Thread: Alternative Email Providers Not the myopic or the one that ogles

Originally Posted by Tins

Mail?

Hello Tins,

Yes, snail mail. I was going to suggest homing pigeons. However, my flock of them have long since flown the coop.

Kind regards
Lionel

Originally Posted by Lionelgee

.....

Now, wait for it ... being able to press 'Send' and the email gets sent on its way through the ether and magically arrives at someone else's, or perhaps even my own email address.

....

Kind regards
Lionel

Yep, sounds to me like Discogazza got it right too(and what I thought you were asking about)

From one luddite to another (semi) luddite ...

Email provider = the actual email company entity you choose to make your email address.
ie. lionel at gmail dot com, or lionel at email provider dot com ... etc.

The 'at blahblah dot com' section of the email address you use is the provider.

eg. lets assume you are with telstra for your internet connectivity. Telstra provides you with a set number of email addresses for that internet service.

Not all internet providers do so tho. I used to be with optus, but recently changed to TPG.
Optus used to allocate me 5 email addresses when with them. All gone now as I've rid myself of them.

TPG on the other hand, don't provide email addresses for me to use.
I have gmail, hotmail and others. My partner still uses yahoo!(wow! I thought they shut up shop 20 years ago ..

The point above is that email provider is the company used for the email address. Many free ones out there.

Email client is the software interface that gives you easy(debatable) access to your email addresses.

In Windows world, the two most commonly used email clients used in the world are Outlook and Thunderbird. You don't actually need an email client for most if not all email addresses.
As already said elsewhere in the thread, you can just use a web interface.

I've personally used Thunderbird pretty much forever. I hate Outlook.

so for my hotmail address, I usually access via Thunderbird, but dont' need it. I can access it via a web browser.
Major difference with using a client and web based is that you kind of can't really archive all that much on the web so easily(you can but not as easily as you can with an email client).

So if you need archival ease then the client based method is better. I have emails archived for many years, and they take up about 2.5Gb of disk space.

One thing to note about switching from one email client to another is the ease and surety of switching from one to another is not guaranteed.

eg. converting my years of thunderbird emails collected to work 'properly' in outlook is hit and miss.
Generally going from archived Outlook emails to thunderbird has been more hit than miss.
In effect, once you decide on one system, it's best to stick with it.

Originally Posted by AK83

Yep, sounds to me like Discogazza got it right too(and what I thought you were asking about)

From one luddite to another (semi) luddite ...

Email provider = the actual email company entity you choose to make your email address.
ie. lionel at gmail dot com, or lionel at email provider dot com ... etc.

The 'at blahblah dot com' section of the email address you use is the provider.

eg. lets assume you are with telstra for your internet connectivity. Telstra provides you with a set number of email addresses for that internet service.

Not all internet providers do so tho. I used to be with optus, but recently changed to TPG.
Optus used to allocate me 5 email addresses when with them. All gone now as I've rid myself of them.

TPG on the other hand, don't provide email addresses for me to use.
I have gmail, hotmail and others. My partner still uses yahoo!(wow! I thought they shut up shop 20 years ago ..

The point above is that email provider is the company used for the email address. Many free ones out there.

Email client is the software interface that gives you easy(debatable) access to your email addresses.

In Windows world, the two most commonly used email clients used in the world are Outlook and Thunderbird. You don't actually need an email client for most if not all email addresses.
As already said elsewhere in the thread, you can just use a web interface.

I've personally used Thunderbird pretty much forever. I hate Outlook.

so for my hotmail address, I usually access via Thunderbird, but dont' need it. I can access it via a web browser.
Major difference with using a client and web based is that you kind of can't really archive all that much on the web so easily(you can but not as easily as you can with an email client).

So if you need archival ease then the client based method is better. I have emails archived for many years, and they take up about 2.5Gb of disk space.

One thing to note about switching from one email client to another is the ease and surety of switching from one to another is not guaranteed.

eg. converting my years of thunderbird emails collected to work 'properly' in outlook is hit and miss.
Generally going from archived Outlook emails to thunderbird has been more hit than miss.
In effect, once you decide on one system, it's best to stick with it.

