A beginner’s guide to email

Webmail

What do you need?

A computer, or a smartphone An internet connection An account with an email service provider

What does it cost?

Nothing for the email service Just the cost of your internet connection

Benefits?

Fast communication with other email users Needed for using many web services Can send files as attachments

Drawbacks

Not secure Risk of malware Junk mail (spam)

How it works

Main functions

Compose new message Send message Receive message Reply Forward Attachments Address/contacts list

The email address

Setting up an account

Go to www.yahoo.co.uk, or www.google.co.uk, or www.hotmail.co.uk, and click on the sign up link

Fill in the form

Make a record of your user name and password!

Logging in

Go to the sign in page, and enter your user name and password

Checking mail

If the Inbox link has a number beside it, you have that number of messages waiting to be read