to your hard drive anytime there's new information.
And it will let you know this by marking the site with that red gleam in the favorites
folder.
And since the page is already on your hard drive, you can read it offline.
How often will it connect to the site and check for new information?
Well, you can specify as often as you want.
So let's click on the customize button and go through the subscription wizard.
The first page has two options.
You can download just the page you specified or you can download the main page and all
the pages that are linked to it.
This option is great for the morning news because it lets you read the full story behind
each link even when you're offline.
So I'll choose the second option and click next.
And the wizard gives me the option of downloading one, two, or three levels deep.
What do levels refer to?
Clicking one level deep means that I'll download one page for every link on this home page.
Clicking two levels deep means that I'll download a page for every link on every page that's
on the next level and so on.
So if your website has lots of links and you're not careful, you could end up filling your
hard drive with hundreds of web pages.
Okay, one level ought to be enough for me.
What's the next step in the wizard?
The next page asks you if you want to get an email message to notify you of any changes
to the site.
Since I know the site's going to change every day, I don't need to get an email every day
to remind me.
So I'll choose no and click next.
Here we can choose how often we want IE to download the New York Times webpage.
There are already defaults for daily, weekly, or monthly.
But I'll click on the edit button so the news will download every weekday morning just before
I get to work.
That way I'll be sure to have the latest news.
In the custom schedule dialog box, I'll select a daily update and then choose 7 a.m. for
the time of the update.
And when I click okay, it takes us back to the subscription wizard.
As I connect to the internet using a modem, I'll click on the dial as needed check box
so that my computer will connect automatically at the times I've specified.
Here you can see that the subscription will be updated every weekday at 7 a.m.
If I select manually, Internet Explorer will update my subscription only when I choose
update all subscriptions from the favorites menu.
Finally, it asks if the New York Times website we're subscribing to requires a login name
and password.
This site does require a password, so I'll enter it here.
Click finish to enter the subscription.
And in the add favorites dialog box, I'll click okay.
Now the computer is set to download the news every morning.
So I'll get the latest information when I read the paper.
And since it's free, that'll cover the cost of my internet service right there.
What else do we need to know about subscriptions?
The next item on the favorites menu called manage subscriptions will show you a list
of all the websites you've subscribed to along with information about them, like when
they were last updated, etc.
From here, you can delete subscriptions you don't want by right clicking on the icon
and choosing delete from the shortcut menu.
Or you can update any other attribute that we assigned in the wizard by right clicking
on the icon and choosing properties.
And you can click on the subscription, receiving, or schedule tab to make whatever change you
want.
Okay, now that we've learned how to subscribe to a regular website, let's see how this
differs from channels.
Channels are the websites that are designed to take advantage of the technologies that
are built into IE so it's even easier to surf their sites offline.
And when you are online, channels often have active content so you can have things like
active stock tickers or weather maps.
You can even turn your desktop into an art gallery that updates your desktop with new
pictures every few minutes.
Sounds pretty advanced.
Can you show us how to set these up?
Alright, but first let me point out that you don't have to subscribe to channels if you
just read them once in a while.
Channels can be browsed online just like other web pages.
So to introduce the idea of how a channel works, we can take a look at some channels
online.
So I click on the channels button in the toolbar and that familiar left side pane slides out.
This is kind of like a TV guide that also works as a remote control.
So you can click on the button and connect to the channel.
Since I'm going on vacation soon, let's take a look at the travel channels.
Let's see.
Okay, here's lifestyle and travel.
And when I click on it, you can see the list of channels that are grouped under it.
Let's click on the Expedia channel.
This brings up the channel's front page, sort of like a magazine cover, which has some nice
graphics and some links for me to find what I want inside this channel.
Those are some nice looking graphics on the page.
Well that's because channels take advantage of the advanced technologies in IE.
So a lot of them will have sound, animation, and high end graphics.
Okay.
Now, I want to use Expedia to plan and book my travel reservations.
Can you show me how to subscribe?
We can use a wizard that's similar to the one that we use for subscribing to favorite
web pages.
To bring it up, just right click on any of the channels and choose subscribe.
When the dialog box appears, you'll see some pretty familiar options.
I can just keep the Expedia button in the channel bar.
I can have Internet Explorer notify me when there's new information that's posted in
the channel.
Or I can have IE download the channel website to my hard drive for offline viewing.
Oh, just like with the favorites subscription.
Right.
We could also click the customize button and go through the same steps as in the favorites
wizard.
But since we don't need to get these updates on a regular basis, and since you've already
seen this wizard, I'll just click okay.
It will sign us up and bring us back into the Expedia site.
Well that was quick and easy.
And now I can click on the fare map to plan my trips or even add exotic pictures from
around the world to my desktop.
Which leads us to the next module of this video, integrating the web with your desktop.
You've seen and heard about adding web content like stock tickers to your Windows desktop.
In this section, Tom and Raina will show you how to set up some of these cool web features
on your computer.
Sounds like a plan, Julie.
But before you can integrate the web with Windows, you need to make sure that Windows
is set up with the active desktop.
To do this, open up the my computer icon on your desktop, click on the view menu, and
select folder options.
In the folder options dialog box, click on the general tab and select web style to enable
the active desktop.
And by the way, if you ever want to disable the active desktop, you can return to this
dialog box and select classic style.
If you need more information about setting up the active desktop, check out our Learn
Windows 98 Beyond the Basics video.
But now we're going to show you how to integrate web content into your desktop.
Once you have the active desktop set up, you'll want to minimize all your windows so you can
see the Windows desktop.
Now right click on the desktop and select properties from the shortcut menu to bring
up the display properties dialog box.
From here, click on the web tab and click on the new button to add an active desktop
item.
A dialog box appears asking if we want to visit Microsoft's active desktop gallery,
where we'll find lots of active desktop items.
I'll click yes, and this brings up Microsoft's active desktop gallery.
And as you can see, there are active desktop items for news, sports, business, entertainment,
and travel.
I'll type in stock, click search, and the logo for CMP Net comes up.
I'll click on the logo to bring up a preview of the site.
And now I'll click on the visit active channel button, and it takes me right to the site.
To add the active content to your desktop, you may have to look around your channel website
until you find a link to the active components.
Here it is.
So I'll click on the button that says add to active desktop.
It asks if I really want to add this to my desktop, and I'll say yes.
And I'll click OK again to add the ticker to my desktop.
You can click the custom button to add the stocks that you want.
So Julie, what stocks do you want to track today?
How about Microsoft and Intel?
OK.
So I'll type in MSFT for Microsoft and INTC for Intel.
Notice that you can also add news categories to this ticker.
But for now, I'll click OK.
And notice that the stock prices for Microsoft and Intel start scrolling across my screen.
And as long as I'm connected to the web, these prices will continue to stream across.
So if the stock ticker is running on my desktop and not in IE, how do I resize it and move
it around on my desktop?
Just let your pointer hover over the ticker for a moment, and a thin gray border will
appear.
This window lets you resize and move the active desktop item.
When you're finished, just move your mouse away, and it will blend right back into your
desktop.
Even though IE isn't running right now, let me show you how the stock ticker is directly
connected to IE.
Let's say you want more information about one of these stocks.
You can click on that stock in the stock ticker, and it launches IE and brings up all the details
about that stock.
This is great.
With the active desktop running, I can be as informed as my stock broker.
And if I want to add other active desktop items, I can go through the same steps with
any other channel on the website.
Now what about all the menus in IE?
Is there anything we need to know about there?
Definitely.
There's lots of useful tools in the IE menus.
First let's take a look at the file menu.
If you ever find a page that you want to share with others, you can go to the file menu,
and you'll find options for saving or printing the page.
But the one I use all the time is send.
This lets you send either the page or a link to the page by email.
What's the difference between sending the page and sending a link to the page?
If you send a page by email, then the person who receives the message doesn't have to
connect to the web to download the page.
But if you send a link, they will need to be connected to the web.
Notice that it automatically creates an email message with the web address on the subject
line and an icon in the message area.
So all you have to do is address it and send it.
Another feature you'll probably use all the time on the edit menu is an item called find
on this page.
If you're looking for something specific on the web, this can save you a lot of time.
For example, if I want to know what the weather's going to be, I can connect to my start page
and click edit find, or you can type control F on the keyboard, and then type in weather,
and click find next.
When you do these searches, if it doesn't find what you're looking for, you might get
a dialog box that says finish searching the document.
Before you give up the search, change directions of the search so it moves from your cursor
back towards the top of the document, and then click find again.
And in this case, it does take us to our weather section.
Speaking of finding information, how do parents prevent their kids from finding information
they probably shouldn't see?
IE has a great tool to help you control which sites they can connect to.
Click on the view menu, choose internet options, and under the content tab, click the enable
button in the content advisor section.
This will bring up a dialog box where you can establish a supervisor's password.
So enter and confirm your password.
And the next dialog you'll see is content advisor.
Here you can set the allowable level of language, nudity, sex, and violence that your kids will
be able to access.
For example, if you click on language, you can determine if you'll allow mild expletives,
moderate expletives, obscene gestures, or explicit or crude language, as rated by an
organization called the recreational software advisory council.
The general and advanced tabs are already set up for maximum protection, but you should
know that if a site has not been rated, then you won't be able to connect to it unless
you go to the general tab and put a check next to the item that says, users can see
sites that have no rating.
That's great to know, and I'm sure a lot of parents out there will feel a lot more comfortable
once they've set this up.
Before we move on to email, is there anything else we need to know about Internet Explorer,
Rayna, Tom?
There is one more thing I want to mention called plugins.
Some websites have added functionality that you can get if you download a little software
program that integrates in with Internet Explorer.
A good example of this is on BMW's site.
They have a system called 3D QuickTime that gives you realistic effects like panning around
the inside of a car.
Now it can be a little tricky to set this up, because first you have to download the software
from the web onto your system, then you need to run the setup program, and then you should
delete what you downloaded so it doesn't clutter up your system.
Let's take a look.
This is where I click to download the plugin.
Now it asks where I want the software to be downloaded to.
I like to download software to my desktop so it's easy to find once the download is
complete.
This can take a few minutes, so let's cut to the end.
Don't you wish your computer could do that?
Okay, so the icon's on my desktop, and I can double-click on it to run the setup program.
This will add the QuickTime functionality into the Internet Explorer so we can check
out that cool 3D panning feature.
Okay, the setup is complete, so I'll drag the icon we downloaded to the recycle bin,
and let's go back to the BMW site to check it out.
I'll click on the link, and now we can pan around.
Wow, that is really cool.
So if a website tells you that you have to download software, remember to download it
to a place where you'll find it, like the desktop.
Then run the setup program, and then you can move it to the recycle bin.
Well I know I'm ready to try out all of these tricks and do some power surfing with Internet
Explorer.
Next, let's get ready to learn the ins and outs of using Outlook Express.
As you probably know, email is the most common way that people all over the world use the
Internet.
So if email is not a part of your everyday life already, it probably will be real soon,
once you learn to be an email pro.
In this module, Tom and Raina will show you how to use Outlook Express, the all-purpose
email program that's packed to the brim with advanced time-saving features.
Take it away, guys.
Since we explained how to connect to the Internet in our Learn Windows 98 Getting Started video,
we'll assume that you've already gone through the setup wizard so that Outlook Express is
hooked up to an Internet Service Provider and that you already have an email name.
If not, I'd suggest that you stop the video, click on Outlook Express, and go through the
setup wizard before we move on.
So now that you have Outlook Express working, let me start by showing you how to send and
receive email, reply to messages, and organize your old messages.
At the top of the Outlook Express window, there's a button bar where you can compose
a message, send and receive messages, address your messages, connect to the Internet, or
hang up your connection.
The large area on the right is the workspace.
In the current view, there are pictures representing the major functions of Outlook Express.
And you can click on the pictures to read mail, read news, compose a message, address
your mail, download your messages, and find people.
What do the folders on the left side do?
Well, the first one is the inbox.
This is where all of your new messages are stored when they arrive.
So when I click on the inbox folder, you can see the new messages on the right.
At the top of this pane, there are column headings that tell you who the message is
from, the subject, and when it was received.
If you have a long list of messages, you can click the column headings to sort them.
To see what's inside a message, just click on it and you'll see a preview of its contents
in the preview pane at the bottom.
The preview pane is a great way to quickly scan the contents of the messages you've
received.
If you find a message you want to read, just double click on it in the top pane and a new
window opens up that includes the message contents.
Notice all the graphics and colorful text you can include in an Outlook email.
Above the message area, you'll find the address fields which tell you who the message is from,
when it was sent, who it was sent to, and the subject.
You'll also find at the top of the window all the buttons you need to respond to the
message.
There are also buttons that let you save or print the message.
And if you select any of the text or graphics inside of a message, you can copy and paste
that information.
When you're done with a message, you can delete it by clicking the X.
If you want to reply to the message, you have three options.
You can reply to just the person who sent you the message, you can reply to all the
people who are copied on the original message, or you can click the forward button to send
the message to somebody else.
You can also use this message window to read through the list of new messages by clicking
the up or down arrow to read the previous or next message on the list in your inbox.
This is a fast way to read through your messages without having to go back to the inbox to
open each message you want to read.
On the right is a button for the address book where you can store contact information about
the people who you exchange emails with.
I'm going to click the reply all button, and this brings up a send mail template that's
already addressed to everyone who is on the original message.
Notice that the original message that we're responding to appears in the work area at
the bottom.
And just above that is a space where we can type in a response.
So I'll respond to the message.
Thanks for the useful information.
Please review the file below.
Best regards, Tom.
