The file appearing on the desktop with the file name "~" is a backup of your Windows Address Book. This is the effect of an April 2003 patch for Outlook that contained a bug. Whenever you make a change in the address book, Windows makes a backup of the file and names it "~" and places in the location from which you turn on Outlook Express. You may want to take advantage of this bug by renaming it (right-click & rename) to Addresses.wab and copying it to a floppy as a backup. Future patches will take care of the bug.
While viewing an incoming message or one you are composing,
right-click the person's name and choose Add To Address Book.
In addition, instruct Outlook Express to automatically make Address Book
additions for the people you return messages to. In the Outlook Express main
screen, choose Tools, then Options, and under the General tab, place a check mark
next to Automatically Put People I Reply To In My Address Book.
In the Address Book, select the contact(s) you want to print. Tip: To highlight all the contacts, click the first contact. Then press and hold down Shift and click on the last contact. Hold down the Ctrl key to select just a few contacts. Click the Print button on the toolbar, and then in the Print Style area of the Print dialog box, select a printing style:
To print all address book information about the
contact(s), click Memo.
To print business-related information about the contact(s), click Business
Card.
To print a list of phone numbers for the selected contact(s), click Phone List.
File + Export + Address Book
Choose Text File (comma separated values). Click Export. Save Exported File As: a:\addresses.csv
Before you can back up your address book, you have to know its location. The default location for the file is C:\Windows\Application Data\Microsoft\Ad dress Book, but many people don't use the default installation folders. To locate your Address Book choose the Start Button, then Find, Files or Folders. Type in *.WAB and Find Now. If you have a floppy disk in you can right-click on it and choose Send To - 3 1/2 Floppy A or copy it to any location you choose.
You can import address book contacts from other Windows Address Book files (WAB), as well as from Netscape Communicator, Microsoft Exchange Personal Address Book, or any text (CSV) file.
For Windows Address Book On the File menu, point to Import, and then click Windows Address Book. Select the address book or file type you want to import, and then click Open.
For all other address book formats On the File menu, point to Import, and then click Other Address Book. Click the address book or file type you want to import, and then click Open.
On your Desktop or location of your choice, create a folder and
name it E-Mail Backup. Open Outlook Express. Choose Tools, then Options. On the
Maintenance tab, click Store Folder. Highlight the patch and copy it (CTRL
+ C). Cancel out and close Outlook Express. Click your Start button
and choose Run. Paste (Ctrl + V) OK. You will be taken to your mail.
Edit - Select All. Edit - Copy. Close and go back to the folder you made
and open it. Edit Paste (Ctrl + V).
To import your messages back into Outlook Express you many need to recreate the Identities for each user. Open Outlook Express. Choose File - Import - Messages. Outlook Express 5 or Outlook Express 6 and next. Import mail from OE5 store directory of import mail from OE6 store directory, OK. Browse to the Folder you made. OK. Next. All Folders, Next and Finish
Create Folders to store and catagorize your mail.
First, make sure your Folders list is displayed.
View + Layout ž Folders List, OK.
Click on Local Folders on your Folders List. Choose
File + Folder + New…
Now you can keep your Inbox free of clutter by clicking and dragging mail to the appropriate folder for future reference.
Backing Up A Folder (Inbox, Sent Items)
To back up the folder, find the folder file, and then copy it to a backup folder, floppy disk, or network drive. Outlook Express mail folders have a .dbx extension (for example, "Sent Items.dbx").
If Outlook Express won't open, it may be due to a corrupt Folders.dbx file. You can find (be sure to include hidden files in your search) and rename it Folders.old. Outlook Express will recreate the default folders. You will loose all your saved e-mail.
If your e-mail is too important to loose, download an inexpensive program from www.oehelp.com/DBXpress called DBXpress.
Not going to be checking your mail for some time? In Outlook Express, you can do this from Tools > Message Rules > Mail and clicking on the New Rule option. Select the ‘For all Messages’ options from the condition for your rule field and in the Action select Reply with a message. You will have to select a message that you have already created and saved.
When you create messages using HTML formatting, only mail programs that support HTML can read the formatting. If the recipient's mail program does not read HTML, the message is displayed as plain text with an HTML file attached. For this reason, plain text formatting (though less cool), is most desirable.
You can permanently change the settings (to send all your e-mail (or news) in HTML or Plain Text) by selecting Tools > Options from the menu, on the Send tab you can choose how you want to send your e-mail and news.
On the fly, Outlook Express lets you create and view e-mail in HTML instead of just in plain text. In the New Message window, select Rich Text (HTML) from the Format menu. A new toolbar appears that contains standard HTML formatting buttons for fonts, lists, bullets, lines, links and images. You can use these buttons to create slick HTML email that your recipients can view either in HTML-ready e-mail programs or in a Web browser.
File - Export - Messages - "Microsoft Windows Mail" - Next. Browse to the folder you wish to store the mail in. Next - All Folders - Next. Copy the folder to the other machine. Open your E-mail program and then just drag and drop the individual .eml files into the appropriate folder.
To change the Default Font used by Outlook Express (when sending HTML mail/news):
Send and Receive All Ctrl + MAddress Book Ctrl + Shift + B
New Message Ctrl + NReply to Sender Ctrl + R
Forward Ctrl + FGo to Inbox Ctrl + I
Send Message Alt + S or Ctrl + EnterDelete Message Ctrl + D
Print Ctrl + PCheck Spelling F7
Insert Signature Ctrl + Shift + S
Set Outlook Express to download mail at intervals you choose. Select the Tools menu and click Options. Under General select Check For New Messages Every X Minutes, where X is a number you fill in. A number greater than 10 is generally appreciated by the folks who run your mail server. Click the OK button to save your changes. You're all set. Just make sure you're connected to the Internet via a Dial-Up Networking connection, and the mail will roll in every X minutes.
If you want to change the sound which plays when new mail arrives, don't go looking in Outlook Express! You have to change a Windows sound event.
Start - Settings - Control Panel - Sounds
In the Events: window, scroll down to the entry New Mail Notification Now you can use the Browse button under the Sounds header to select a new sound Press Apply and OK
Edit - Preferences - E-Mail - Composing Options - Signatures - New
<html>
<body>
<p><font size="4">Your Name</font>
<font face="Arial" size="5">Your Company</font><p>
</body>
</html>
To change the Location of your data files used by Outlook Express, first move the files to the new location. Your old files can be found at \Windows \ Application Data \ Microsoft \ Outlook Express.
We strongly suggest that you Copy the files first, and after you are satisfied that OE is working correctly, and storing your files in the new location you can delete the old files.
You can change the text on the Title Bar from Outlook Express to a text of your choice: