E-Mail Address

E-MAIL ADDRESS

E-mail stands for ‘Electronic Mail’. It is a paperless method of sending messages, notes, pictures and even sound files from one place to another using the Internet as a medium. It is an individual name, which is used to send and receive E-mail on the Internet. It is used to specify the source or destination of an E-mail message.

The format of an E-mail address is user@domain. Where,

·         the first part (user) identifies a unique user name.

·         “@” separates the user from the domain, which identifies the mail server.

The E-mail is transmitted between computer systems, which exchange messages or pass them onto other sites according to certain Internet protocols or rules for exchanging E-mail. You can send E-mail from your computer at any time to any address around the world and your electronic letter or E-mail will arrive at its destination in seconds after you send it, even if the receiver is not online.

For sending and receiving an E-mail, you must have an E-mail account, which is either a Web based online E-mail account or an E-mail account on your ISP server.
Web based online E-mail account can be created through many sites like Gmail, Yahoo mail, Rediffmail etc.

Elements of E-mail Account
Some important elements or folders that are used to organise your E-mail messages are as follows:
Inbox         It contains all incoming messages.
Outbox      The message is stored in the outbox until, it is successfully sent to the recipient.
Sent mail   It contains all sent messages.
Draft          It contains the draft messages, which are ready to be sent.
Trash         It contains deleted messages.
Spam         It contains junk E-mails.

Formats of an E-mail Message
There are two formats of an E-mail message, which are as follows:

1.    Plain text (txt) E-mail It can be read by anyone type of E-mail application. It does not support text formatting options Such as bold, italic, colored fonts etc. It can have attached pictures or graphics, but they can not be inserted.

2.    Rich text (rtf) E-mail It cannot be read by any type of E-mail application. It supports text formatting options such as bold, italic, colored fonts etc. Pictures or graphics can be inserted.

Structure of an E-mail Message

The general structure of an E-mail message has the following components:

Components	Description
To	This field contains the E-mail address of recipient.
Cc	Cc stands for Carbon copy. This contains the address of recipients to whom you want to send a copy of an E-mail message.                          .
Bcc	Bcc stands for Blind carbon copy. This field also contains the list of recipients. Bcc recipients can see the To and Cc addresses but Bcc recipients name is not visible to others.
Subject	This field contains the title of a message.
Body	It includes text of an E-mail message.
Attachments	You can attach any document with E-mail message.
Formatting	Using the formatting tab, you can edit the message.
Other options	Other options like emoticons, bold, italic, hyperlinks etc, are used to make message more interactive.
Send button	You have to click the send button to send the mail.

An example of the structure of an E-mail is given below:

Emoticons

Emoticons or smileys are elements that help you to express your emotions or feelings in your E-mails and text messages. They provide a direct and funny way to express yourself in addition to the words in your messages. 
Acronyms

Apart from emoticons and symbols, you can also use acronyms and abbreviations for most frequently used words. Some of the most widely used acronyms are as follows:

Acronym	Meaning
AAMOF	as a matter of fact
BBL	be back later
BRB	be right back
BTW	by the way
CU	see you
CUL	see you later
FAQ	frequently asked questions
FTF	face-to-face
FYI	for your information
L8R	later
WB	welcome back
W8	wait