Hello Discogazza,

Thank you for your detailed replies.

My email address looks like this ... Lionelxxx@hotmail.com Since it was taken over I access my @hotmail.com emails via doubtlook. Well okay, Microsoft Outlook. I did try the very good instructions given by and I selected 'repair'. Unfortunately it did not repair. I even tried going through the 'shell' option and typed in the good old DOS prompt that an IT post suggested. Still no go.

Back in the olden days, I would have just gone to the software CD and run a new installation of Outlook. But of course that was when you only paid once for a bit of software and could opt to buy software on CDs or USBs.

I am visiting one of my sons in a couple of weeks. They live interstate and they studied IT and Computers for their degree. Plus they have remained working in that field. I reckon it is time for my laptop to have a bit of a tune and a tweak.

Kind regards
Lionel

Originally Posted by Tombie

Thunderbird is a mail reader, not a mail server.

He will still need a server.


Lionel, why not just purchased your own domain. (Tax claim for work) and run your own?

Hello Tombie,

I have one. Due to my technological illiteracy I do not know how to link to it? I also have a Squarespace webpage that I am working on. Also a Hostinger thingo. Ergo, the opportunity for my very own email identity without @hotmail.

In the meantime I have learnt that just because I am on the Autism spectrum does not mean I am good with computers and their arcane arts. Also, that attempting to watch YouTube clips about what to do in Squarespace and then carrying out the task immediately afterwards just does not work. My hardcopy ... you know 'book' .. hold it in your hands and read it version of Squarespace for Dummies has arrived in the post.

Now, my level of ignorance in asking the next question might send some people over the edge... So brace yourselves. Even if I did set up the Hostinger thingo could I use it to access my Lionelxxxx @hotmail.com email through it? You know open my hotmail messages, copy and paste using a mouse, attached documents to emails and actually send them to people.

My main concern is that I can read my emails and people can send me emails - I just cannot Send emails or while sending them put attachments to them.

I have a Gmail account so I can communicate with the outside world via email. I can even cut, copy and paste using mouse strokes and I can attach files and Send emails. So all is not lost.

I just dislike Google from their early days where their algorithm collected data and used that for their and other people's marketing. You know I think it is called data protection - or lack thereof. Google's search engine is like a sawn-off shotgun and just finds so much useless crap. So I do not use it. My most frequently used Google product is Maps. Of course my Android phone is Google rich - which is pretty much unavoidable - despite the phone being a Samsung.

I have worked with organisations and sectors that were Apple specific and I just found all the hype about 'user-friendliness' was good marketing. The reality proved otherwise. So - going away from Microsoft to Apple is not an option. My work phone is an Iphone and it not my favourite bit of tech.

What happened to just good old hammers where every thing got fixed by just a couple of whacks.

Kind regards
Lionel

Originally Posted by disco gazza

Sorry Lionel, I misread the question you asked.

DG

Hello Disco Gazza,

No worries - I don't really know the correct words to utilise to explain the situation of what is happening with 'New' emails not being able activate different aspects of their functionality.

The New emails just do not work and online suggestions from other forums that other people have used to solve their problems do not seem capable of solving mine. The type of internet search where I copied error message and dumped it into a search engine along with the identification of Microsoft Outlook 2024.

Being a semi-Luddite I just know that a software program is designed to work. Therefore, it should work. If it does not work then a FB Hammer is reached for. 'Simples'

Kind regards
Lionel

OK, hotmail is good(to know, not hotmail itself is good!)

So go to live.com login page and try to log in from there.

Now that we know, your email provider is hotmail or microsoft.
And for further word correctness, your email client is outlook.

