Compose: sending mail

The Compose screen is where you write and send messages. The Compose screen in divided into two sections:

Writing messages

  1. On the menu bar, click Compose.
  2. In the header section, enter the addressing information. By default, the header displays the To, Cc, and Subject fields. For information on displaying more header fields, see Headers.
  3. In the message section, enter your message text. At the top of the message section, a formatting toolbar allows you to apply rich-text formatting to message text. You can also insert links and graphics using the formatting toolbar.
  4. If desired, you can mark your message with a priority level. On the menu bar, point to Priority, and then click the level that you want for this message.


Including attachments

  1. On the menu bar, click Attach.
  2. Enter the path and file name for the file that you want to attach, or click Browse to browse for the file and select it.
  3. If desired, enter a description in the Description field.
  4. Click Attach file.


Sending, canceling, and saving drafts

To send mail

You can control whether all send messages are automatically saved to your Sent folder. For more information, see Settings.

You can also control whether all sent email addresses are saved as contacts. For more information, see Settings.

To cancel an editing session

  1. On the menu bar, click Cancel, or click any item in the left pane, such as your Inbox.
  2. Click Discard to confirm. The Compose screen closes and your Inbox appears.

To save a draft of a message

Note:

If you open a previously saved draft, make more changes, and then cancel the editing session and discard changes, the entire draft is deleted, not just the most recent changes.


Headers

The header section is where you enter addressing information. By default, the header displays the To, Cc, and Subject fields.

To display all headers

To display only the default headers

Header fields

The following header fields are available:

Automatic saves

Alpine saves a draft every 5 minutes, overwriting the draft each time, so that only the most recent saved version is preserved.

Displaying the Compose window in a new browser window

You can display the Compose window in a new browser window, so that you can see the message that you are writing and another Alpine screen, such as your Inbox, at the same time.

To display the Compose window in a new browser window

Selecting a compose encoding

You can select an encoding for outgoing messages. For more information, see Settings.