Switching from Gmail to Outlook.com

I always recommend using a free personal email service like Gmail or Microsoft as opposed to your ISP's email service. Why is this? Well lets say you have a Comcast email address and you decide to switch to Verizon. You are going to be in a position where you are forced to change your email address which can be a big inconvenience. If you use Microsoft or Gmail for example you will not need to make any email address changes, regardless of your ISP (internet service provider).

During the past year Microsoft has really stepped up their free email service and transitioned what had been Hotmail and Live.com over to Outlook.com. This is the one I recommend.

As I just noted switching email services can be a huge decision, and a major chore. You have to notify friends and family members about your new email address, transfer over your contacts and folders, and find a way to get all your messages from one service to the other.

The thought of all that work might discourage you from switching, even if you're not happy with your current email provider. But if you use Google's Gmail and it just isn't working for you anymore, Microsoft wants to simplify the process of moving to Outlook.com.

The software recently introduced s new functionality in Outlook.com that lets you easily transfer over all your emails, contacts, and folders from Gmail. The new service is rolling out and should be available to all Outlook.com accounts worldwide over the next several weeks.

You can access the new tool from your Outlook.com settings, or by clicking here and signing in with your Outlook.com account (if you don't already have an account, you'll be able to sign up for one). From there, you'll have the option to import all your Gmail into a new set of subfolders in Outlook.com.

Next, you will need to sign in to Gmail and grant the tool access to your account. Once you OK this, the tool will start copying over your email and you will be navigated back to Outlook.com. After you start the import process, Microsoft will send you instructions on how to set up email forwarding, so that all the messages sent to your Gmail account go to Outlook.com. Once the import is complete, Microsoft will send to a message letting you know it has finished.

Face to Face is Best

Don’t you just hate it when you are in the middle of something and “bing” someone sends you an email. Not another interruption! But of course you just “have to” see what that bing was and you stop what you were doing to read the message. It has been said that on average we check our email an average of 37 times an hour. That’s more than once every On the other hand we typically spend only six seconds on each email.

Email hits your productivity. If you don’t manage your email, you are less able to work effectively. Research consistently shows that email is one of the biggest hits on your time and on your ability to concentrate on the work you need to do.

A study published last year confirms that the break in continuity of work due to email can affect your productivity and can actually act as constant source of disturbance.

This all suggests that we are so supremely social and that we need social stimulus to keep us going. Therefore when it comes to the office being interrupted by constant emails you become less productive than being interrupted by your work mates. Rather then getting people to send you an internal email you will do better at your job if you ask them to come over to your desk and talk to you.

There are also additional benefits in taking this kind of approach. Not only does it boost the ability to get on with the job, it also helps staff feel happier because they are now in much more real, face-to-face contact with each other. Plus there are health benefits of the increased wandering around the office, perhaps leading to fewer days off sick.

If you want to boost your personal and business productivity, the best thing you can do is to start managing your email, switching it off for most of the day, moving around and actually speaking with people directly, even your co-workers.

Microsoft 365 - Local Report from the Cloud

We here at the Borough of West Chester have been living in the cloud with Microsoft for email services for almost 3 years now. First we were on their older service, Microsoft Online and earlier this year we were moved to their new service, Microsoft 365. For us the move into Microsoft's cloud for email service was a "no brainer". With an IT staff of 1 and between 130-150 users to service, managing an on-premises Exchange (email) server was at times daunting and often time consuming.

 

One of the primary concerns for me, as well as others who have considered a change from "on premises" to "cloud" services for email specifically is uptime. I must admit that this was one of my primary concerns when I was looking to make this change almost 3 years ago. However by completing good research and interviews I was very comfortable with moving to cloud services for email. After all, it was my belief that an IT staff of 1 could never compete with the full power of Microsoft.

Now almost three years later I can look back on this decision and report that it was the right thing to do for us. Downtime has probably been less that 8 hours over these past 2+ years. Now don't get me wrong there have been hurdles from time to time with Microsoft. Some of the service issues we experienced since our move to the cloud have included:

1. Microsoft Lync continues to be problem from time to time. While it is presented by Microsoft as a easy to setup on the user end this is often not the case. I often find myself having to manually enter internal and external IP server information on many workstations during setup.

