Tag: Mail

Using Mail, Address Book and iCal with Exchange 2007 and Active Directory

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Once I had setup the OS X 10.6 VPN and had a working connection to my employers' network I wanted to use the native OS X 10.6 applications to access my email and calendar. I have a copy of Microsoft Office for Mac 2008 which includes Entourage. Entourage is Microsoft attempt at providing an Outlook type experience on the Mac. While it works it does not work well (the software is as slow as molasses) and the user experience is not up to par with what a Mac user might expect. I only had one copy of Office 2008 for Mac and I wanted to be able to check my corporate email from any Mac on which I had an account.

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Apple promised that Snow Leopard had native support to Exchange mail and calendar and I wanted to test their claims. Setup was much easier than I thought but you'll need to know the address of your Exchange server. You can get that from your Exchange server administrator. After connecting to the VPN, launch Mail and selected Mail->Preferences->Accounts. Click the + to create a new account and enter the email address and password for the account. Mail will attempt to scan for the mail server. If it does not find it, no problem - just select Exchange 2007 from the menu and enter the relevant information. At this point, I also selected the check boxes to set up iCal and Address Book. These can be done later but doing it now made things easy. Once this is done you should have an entry that looks like this.

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You do not have to use Mail to initiate the setup. You can also use any of the other apps, iCal or Address Book. I did encounter one issue that I have no been able to resolve. iCal is not able to connect to the Exchange server at all. I've Googled around and hung around Apple forums since Snow Leopard debuted looking for a solution to no avail.

How to setup OS X's Mail.app to use Gmail

In a previous post I mentioned that I had already configured my Mac to use some of Google's free services and how I felt that this was a cheap way to get some of the same features offered in MobileMe. Namely, I configured Mail.app for use with Gmail, synced my Address Book to my Gmail Contacts, and connected iCal to my Google Calendar. In this post, I explain how to setup Leopard Mail.app for reading Gmail.

IMAP vs POP3

Google provides three ways to access Gmail, their free email service; via the browser, POP3, or IMAP. The Post Office Protocol version 3 (POP3) is a standard protocol used by local e-mail clients to retrieve e-mail from a remote server and download it to the client. IMAP is also a standard protocol for accessing email but unlike POP3 the email stays on the remote server. With POP3 you are limited to reading your email from one location. With IMAP the email stays on the server and you can read it from any computer. IMAP is the method I use to access my Gmail in Mail.app. If I read an email in a web browser then it is marked as read on the server and in Mail.app.

Configuration

Picture 2.pngConfiguring Mail.app to use Gmail is relatively easy. Google has provided excellent instructions on their Gmail Help web site. I have provided my own version here. I think screen shots help in understanding. Launch Mail.app and click Mail->Preferences from the menu bar. Click on the Accounts tab and then click the "+" symbol on the lower left to start the account creation wizard.

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Enter your name, your Gmail address and password. Be sure to deselect the "Automatically set up account" check box. This check box is enabled by default and automatically creates an entry for POP3 access. We want to setup for IMAP. Now click continue.

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Click the Account Type drop down and select IMAP. Be sure to change the Incoming Mail Server address to imap.gmail.com. Leave the other fields as they are and click Continue.

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The next screen is for setting up the Outgoing Mail server information. Other than entering a description, e.g Gmail, you can go ahead and click continue. This will take you to a confirmation summary page. If it all looks correct go ahead and click create. The new account should now appear in the Account column on the left.
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Tweaks

There are a few small details that will make reading Gmail in Mail.app easier. We will need to change a few things to make Mail.app play nice with Gmail. Google has a number of DO's and DON'Ts that will ensure a smooth experience using Mail.app. Google wants all deleted or sent mail to use the local trash and sent folders. While still in the Accounts tab make sure to deselect all the checkboxes except for "Store draft messages on the server".Picture 9.png

Summary

One of the benefits of using Mail.app with Gmail is that you can now take advantage of all of Mail.app goodness. You can set fonts, colors, backgrounds, and signatures, or one of those interesting templates and pick addresses right from your Address Book. Next post, I'll tell you how to sync your Gmail contact straight with Leopard Address Book.
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"My Little Girl" by Tim McGraw

I've never done a book review but I thought I would give it a try. So I signed up to be a Thomas Nelson Book Review Blogger. They send me a book, I read it and post my review on a consumer site and on my blog. I get to keep the book. Fair enough.

The book I received is a wonderfully illustrated book called, "My Little Girl" by Tim McGraw and Tom Douglas. When this book arrived in the mail and my 8 year daughter saw the cover she insisted I had to read it to her. We sat down right after dinner and I read to her in my best interpretations of the characters voices. She listened intently to the sweet story of a father and his daughter enjoying time doing "nothing in particular". They find time to dance and talk about imaginary cloud formations. I think my daughter loved the drawings but not the text/dialogue of the story.

The words did not seem like the kind you expect to hear from a young princess talking to her father. "Daddy, swing me all the way over the sun!" does not sound like anything I have ever heard from my daughter.