This is a bit hard to read, so I'll use the editing tools to make it look a little nicer.
The first thing I'll do is highlight all the text and increase the font size to 14.
That's easier to read.
I can click the font color button and make the highlighted text turn green.
And I'll indent my closing by highlighting it and clicking the increase indentation button.
I can also make my name look like handwriting by using the brush script font and changing
the point size to 24.
Now to insert the file that I want everybody to review, I can click on the insert file
button that looks like a paperclip.
From this dialog, I can find the file I want and click the attach button.
First set an icon for the file now appears below the message.
Now to make my message look really sharp, I can apply some stationary.
So I'll click format, apply stationary, and I think Ivy will look good with green text.
Well that looks great, but what if the person you're sending this email to doesn't have
Outlook Express?
Will they see all this formatting?
If the recipient doesn't have a graphical email package like Outlook Express, the message
will probably appear with plain black text on a white background.
But chances are they'll still receive the file attachment with their message.
So since I finished creating the email, I can click send to send it out.
A message pops up to tell us that when you click the send button, the message will be
temporarily stored in the outbox folder until you connect to the internet and send it on
its way.
Let me click on the outbox folder so you can see that our message is in there.
Now I'll click the send and receive button on the button bar and Outlook Express connects
to the internet and sends the message.
Notice that the message has disappeared from the outbox folder, but whenever a message
is sent out, a copy of it is stored in the sent items folder.
This comes in handy if you ever need to remind yourself what you wrote to somebody.
So let's go back to the inbox because the original message is still there.
Notice that since we've read this message, the icon appears as an open envelope.
But the messages we haven't read have a yellow closed envelope with bold text.
Since I don't need the message anymore, I'll click once on it to select it and then I'll
click the delete button.
This doesn't actually delete the message, it just moves it into the deleted items folder.
I see, the deleted items folder works a lot like the recycle bin on the desktop.
So if you ever need to get the message back, you can find it in the deleted items folder.
Now what's the drafts folder for?
If you start to create a message but you're not ready to send it, you can close the message
and a dialog will appear which tells you that your message will be stored in the drafts
folder.
When you're ready to complete the message, you can click on the drafts folder, the message
will appear to the right and you can open it, complete it, and send it.
Okay so let me review all of the folders.
When you receive a message, it goes into the inbox.
If you start to reply to it but close the message before sending it, it goes into the
drafts folder.
But you can double click to reopen the message and when you complete the message and click
the send button, the message is temporarily stored in the outbox.
And when you click the send and receive button to connect to the internet, the message is
sent out of the outbox and a copy is saved in the sent items folder.
And when you delete the original message, it goes into the deleted items folder.
Perfect.
Now what about the messages in the inbox that you've already read?
Can you create folders to store these messages?
You can create new folders to keep all your messages organized.
I'll create a new folder called Winstruct to store any related messages I want to keep.
So I'll click on file in the menu bar, click on folder, and then click on new folder and
this brings up the create folder dialog box.
Here I can type in the name of my new folder, Winstruct, and then click on the folder where
I want the new folder to appear.
Since I want this to be on the top level, I'll select the Outlook Express folder at the top
and click OK.
Now you can see the Winstruct folder right here in the folders pane along with all of
the default folders.
So it works like the folders in the Windows Explorer.
Can you show us how to add subfolders under the Winstruct folder to further organize your
emails?
You bet.
Let me show you how to create a subfolder.
We get a lot of emails from our customers and we send a lot of internal emails about
creating new products.
To keep these messages organized, I'll add a folder called customers and another called
products under the Winstruct folder.
Let's go through the process to create these subfolders.
I'll click file, folders, new folder to open up the create new folder dialog box.
This time I'll type in customers as the new folder's name.
Now I want the new folder to be inside the Winstruct folder, so I'll highlight the Winstruct
folder and click OK.
Now when we look back in the folders pane, we see a little plus sign next to the Winstruct
folder.
This means that there's a subfolder inside.
When I click this little plus sign, you can see the customer's folder will appear as a
subfolder of Winstruct as we intended.
But let me show you an easier way to create a new folder.
If I right click on the Winstruct folder, I can choose new folder from the shortcut
menu, type products and click OK.
Now you can see we have the beginnings of an organized system of folders.
And let me guess, to move the emails into the folders you can click and drag.
Exactly.
I just click on the message I want to move, drag it over to the customer folder and release
the mouse to move it out of the inbox and into the customer folder.
In our Learn Windows 98 Getting Started video, we talked about automatically deleting unwanted
email.
Tom, does this have anything to do with the folders?