2. Microsoft Lync often has trouble connecting to our account on mobile devices, even on Windows phones!

3. When we transitioned from Microsoft Online Services to the new Microsoft 365 service, I found that many Outlook clients were not connecting. This occurred about a week prior to the scheduled upgrade. It was determined that Microsoft had changed their settings (MX records etc.) prior to actually upgrading our account! This caused Outlook clients not to connect for a few hours until we determined the actual cause which was corrected by myself and Microsoft.

4. Recently Outlook clients started to fail on connecting to Microsoft. It was determined through troubleshooting that for some reason Microsoft did not like the OpenDNS addresses we had been using on our DNS servers. The problem here is that Microsoft still has not acknowledged this as the root cause, but nevertheless by moving away from OpenDNS the connection problems were resolved. Why this actually occurred I am at a loss because we have always used OpenDNS addresses for our DNS servers.

There have been other minor issues, however overall uptime has been very good, in fact better then I could have provided managing our own internal Exchange servers.

According to an Office blog post, for the year from July 2012 to the end of June 2013, Office 365 had an uptime of 99.98%, 99.97%, 99.94% and 99.97% for each successive quarter respectively. For the sake of clarity, uptime is the amount of time that services provided by a vendor are actually available to users.

What is even better is that Microsoft promises to provide quarterly figures for uptime from here on in, which should offer current and potential users the confidence they need to sign-up, or stay signed-up if they are already customers.

Microsoft says it has calculated the uptime based on the number of minutes Office 365 was available over the course of a calendar month compared with the number of minutes in month.

Other things worth noting is that this figure was also calculated based on the number of people using any one of the given services like SharePoint, or Office Web Apps.

As these services come as a package, Microsoft said it lumped all the stats for each app and for each user together no matter what service they were using. The figures also include services for business, education users and government users.

The challenge with stats is that they can often be.... cloudy (pun intended). It should be noted that there have been times during the past 2+ years here that a part of the Microsoft service was down, while others have ben up. For example the most common outage has revolved out Outlook client connectivity. What usually happens here is that during the times we have experienced Outlook clients not connecting to the service, email continued to flow to mobile devices and the Web Outlook service. Therefore we were not completely down and I wonder if these partial service interruptions are included in Microsoft's statistics.

Cost savings are another factor to consider. For our organization, the cost savings was minimal. For us the cost of purchasing (every 3 years)  then installing and maintaining the equipment and services is just about balanced out by the monthly service cost. There is also no question that cloud services will allow your organization to control or reduce staffing levels.

The cloud is here to stay, the only question is to find the right mix of "on premises" services and "cloud" services for your particular organization.

In August of 2011 Microsoft published a case study of the Borough of West Chester which can be found here.

Protect Your Email

Internet security takes many forms and can be rather overwhelming to the average computer user.  I was reminded of this last week as I was asked to "repair" 4 infected computers.

The key is assessing risk and identifying which online activities pose the most significant threat.  Anyone with an e-mail address is exposed to a variety of Internet security threats including malware, phishing, and spyware. E-mail scams have become increasingly complex and more difficult to spot. 

There are a variety of simple e-mail security tips anyone can implement immediately with very little time or effort - so listen up.

All of these email internet security tips are easy to implement and will reduce the risk of data theft, malware, and viruses.

1. Use Multiple Accounts

The first way to make e-mail more secure is by using multiple accounts.  Using multiple e-mails spreads the risk of data theft across multiple secure accounts. If an e-mail account is compromised, only a small portion of personal data is vulnerable when multiple accounts are used.  One account should be closely guarded and only used for online financial transactions, such as banking and bill paying.  By doing this, users know that any e-mails from outside sources can be ignored.  Several other accounts can be created for social purposes, business, and newsletters.

2. Change Your Password Regularly

Regardless of how many e-mail accounts are used, every password should be changed regularly.    Additionally, every e-mail account should have a different password. If a different password is used for each account and a single account becomes compromised, the remaining accounts will remain secure, limiting the damage.

3. Be On The Lookout For Phishing

The number one Internet security threat associated with e-mail is phishing.  Malicious third parties send unsolicited e-mails in an attempt to gather information about the user.  For example, this tax season has introduced a variety of new targeted phishing attacks.  Third parties attempt to gather information by offering deals on tax filing services.  When a user fills out their tax information, the third-party will then have all of the information they need to steal the user’s identity.  It is even more dangerous now that many people have their refunds directly deposited into their bank account.

4. Scan Attachments

Viruses can be hidden in a variety of file types.  In a well-designed attack the user doesn’t even need to download the attachment to be at risk.

