GMAIL TIP SHEET. A Note About Space. A Note About Spam. Signing Up for Gmail

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1 GMAIL TIP SHEET provides individuals with a quick and easy way to correspond with anyone possessing a computer and a connection to the Internet. Not only does provide users with a convenient means for communicating via the World Wide Web, programs also allow you to send digital photographs and other documents (like digital photographs, sound files, or a document created using Microsoft Word) as attachments. And this all occurs almost instantaneously, so there is no waiting for the postal service to transport your correspondence. This tip sheet discusses the Gmail program, which is available for free. Gmail takes an approach to that varies in two major respects from other popular programs. First, it groups conversations together instead of listing each individual in a back and forth exchange separately. Second, it allows you to organize your mail using labels, whereas most programs use folders. The advantage is that you can attach multiple labels to an instead of having to choose a single folder. A Note About Space Think about a written letter. It might be half a page long. It might be 20 pages long. One page requires a single sheet of paper; the other will require 10 or more (depending on whether or not you write on both sides). These same two letters composed as s also require space, but, instead of paper, s require disk space, which is measured in bytes. The longer your , the more disk space you will need to save that message. As such, disk space is an important consideration. Gmail provides users with over 7.5 GB of space. Given that most messages take up little more than a few dozen kilobytes, space should not be an issue unless you re archiving lots of messages containing attachments. The chart to the right shows how disk space is measured. A Note About Spam Measuring Space in the Computer World Smallest unit = 1 byte 1000 bytes = 1 kilobyte (KB) 1000 KB = 1 megabyte (MB) 1000 MB = 1 gigabyte (GB) The term spam refers to unwanted, unsolicited (i.e. junk mail). If you only give out your address to friends and family, you will probably never receive spam. If you use your to purchase items online or to register for promotions or online services, you may end up receiving spam as some companies/organizations will sell addresses to other companies and organizations. If you plan to do a lot of shopping online, it is suggested that you create a separate account for shopping and only use your primary account for corresponding with friends and family. Signing Up for Gmail 1. Go to and click the Gmail button that appears in the black bar that runs along the top of the screen 2. Find the red button near the top right corner of the screen that reads Create an Account and click it 3. You will now be asked to provide Google with some personal information: The name you enter will display when you send a message to someone, so if you want your friends to know a message is from you, you should enter your actual first and last name Your desired login name (or username) must be unique; no other Gmail user can have the same username as you (Note: your username is the first part of your address, e.g. username@gmail.com) Your password does not need to be unique, but it should be difficult for others to guess o Good passwords include a mix of letters and numbers; better still, they include some uppercase and some lowercase letters 2011 Monroe County Public Library For Training Purposes Only Not For Sale or Distribution Outside of MCPL Page 1

2 You must choose a security question; if you ever forget your password, you will be able to reset it by answering the security question you choose The Recovery field does not need to be filled in; however, it provides an alternative to answering the security question if you ever forget your password Make sure you enter the birthday as shown in the example, i.e. separate month, day, and year with backslashes, e.g. MM/DD/YYYY Fill in the word verification request (this is how Google determines that you are a human, and not a computer program, that s trying to set up an account) Click the I accept. Create my account button at the bottom of the page Additionally, you may be prompted to enter a cell phone number and to choose whether you want to receive a voice call or a text with a final numeric verification code; if so, follow the directions on the screen 4. Once you ve worked through the above steps, you will be re directed to you Gmail account; you will see three messages in your Inbox Signing In 1. Once you have an account, you can access your account by either clicking the Gmail button that appears in the black bar that runs along the top of the Google homepage, or by going to 2. Enter your username and password in the appropriate fields 3. Click the Sign in button, or press the ENTER key on your keyboard Your Inbox After you sign in to Gmail, the first screen you will see is your Inbox. This is where any messages you have received will be displayed. Worth noting are the small box and star to the left of all of the messages/conversations in your Inbox. The checkbox is used to select a message (or messages) so that another task can be performed like, deleting messages, archiving messages, labeling messages, and more. For example, if you want to delete a message from your Inbox, check the box to the left of the message, then click the Delete button above the list of messages. The small star to the left of a message provides you with an easy way of identifying a message as important and/or in need of follow up. Note also that in the list of options along the left side of the screen, there is an option that reads Starred. If you click that, you will only display the messages that you ve starred. To return to a listing of all the messages in your Inbox, click the Inbox option in that list. Sending an There are two main reasons for using 1) to send messages, and 2) to reply to messages. Let s start with sending messages. Just below the Gmail logo in the top left corner of the screen is the Compose Mail button: 1. Click the Compose Mail button You will now be looking at the compose message screen. Note that there are three boxes: the To: box, the Subject: box, and a large box that takes up most of the screen (let s call this the Body box). 2. Type the address of your recipient in the To: box 2011 Monroe County Public Library For Training Purposes Only Not For Sale or Distribution Outside of MCPL Page 2