It does, because you can use a tool called the Inbox Assistant to automatically look
for certain types of messages and then automatically move them into any folder you want, including
the deleted mail folder.
Sounds like a powerful feature.
How about an example?
No problem.
I would bet that most of you get your share of unwanted junk email almost every day.
Sometimes you'll get a bunch of junk emails that come from the same address or with the
same subject.
For example, just this week I got a series of emails with the subject No Money Down.
The Inbox Assistant can direct Outlook Express to automatically put any email with that subject
directly into my deleted email folder.
Or on a more positive note, I subscribe to Microsoft's Sidewalk email that gives a list
of fun things to do in Boston each week.
Now it would be more convenient to have these emails automatically go into their own folder
so they don't clutter up my inbox and so I know where to find them when I want to use
them.
Now, I can create an activities folder and use the Inbox Assistant to automatically direct
the Sidewalk emails into their own folder.
That's a useful feature, but it sounds like it's hard to set up.
It's actually easier than you'd think to set this up.
Just click on the Tools menu and select Inbox Assistant.
From here, I'll click on Add to create a new rule and a dialog box with all kinds of options
comes up.
The top half of the dialog box says if a message arrives with the following criteria and then
it lists all the fields that you'll find in a message header like To, CC, From, and Subject.
In this case, I want to deal with the messages that include Sidewalk in the subject.
The bottom half of the dialog box says perform the following action.
Here, I can select to move to and then click the folder button and now I can create a new
folder and we'll call it Activities.
So now we've set up a rule that if a message arrives with the word Sidewalk in the subject,
the Inbox Assistant will move it into the Activities folder.
Can you set up a rule to do more than one thing?
You can.
For example, Raina might also want to get the Sidewalk email, so I can click on the
Forward To button and enter Raina's email address.
Now when I click OK, you can see that the rule says if subject contains Sidewalk, then
move to the Activities folder and forward to Raina's email address.
Okay so now let's set up a rule to get rid of junk emails.
Sometimes you get junk mail from the same address or with certain undesirable words
in the subject.
For example, let's say I didn't want to get those weekly Sidewalk emails from Tom.
I can create a rule so that if an email arrives from Tom and has Sidewalk in the subject,
then delete it.
So I'll click on the Address Book button and find Tom's email and I'll enter Sidewalk
in the subject and I'll select the Deleted Items folder on the bottom.
In other words, if you're getting email you don't want from a particular person or about
a subject you don't want, then you can set up a rule and have the emails deleted before
you even see them.
Now I noticed that you used Outlook's Address Book to enter Tom's email name.
Can you show us how to use it?
I'd be glad to.
The Address Book in Outlook Express makes it easy to keep track of the people you correspond
with.
To open the Address Book, click on the Address Book icon on the button bar.
The Address Book will open up and you can see that I already have some contacts listed.
If I want to get information about one of these contacts, I can click once on their
name and a window pops up with a quick view of their contact information.
But to get more detail, just double click on the entry and the full dialog opens with
fields where you can type in their home and business information.
You can also take notes on discussions or action items and you can store information
about NetMeeting and digital IDs which we'll tell you about in a few minutes.
Let me close this.
Now if I want to add another contact, I can click on the New Contact button in the button
bar and type in all the new contact information.
But if someone sent you an email, there's a quicker way to add their email name to your
contact list.
Just open the message, right click their email name in the From field and select Add to Address
Book from the shortcut menu.
But the easiest way to add contacts to your address book is to just do it automatically.
If you click on the Tools menu and choose Options, under the General tab, put a check
mark next to Automatically put people I replied to in my address book.
This way, every time we reply to an email message, Outlook Express will add any new
names to your address book.
So if Outlook Express automatically creates an entry for someone, how do you add the rest
of their contact information?
Just click the Address Book button like we did before.
Double click on the entry you want to edit and make whatever changes or additions you
need.
Okay, and what's the new Group button in the button bar?
Groups provide an easy way of sending one email message to a whole group of people.
For example, I like to send a weekly newsletter to my key business associates.
So I can create a new group called Weekly Update that includes all of their email names.
Then I can address the email to the weekly newsletter group and it will be sent out to
all of their email addresses.
This way, I don't have to type in all their email names every time and I don't have to
worry about forgetting somebody.
Let me show you how.
I'll click the Address Book icon and then click on the New Group icon.
Under Group Name, I'll type in Weekly Newsletter.
And I can click on Select Members and choose the people I want the mail to go to.
I could also add a new contact here if I want to add somebody to the group who's not in
my address book yet.
But for now, I'll click OK and I now have a new group email address.
Now when I compose the weekly report email, I can click the little address book icon in
the To field and select Weekly Newsletter to address the message.