Taming Your Email

It's a rare computer user who isn't constantly battling email overload. Does that describe you -- or someone you know? Never fear. You're not alone, and there are steps you can take to tame the electronic avalanche and regain control of your computing life.

 

Step 1: Shut down your in-box.

 

Step 2: Unsubscribe -- again and again. Turning it all into a game can't hurt, either.

 

Email has been around since before the Internet, but while the technology itself hasn't changed much since the 1970s, the volume of it has. Some people, in fact, receive hundreds of messages a day. That's a threat to a human's ability to process information.

 

There are, however, ways to manage email. Here's how to go about it.

Step 1

Shut down your in-box if you find emails are distracting you from productive work. You can still be alerted to important messages through an SMS text message.

Set up a "from-based" filter within your email client, such as Gmail, to forward important emails to your phone's text account. That way, you'll see the initial 140 characters on the phone as the message comes in and know that you need to open your email client to address the email. Yet you won't get distracted routinely by less important email.

Step 2

Hit the Unsubscribe link embedded in legitimate mass emails and then delete the email without reading it. Gradually your daily volume will decrease -- some of those lists are bombarding you frequently.

Step 3

Use a burner email address.

Unfortunately, marketers looking for prospects to harass have wised-up to the use of completely fabricated email addresses when signing up for services, and won't let you register for services without a legitimate email.

Burner email addresses are disposable addresses that let you sign up for services and click on the verify link in the sent email; the addresses then vaporize after a predetermined period, like an hour. Guerrillamail.com is one such Web-based solution.

Step 4

Look for newsletter marketing preferences options whenever you give out your email in a Web-based form and uncheck the boxes.

Step 5

Take advantage of triaging tricks offered by email services.

Clients like Outlook let you set up hierarchical folders. Add project folders with action and archive subfolders, then drag-and-drop from the in-box as emails come in, for example. Then deal with the email on a project-by-project basis rather than a hit-and-miss chronological one.
Alternatively, use filters to send messages to the project folder, then address the email content as you work on that particular project.

Look for category options within email clients and take advantage of them. Gmail's newest client on some Android 4.0+, iPhone and iPad devices, for example, lets you categorize by people you actually know. Look for the new Primary tab there.

Step 6

Try some email management software.

Boomerang, a plugin for Gmail, lets you set up reminders if no one replies to your message, so you don't have to retain tickle items in your in-box.

ActiveInBox, a Gmail extension for Chrome or Firefox, creates professional status and prioritization project management-like elements within Gmail.

Step 7

Turn the whole process into one big game with The Email Game. This Gmail- and Google Apps-compatible game gives you a score. The faster you clear your in-box, the more points you get.

Archiving By 365

If you are a Microsoft 365 customer be aware that your email will be archived from time to time. While I understand why Microsoft does this it can be confusing, especially the first time this happens.

What Does This Mean?

• Any (old) email that you have received, even if it was deleted or moved into a special folder will be moved (by Microsoft) to your "Online Archive".
• You can access this 'archived mail' on the left  pane of your microsoft Outlook client. You will find this near the bottom of the left pane. Look for "Online Archive ----your email address".
• Click the arrow to the right side of this and your archived email will be here. The first time you do this - it may take a minute or two depending on how much email is in your archive.

More to Know

• Unfortunately Microsoft cannot recreate any folders you made. Theerefore all of your old email will simply be in the archive inbox. To me this is the biggest problem here. I for one am crazy for organizing everything in my life, even my inbox and to see all of this taken away is somewhat frustrating.
• If you move any of your archived email back to its original folder it will simply revert back to the online archive. So don't do this.
• If you want to re-organize the archived email you will have to recreate the folders again, inside the online archive.
• You can search the online archive in the same manner as your regular inbox.
• You can also access your "online archive" through your Outlook client or on the Microsoft 365 Portal.
• The online archive cannot be accessed via mobile devides (smartphones) and most tablets.

Don't Click That Link!

It seems to me that I have been spending a lot of my time working on staff computers infected by Trojan horses and other cyber baddies. Why is this problem growing? I wish I knew. However I wanted to take the time to post one of the most important things you can do to avoid infecting your PC.

Don't click strange links!

If you get an email from a friend or other associate that has several people attached and the email contains a strange looking link, chances are they were hacked. I would contact your friend other then through their email and ask them if they sent it. If they did not, have them read this post and then change their passwords.