3 If this is the first time you are sending the recipient an message, you will need to type in the recipient s entire address (e.g. recipient@gmail.com) If you have ed the recipient in the past, you can simply type in the first few letters of the recipient s first or last name, or the recipient s address (this will prompt Gmail to search your account s built in address book for matching names/addresses and to suggest recipient addresses); click on the appropriate suggestion to have Gmail fill in the rest of recipient s address in the To box 3. Enter a short statement in the Subject box that indicates the topic/purpose of your message 4. Compose your message in the large Body box 5. Click the Send button (Note: there are two Send buttons on the screen; one just above the To box, and one just below the Body box). If you decide after composing your message that you don t actually want to send it, you can either click the Save Now button to save a draft version of your , or you can click the Discard button to get rid of the message. You should be re directed back to your Inbox. If you aren t, click Inbox from among the list of options along the left side of the screen. Reading Messages from Others Sometimes we re not the ones who initiate an conversation; sometimes an acquaintance, colleague, or family member contacts us. When this happens, a new message will appear in your Inbox. When looking at messages in your Inbox, click on the name of the sender or the subject of the message to open the message. Once the message is open, read through it. You now have six options: 1. You can log out of your account; if you do this, the message will remain in your Inbox 2. You can return to your Inbox by clicking the Inbox option along the left side of the screen; if you do this, the message will remain in your Inbox 3. You can archive the message by clicking the Archive button, which is displayed among a horizontal row of buttons near the top of the screen; this will remove the message from your Inbox, but it will not delete it 4. You can delete the message by clicking the Delete button, which is displayed among a horizontal row of buttons near the top of the screen; this will move the message to your Trash Can, where it will be deleted permanently after thirty days 5. You can forward the message on to another person by clicking the small downward pointing arrow next to the Reply button near the top right corner of the box displaying the message you re reading, and choosing the Forward option, or by clicking the Forward link that appears below the message you re reading; you will then have to enter the address of the person to whom you want to forward the message, and click Send 6. You can reply to the message by clicking the Reply button near the top right corner of the box displaying the message you re reading, or by clicking the Reply link that appears below the message you re reading Replying to an If you choose to reply to a message, start by clicking the Reply button near the top right corner of the box displaying the message you re reading, or by clicking the Reply link that appears below the message you re reading. This will take you to 2011 Monroe County Public Library For Training Purposes Only Not For Sale or Distribution Outside of MCPL Page 3

4 a screen that looks similar to the compose screen; however, you will not see a field for entering a subject. All you need to do at this point is type your reply and click the Send button. Conversations Unlike most software, Gmail stores a back and forth exchange as a single conversation rather than a series of individual s. The thinking behind this feature is that your Inbox won t fill up with separate s related to the same topic but rather such s will instead, as mentioned, be grouped together. Note that once you reply to a message and return to your Inbox, a number appears in parentheses next to the message. This number indicates the number of messages in the ongoing conversation. When you read view a conversation that has multiple parts, you will notice that Google collapses the conversation so that only unread portions of the conversation are displayed. However, if you want to display all of the messages in an ongoing conversation, you can click the Expand all button near the top of the message. If the conversation has been expanded, this button will become a Collapse all button. If you would prefer to display every message in your Inbox and not have them grouped into conversations, click the Options button in the top right corner of the page, and choose Mail settings. Under the General tab, select Conversation view off, then scroll to the bottom of the page and save your settings. Attaching a File to an allows you to do more than simply send messages; you can also send files like digital photos, documents, and music files. If you need to include a file with your , click the Compose button and write your as you normally would. When you re ready to attach the file, look for the Attach a file link just below the Subject box. Click the link, browse to the file on your computer, then double click the file to attach it to the . It may take a few seconds to upload. Once the upload process is complete, the file will be attached and listed just below the Subject box. Note: to the right of the attachment is a checkbox with a checkmark in it. If you decide you don t want to include the attachment, simply uncheck the box. You cannot upload attachments larger than 25 MB in Gmail. If you have a file to send that is larger than 25 MB, you will need to find another way to send that file. Viewing/Downloading a File from an You ve Received If you receive an that contains a file attachment, you will first want to verify that you know and trust the sender. If you do not, you should not open or download the attachment; it might contain a virus. If, however, you know and trust the sender, you will probably want to do one of two things: open the file to view it, or download and save the file to your computer. When you receive an containing an attachment, the attached file(s) will be listed below the text of the message. Below the name of the file you will see a number indicating the size of the file, a link labeled View, and a link labeled Download. If you click View, Google will open the document in a new browser tab (Note: that documents created using Microsoft Office products like Word, Excel, and PowerPoint will be displayed using the corresponding Google program, i.e. Google Docs, Google Spreadsheet, Google Presentation, 2011 Monroe County Public Library For Training Purposes Only Not For Sale or Distribution Outside of MCPL Page 4