Or if I just start typing Weekly Newsletter, Outlook will automatically complete the address.
Just a couple of clicks and you don't have to worry about forgetting anyone on your group
emails.
So if you grow your newsletter group to hundreds or even thousands of people, it will be a
snap to send it out.
Now if you start using email for important business, you'll probably start saving a lot
of your messages in your folders.
But just like any other files on your computer, it's possible that they can become corrupted.
Tom, how should we make sure we don't lose the email messages that we've saved in our
folders?
If you start saving lots of messages in your folders, the folders can get real big, real
fast.
So I'd recommend that you periodically delete any messages that you don't need.
But if your folders start taking up lots of the hard disk space, you can compress them
by clicking on a folder, then choosing File, Folder, and Compact All Folders.
But whenever you compress files, it's possible that the information can get corrupted.
So I'd recommend that you back up the folders before compressing them.
In fact, if you have important information in your email folders, it's a good idea to
back them up regularly in case you get a computer virus or in case your hard drive crashes.
Now to back up the folders, click on Start, Find, and in the Name field, type in asterisk
dot MBX, semicolon, space, star dot IDX, and click Find Now.
When the files come up, click the Name button, and you'll see that each of your folders has
a message file and an index file.
So to back up your folders, just save these files to another disk, like a zip disk or
a network drive.
Also, make sure you back up your address book, and to find that, type in star dot WAB, Windows
Address Book.
Again, once you've found it, you can save a copy on another disk.
Another great time saver, guys.
So at this point, we've gone over all the main features of Outlook Express.
To move on, what can you tell us about some of the really advanced features, like encrypting
email messages?
If you use email to send and receive sensitive information, you'll be glad to know that Outlook
Express includes some sophisticated encryption technology that will allow only the person
you're sending the email to, to read it.
Why don't you give us an example of how this works?
Sure.
Let's say Bill wants to email a private message to Monica, and he wants to make sure that
Ken can't intercept it and read it.
To do this, Monica first needs to send an email to Bill that includes something called
a public key.
When Bill sends a secret message back to Monica, he can encrypt it by including Monica's public
key with the message.
When Monica receives the message, she can decrypt it by matching her private key that
only she has with the public key.
Since Ken doesn't have Monica's private key, even if he were able to intercept the email,
he would not be able to read it.
Good example, Raina.
Hey.
Where do you get these public and private keys?
The first time you start Outlook Express, you'll find an email message in your inbox
called Security Features in Outlook Express, which explains the whole process.
Or if you've deleted this message, then go to Tools, Options, and click the Security
tab.
At the bottom, you can click the More Info button, and it will tell you how to set it
up.
Great.
Well, that gives us a pretty solid understanding of Outlook Express, so we can send out nicely
formatted messages.
We can organize our email in folders.
We can automatically sort our mail into these folders, and we can use encryption to make
sure nobody reads or changes any sensitive messages.
If you want to practice using Outlook Express, or if you want to set up your digital ID or
set up your inbox assistant, feel free to stop the video now.
But be sure to come back, because in our next module, we're going to show you two revolutionary
programs that are also included with Windows 98, Media Player and Net Meeting.
In the Internet Explorer section, we learned how to access information on the World Wide
Web.
In the Outlook Express section, we learned to communicate using email.
In this module, we're going to show you that the Internet can deliver a lot more dynamic
content than just web pages, and that communication can be much more than just text messages.
Two products bundled with Windows 98 make this possible, Media Player and Net Meeting.
Media Player and Net Meeting are two cutting-edge software products that really push the envelope
of what the Internet can do.
Media Player allows you to view video over the Internet.
In the past, if you wanted to watch a video over the Internet, you had to wait several
minutes for this huge video file to be downloaded to your hard drive before you could watch
it.
But with Media Player, it has a technology called Streaming Video, which means that you
can watch the video as it's downloading or streaming into your computer, and it doesn't
fill up your hard disk.
Net Meeting is an amazing tool that allows you to do all kinds of communications over
the Internet, like video conferencing, sending files, sharing a whiteboard, and you can even
take control of someone else's computer across the Internet.
Net Meeting has quite a list of features, and we'll show you how to use them in just
a minute.
But first, let's take a quick look at Media Player in action.
A website that has some interesting video and audio is www.businessvideo.msnbc.com.
But before we start playing the video and audio, can you tell us what kind of modem
we need to have to use Media Player?
If you're using Media Player for just audio alone, it will usually sound great, even if
you have a 288 modem.
Video can be a bit choppy if you have a slower modem, but if you have a high-speed connection,
it'll be pretty close to TV quality.