I said passwords, as is in, more then one. That is because once someone has access to your email account, they could potentially gain access to your other online accounts.

Here is just one example of what can happen if you email account is hacked. Once your email is hacked the hacker could gain access to your email account and browse through your emails to find an email from your bank. They then go to your bank's website. The first thing they'll try doing is using your email password in case you used the same password for your email as for your bank. If that doesn't work, then they'll try the forgot password feature and within a minute they could have access to your bank account. If this happens your computer problems could quickly turn into financial problems.

I cannot stress this enough. If you are not sure of where the email came from and that it is legitimate do not click on any of it's links. Simply delete the message and take a deep breath.

RIP Hotmail - Hello Outlook.com

If you are a Hotmail user read up and get ready for Outlook.com.

Outlook.com will fully replace Hotmail as Microsoft's webmail service. The company will begin to auto-update accounts, and hopes they will be fully migrated from Hotmail to Outlook.com by this summer.

Microsoft's move was spurred by surprise growth in the Outlook.com mail service, which has amassed 60 million active users in just six months. Microsoft has also removed the "customer preview" label on the product. I have been using Outlook.com for my personal email since last fall and I for one am glad to see the "customer preview: label gone.

I know the first thing you're thinking: "Does this mean my Hotmail address will just go away?" No. It just means that when you go to hotmail.com, you will be re-routed to Outlook.com, and when you log in on the Web, you will get the Outlook.com experience. You can keep your @hotmail.com email address forever, but you can also use that account to create multiple new @outlook.com email addresses, too, if you so desire.

But I recommend that you don't wait for Microsoft to switch your old Hotmail service over to Outlook.com. Do it as soon as you have time. You will not be disappointed. (Switching your account over takes almost no effort: Just log into Hotmail then click Settings at the top right — you will see the option to convert to Outlook.)

If you are a SkyDrive user Outlook.com nicely integrates with this as well.

I believe that Outlook.com can give Gmail a run for its money. It's a very smart service with a very streamlined design, tasteful social integration and auto organization features such as inbox "sweep" and scheduled cleanup. Because of this last bit, it's ideal for use either as a main email or as a "spam account," the kind you provide to online retailers and other data collectors.

How to Set Up Multiple Email Signatures in iOS 6

Today I was asked if you can have multiple signatures on your IPhone & IPad. The good news is that yes you can, as long as you have upgraded your Apple device to iOS 6. This upgrade was made available earlier last year, so hopefully you have already completed the upgrade.

Before iOS 6, you were allowed only one common signature that appeared on each email account. Other then deleteing and adding a new email signature for each email message there was really no other way to deal with multiple email accounts.

With the new iOS each of your accounts can have it's own distinct signature. Isn't technology womderful! So, your work email can give all your professional information while you're personal account can have more of a personal signature.

Here's how to set it up:

Go to Settings on your home screen, select Mail, Contacts, Calendars. Scroll way down until you see the Signature option. Tap on it and you'll see the options shows in the image below.

All Accounts will enable one signature to be sent from all your email accounts. Tap Per Account and each of your accounts will pop up, allowing you to create personalized signatures for each of them. (see image below)

Now, when you send an email, iOS 6 will automatically know which account it's coming from and apply the correct signature.

Microsoft Launches "Outlook.com"

Microsoft is preparing to retire it’s free email service Hotmail and replace it with a newer crisper one, simply named “Outlook.com”. Outlook.com has a very clean, simple look which is obviously a reflection of their impending move to Windows 8 and Office 2013. If you’re personal email account has been driving you crazy lately with spam and junk mail maybe it’s time to consider a new service. Also, because this service is less than a week old you may be able to get the email address you desire. For example I was able to register and obtain wmann@outlook.com. Within days I am sure that this simple email address would have been snatched up.

I recommend that if you are considering a change for your personal email check out Microsoft’s new free email service at outlook.com. Special Note to Microsoft 365 Users

If you are a current Microsoft 365 subscriber, which we are here at the Borough of West Chester you may be presented with an error message when opening the outlook.com webpage. If this happens to you, don't panic. Simply delete the browsing cache in Internet Explorer and restart the browser and try again.

Organizing Your Personal Email
If you do this, you can begin to take control & organize your personal email account by simply visiting all of the websites and services you use on a regular basis and change your email address there. This will allow you to clean up your email account and reduce the amount of spam and junk mail probably cluttering you’re inbox.