5 etc.). If you click Download, you will be prompted to choose where you want to save the file on your computer. Once you have designated where you want to save the file (and potentially renamed the file), click the Save button. You can now use Windows Explorer to navigate to the file on your computer and open it. Applying Labels Labels are the Gmail equivalent of folders, which are the primary means of organizing messages in other programs. The nice thing about labels is that you can apply multiple labels to a single message/conversation. When you first create your Gmail account, four labels are set up for you. If you prefer, you can delete these labels and create labels of your own. To label a message follow these steps: 1. Check the box next to the conversation(s) you want to label, or open the message/conversation 2. Click the Labels button along the top edge of the list of your messages/conversations 3. Choose a label from among those listed, or click the Create new option to create a new label If you want to delete/manage your labels, click the Labels button along the top edge of your messages, then choose the Manage labels option. You will now be looking at the settings page that lets you manage both system labels and the labels you ve created. Find the label you want to manage/delete in that list and choose the appropriate option. Note that when you look at your Inbox, your labels (or some of them, depending on your settings) are displayed in the list of locations along the left side of the screen. If you click on one of your labels, you will display every message/conversation that has been labeled as such. Archiving Messages Some folks like to delete messages/conversations from their Inbox on a regular basis, but there are times when you may want to remove a message from your Inbox without deleting it. That s where archiving comes in. When you archive a message/conversation, you remove it from the Inbox and put it in a folder that Gmail calls All Mail. By default, the All Mail folder is not displayed (unlike, for example, the Sent Mail folder, which is displayed in the list of options along the left side of the page). To access the All Mail folder (and all of the messages you ve archived), click the 6 more (it may be a different number) link at the bottom of the list of locations along the left side of the screen. You should now see the All Mail folder; click it to display every message in your account (except Sent Mail). You can make the All Mail folder display by default by changing your Label settings. To do so, click the Labels button along the top edge of your messages, then choose the Manage labels option. You will now be looking at the settings page that lets you manage both system labels and the labels you ve created. The All Mail label is a system label. To make it visible by default, simply change it from hide to show. Searching for Messages The easiest way to find a message from among those saved in all locations in your Gmail account is to use the Search Mail feature. Near the top of the Gmail screen is a search box. Simply type in a contact s name, a contact s address, or a keyword, and click the Search Mail button. Gmail will then display all messages in your account that meet the search criteria Monroe County Public Library For Training Purposes Only Not For Sale or Distribution Outside of MCPL Page 5

6 Populating Your Address Book Gmail will automatically save the address of anyone you in your Contacts folder (some folks refer to this feature as an address book ). You can also manually add individuals to your Contacts. 1. Click the Contacts link just below the Gmail logo 2. Click the New Contact button along the left side of the screen 3. Add as much information for that contact as you would like (you should at least type in the name and address) 4. Click the Save button If you have recently switched from another provider to Gmail, you can import contacts into your Gmail account from that older account. To do so, click the More button along the top of the list of Contacts, then choose Import. Next, click the Learn more link in the pop up window, and follow the instructions to import your contacts into Gmail. Settings Click the Settings button in the top right corner of the screen (it looks like a small gear) to customize your Gmail experience. Options include the ability to set up an on vacation response, mail forwarding, creating a signature file, apply filters to weed out junk mail, creating tasks and reminders, and more. Other Features There are a number of Gmail features that are not discussed on this tip sheet. To learn more about a specific feature, click the Settings button in the top right corner of the screen (it looks like a small gear), then choose Mail help. You can then search the Gmail help pages for the answer to your question Monroe County Public Library For Training Purposes Only Not For Sale or Distribution Outside of MCPL Page 6