We're using a 56K modem, so let's see how it looks.
To view the video, just click on the hyperlink, and Media Player opens in a separate window.
It takes a few seconds to start playing, because Media Player has to download a few seconds
worth of the video into its memory.
Okay, now it's starting to play the video.
And in the background, the next few seconds of video is continuously downloading.
Given that you're using a 56K modem, that looks pretty good.
Now, what else can you do with Media Player?
Media Player is a simple program, because it works just like a VCR.
It has buttons to play, pause, or stop the video.
There are also skip and scan buttons that let you skip forward or backwards between
segments of the video.
But these don't always work, because the person who creates the video clip has to program
in the places where it skips to.
There are also buttons that let you fast forward or rewind.
There's a favorites list, so you can quickly access your favorite videos.
And there's a go command, which lists all the most recent videos that you've watched.
Well, if that's all there is to it, I think any of us who can use a VCR won't have much
problem playing videos over the Internet.
Now let's take a look at NetMeeting.
The most well-known function of NetMeeting is its voice and video conferencing.
If you have a business associate or a friend who has Internet access, all you need is a
microphone, speakers, and if you have a video camera, you can also send your image over
the Internet, and they'll see you as you're talking.
In addition, the whiteboard feature allows anyone who's connected to NetMeeting to draw
diagrams and type out words so the rest of the group can see it.
There's also chat, which is useful for people who don't have a microphone so that they can
converse by typing in text.
The file transfer feature lets you send out a file simultaneously to everyone else in
your NetMeeting.
And one of the most exciting features in NetMeeting is called share, which allows all meeting
participants to see and control a program like Excel or PageMaker that's running on
someone else's computer.
Well that does sound impressive.
Let's take a look.
Well, let's start by opening up NetMeeting.
The first time you run NetMeeting, it will start a wizard, which will take down all your
contact information and make sure that your microphone and speakers are working properly.
We've already configured NetMeeting, so it starts right up.
So let's take a look at the NetMeeting window.
On the left are the icons for the four different views you can have in the main window.
Directory, speed dial, current call, and history.
We'll discuss these in a moment.
Top above are the volume controls for the speakers and microphone, the button bar, and
the menus.
Looks great.
Now let's start a NetMeeting.
If you want to make a connection with somebody via NetMeeting, you need to connect to the
internet and then log into one of the Microsoft servers that list the users who are connected
to NetMeeting.
NetMeeting refers to these servers as Internet Listing Servers, or ILS.
If you look in the Directory window, you'll see a list of the ILS servers, and you need
to select the one from the list that the people who you want to conference with are also connected
to.
As you can see, there are a lot of people listed here who are connected from all over
the world.
And the column headings allow you to sort by their email name, whether or not they have
sound and video enabled, first name, last name, city, country, and comments.
Let's find Reyna.
So I'll sort by first name and scroll down the list.
Here she is.
So to connect with her, I can click on the listing and click call from the button bar.
Before I make the NetMeeting call, I'm going to create a shortcut to Reyna's listing since
I might want to communicate with her on a more regular basis.
So I'll right click on the listing and select add speed dial.
Now when I click the speed dial button, Reyna's listing is easy to find.
Or if you want to connect with somebody who you've called recently, you can click the
history button to find their name.
So let's connect to Reyna by selecting her listing and clicking the call button.
She does need to have NetMeeting running, and she has to be connected to the ILS server.
So it's a good idea to coordinate by email to plan the time of your NetMeeting so that
you can both be online for the call.
A call is coming into my NetMeeting, and in the current call window, I can see that it's
from Tom.
Since Tom has a video camera, I can see his image in the screen on the right, and we can
talk through our computer's microphones and speakers.
On the left is where the names of the meeting participants are listed.
The columns following the name column tell us which capabilities each participant has,
so we can see that Tom has video, audio, chat, and application sharing.
Hi Tom!
Hi Reyna, can you see and hear me?
Loud and clear, but now I'm going to end this meeting and host one of my own, so I'll click
and hang up.
And to start a meeting, I'll click on call in the menu and then select host meeting.
Once I'm set up as the host, other people will be able to join or leave the meeting
as they please.
Okay, so now that I'm hosting a meeting, you can see a listing which shows that my computer
has audio, video, and chat capability.
And you can see that I'm not sharing any applications yet.
Since I know that Reyna is hosting a NetMeeting, I'll open my copy of NetMeeting and search
the ILS server for her name.
Here it is, so I'll double click on it to join her meeting, and I'll click on the current
call icon to start communicating.
So now let's see NetMeeting's other capabilities in action.
Let's start with the chat function.