Customizing Your Outlook.com
You will see that there is some advertising on the right side of the interface, however this can be reduced greatly by adding a preview pane to the right side of your inbox. Microsoft obviously made a decision that simpler is better with their new free email service. It is because of this that the customization options are minimal. Other than reading pane location and interface color there is not much your need to learn here.

Social Media Connectivity
You can connect your social media services such as Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube to your account. This will allow you to “chat” with facebook friends and easily see “status updates” right from your email account.

Privacy Protection
Although you will notice advertisements on the right panel Microsoft states that your information is not used to display the advertisements. I am not so sure about this but time will tell.

Setting Up Outlook.com on Mobile Devices
Outlook.com can easily be setup on any mobile device using the “Hotmail” account selection. Simply enter your email address, password and you should be receiveing your email on your smartphone or tablet.

This service premiered only days ago, on July 31 so there will obviously be enhancements and improvements just around the corner. However I like what I see so far and recommend that anyone struggeling with an old junk filled personal email account give it a try.

Junk Mail Just Got Fun!

Our Junk Mail folder is now active. You can say goodbye to "Forefront". To learn more watch this exciting video!

Managing Your Microsoft Online Password

There is no doubt. Passwords can be a big pain for everyone. However without passwords our information is not secure. This short training video will demonstrate how to manage and change your Microsoft Online password and what happens if you allow your password to expire (after 90 days).

Managing Your Email in the Cloud

Microsoft Online offers very good quarantine and archving software solutions. All employee's should become familure with the use of the both of these excellent resources. Take a few minutes to learn how to access your email quarrantine and archive.



You can access your quarantine and archive at quarantine.messaging.microsoft.com.

Tip: Adding A Signature To Your Email

Many of you have asked from time to time, "How can I add a signature on the bottom of my email messages?". I thought I would take the time to demonstrate one of the ways you can do this easily.

If you access your email through Web Outlook, select the "options" menu on the bottom of the left side toobar.

Then browse down and open "edit signature".

Finally, enter what you would like your signature to look like and save. That's it. You now have a signature that will appear on all of your email messages.

Syncing Your Android & Network Passwords

I have found one of the biggest challenges for users of Android devices is keeping the email password synced with the network password. For anyone who has used a Blackberry device in the past this is a new issue you should be aware of.

Be aware Android users! Android devices are checking in on your Microsoft Exchange account and the password on your device must match the password on the network. If you forget to change the password on the device after changing it on the network, you will be "locked out" of the network within an hour. This results in phone calls to my office so I am hoping to educate everyone here and save all involved some time.

First, when you know you are going to change your network password, make sure you have your Android device with you.

After changing the network password on the computer select the menu button on your device, then select settings. Browse down and select Accounts. Then select your West Chester (corporate account). Enter your new password in the password field and select OK. Thats it.

Here is a video with step by step directions for syncing your network and Android passwords.

Email Etiquette Training Announced

Email Etiquette is a hot topic these days in the professional world. How should email be handled? When is email an appropriate response as opposed to a phone call, or face-to-face conversation? These and many other issues will be discussed in our next information technology training class which will be held in early March. Below are some email etiquette “tips” which will all be discussed when we get together for the training.

32 email etiquette tips:

1. Be concise and to the point
2. Answer all questions, and pre-empt further questions
3. Use proper spelling, grammar & punctuation
4. Make it personal
5. Use templates for frequently used responses
6. Answer swiftly
7. Do not attach unnecessary files
8. Use proper structure & layout
9. Do not overuse the high priority option
10. Do not write in CAPITALS
11. Don't leave out the message thread
12. Add disclaimers to your emails
13. Read the email before you send it
14. Do not overuse Reply to All
15. Mailings > use the bcc: field or do a mail merge
16. Take care with abbreviations and emoticons
17. Be careful with formatting
18. Take care with rich text and HTML messages
19. Do not forward chain letters
20. Do not request delivery and read receipts
21. Do not ask to recall a message.
22. Do not copy a message or attachment without permission
23. Do not use email to discuss confidential information
24. Use a meaningful subject
25. Use active instead of passive
26. Avoid using URGENT and IMPORTANT
27. Avoid long sentences
28. Don't send or forward emails containing libelous, defamatory, offensive, racist or obscene remarks
29. Don't forward virus hoaxes and chain letters
30. Keep your language gender neutral
31. Don't reply to spam
32. Use cc: field sparingly