I'm pretty sure then what's happened is same as myself.
Outlook itself is probably working no worries. Repairing it was a wasted effort. I don't think Outlook is the problem.
But you need to confirm this first by logging in to live.com with your browser. you just need your email address and your password.
Assuming that you have gone to live log in, and into your email account you should by default see your email page.
Over on the far left column you should see the envelope symbol for email, and a calendar under that, etc. if not already, highlight the envelope.

outlook online.jpg

if you end up logging in to your hotmail account, then look for the gear wheel up near the top right corner(one red arrow).
Hit that and then a new box will pop up.
You want to look for the sync email section, and click that(other red arrow).
What happened to mine randomly and for no known reason after working fine for many years, MS changed this setting and it was NOT activated suddenly one day. I can't remember when, but it was a while back and I had no access to hotmail via Thunderbird(or in your case Outlook).
Even tho I used the IMAP setting, doesn't really matter if you use IMAP or POP, this setting allows the PC based software to access the hotmail account from the net.
So make sure that the area here is set to the blue colour to allow devices and apps to use POP if it isn't already set.

Remember outlook and thunderbird are the email clients. Calendar clients, contacts clients, email software .. whatever you want to call them, they do same/similar stuff.
By logging into hotmail via your browser, doesn't matter if it's Edge or Firefox or Chrome ... in that instance you are checking email via webmail.

If this setting was already set to on(blue), then I got no idea whats gone wrong with your outlook software. Could be a connectivity issue.
Do you have any other email addresses that you do/don't use?

eg. as said before, if you have an internet connection then high chance that you have a email address or two provided by one of the internet providers. But they don't all do this(like TPG). Telstra and Optus does tho.
Outlook can access these emails too.

hope that helps.

Originally Posted by AK83

Even tho I used the IMAP setting, doesn't really matter if you use IMAP or POP,

I appreciate you are working within contextual parameters here, but, just for clarity, oh yes it does. As I'm sure you know, but perhaps Lionel doesn't, the principal difference is that POP downloads the email to ONE device and deletes it from the server, so if the device goes down or is lost, so is the email. IMAP downloads to any device that legitimately requests it and leaves it on the server, so it is available across devices, and indeed platforms, until deleted by the recipient. The big mobs such as GMail and iCloud are obviously IMAP, and so would be lionel123@hisowndomain.com. ISPs typically provide POP, if they provide anything at all. POP is destined for the rubbish bin of history. Hopefully.

Like I said, I'm sure you know all that.

Originally Posted by Tins

I appreciate you are working within contextual parameters here, but, just for clarity, oh yes it does. As I'm sure you know, but perhaps Lionel doesn't, the principal difference is that POP downloads the email to ONE device and deletes it from the server, so if the device goes down or is lost, so is the email. IMAP downloads to any device that legitimately requests it and leaves it on the server, so it is available across devices, and indeed platforms, until deleted by the recipient. The big mobs such as GMail and iCloud are obviously IMAP, and so would be lionel123@hisowndomain.com. ISPs typically provide POP, if they provide anything at all. POP is destined for the rubbish bin of history. Hopefully.

Like I said, I'm sure you know all that.

Hello Tins & AK83,

While I greatly appreciate both your insight and suggestions I have to wonder something. Are youse guys even writing English? POP is the sound that happens when corks get taken out of bottles. IMAP is that Apple's version of mapping? Internet Service Provider (ISP) I know that one.

Off I go to the internet to do some searching in the attempt to make up the obvious short fall I have in what should be a basic knowledge base about IT. My children would be so proud of my levels of computer ignorance and they would be cringing if they read this.

I will follow the advice given after I print it out and can hold it in my hand, while I tap at keys as per the directions. Thank you for your collective patience.

This is a classic case of what Latour describes as blackboxing. Bruno Latour* defines blackboxing as the way scientific and technical work is made invisible by its own success. When a machine runs efficiently, when a matter of fact is settled, one need focus only on its inputs and outputs and not on its internal complexity. Thus, paradoxically, the more science and technology succeed, the more opaque and obscure they become. *Bruno Latour (1999). Pandora's hope: essays on the reality of science studies. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p. 304.


Kind regards
Lionel