So I'll click chat on the button bar, and to start the chat, I'll type in, hello Reyna,
in the message area, and click on the send icon to post it.
And as you can see, Tom's message appears in my chat window as well with his name next
to it, so I know he just sent it.
I'll respond back.
Hi Tom.
That's pretty simple.
And pretty useful too, because sometimes the network runs slowly, and your audio and your
video don't run as quickly as you'd like.
When this happens, you can always communicate with real-time chat.
But our video and audio is working just fine, so I can talk to Reyna just like we're on
the phone.
So Reyna, what do you say we demonstrate the whiteboard?
Okay, let me open it up from the tools menu.
Since Tom and I are in a net meeting, when I open the whiteboard, it also opens up on
his computer.
The whiteboard looks and works a lot like the paint program that comes with Windows.
There's a text tool, a line tool, a circle tool, etc.
So I can quickly sketch out my ideas.
Whenever I put on my whiteboard, it also appears on Tom's whiteboard.
That's a beautiful piece of artwork.
Let's see if Tom has anything to add.
Notice how the picture changed automatically.
That's because Tom made some changes on his end.
We haven't exactly created a Picasso here, but there are a few tools in the whiteboard
that will help you share your graphical ideas more easily.
If you want to draw attention to a part of the drawing, you can use the highlighter tool,
and you can add text to the picture by clicking on the A, then clicking on the spot where
you want the text to appear, and then typing.
Or you can add this hand to point to something.
And if you don't want anyone else to change your masterpiece, click the lock contents
button.
I want to create a new page, so I'll click the insert new page button at the bottom right.
Now let's say I wanted Raina to comment on a new graphic I've been working on.
I'm going to click the select window button, and the message tells me that the next window
I click will appear on the whiteboard.
To get to the window you want, you need to use the alt tab key combination, because whatever
you click on next with the mouse will appear on the whiteboard.
Okay here's the window I want, so I'll click on it.
Now Raina and I can use the other tools in the whiteboard and annotate it.
And I could use the whiteboard to try and annotate the chart, but it would be a lot
easier if I could actually use Excel to make some changes.
NetMeeting has an amazing feature called Share.
If Tom shares his Excel spreadsheet and also clicks the collaborate button, then I'll be
able to control his spreadsheet from my computer.
Tom, can you share the spreadsheet?
Okay.
From the tools menu in NetMeeting, I'll select share application, and then select my Excel
file from the list.
Now Raina can actually see on her computer the files that I've shared on my computer.
Since I want Raina to make some changes, I'll also click on collaborate, which allows her
to actually use my computer over the internet.
Let me point out that it's pretty risky to use the collaborate feature, because the other
people in your NetMeeting will be able to use the file open feature on your computer
to access other files on your computer.
And if you're on a network, they could even access files on other computers in your company
across the network.
So make sure you're at your computer paying attention when you're using the collaborate
feature.
Now that Tom has shared the file and allowed me to collaborate, I can open his spreadsheet
on my computer and use it just like any other application.
The only difference is that Tom can see whatever I'm doing, and he can turn off the collaborate
feature at any time.
That's amazing.
You don't even have to have Excel on your computer to use it on someone else's computer.
Is there anything else that NetMeeting can do?
The last major feature of NetMeeting is the ability to send files to other people.
During a meeting, I can send copies of a file to one participant, or I can send them to
all the participants.
Let's say that I don't feel comfortable letting Raina access my computer.
Instead, I can send a copy of the file to her computer.
To do this, I'll open the Tools menu and select File Transfer, and then Send File.
From here, I'll find the spreadsheet file that I want to distribute, select it.
NetMeeting will now send the file to Raina, and if there were other participants, all
of them could receive a copy as well.
I'll even get a confirmation when the file is successfully delivered.
That's a lot better than sending files through email because you know they'll get there
right away.
Then you can use chat, or video conferencing, or just voice conferencing to discuss it.
If there are more visual ideas you need to share, you can use the whiteboard, or you
can even take control of programs and files on other people's computers.
I think the most amazing part about this is that you can have these types of Internet
meetings across the country or around the world without even paying any long-distance
phone bills.
It's amazing how much time and money that can save.
It's also amazing that the time has flown by, and we've completed our Learn Windows
98 Advanced Internet and Email video.
We've had a great time introducing you to this incredible software.
If you want to learn more about Winstruck's other training products, just connect to our
website at www.winstruck.com, or you can order products by calling 800-242-4842.
If you have any feedback, please send it to info at winstruck.com.
So, for Tom Jaffe, Reina Chudnovsky, and myself, Julie Lydon, I'd like to thank you for choosing
Winstruck, the software guys for your Windows training needs.