For Your Information

Here is where we will put a little useful information for you to consider. Touching on such topics as applications you may want to install on your system or things that you may encounter. Remember these are mostly our opinions (well some are actual definitions with an opinion included) and work well for us.

We all must have some sort of a Internet Service Provider or Online Service to get to the Internet. There are many good choices out there however you must take great care in choosing one. Is anything ever really free? Most times the bargain or free services have you install software that keeps a barrage of PopUp, PopOver, PopUnder(s) Advertisements taking up valuable desk top space. Another thing in question is Viruses that may infect your computer. At this link I hope that I have a few answers on that subject.

What's the deal with missing mail? Some one says they sent mail to you and you didn't get it. Check out Mail Mysteries, I hope this clears up a few questions for you.

We have put together a glossary of words that may help shed some light on what the computer world or or services can do for you.

Missing Mail Mysteries

Every wonder why you don't receive some e-mail? By digging deeper into server records shows that the e-mail did indeed go out to them. Why didn't it ever show up in their mailboxes?

To track down the source of the problem, you have to understand how email works. The program installed on your computer that you use to send and read mail (such as Outlook Express, Outlook, Eudora or Pegasus) is called an email client. When a message is sent, it goes from the sender's mail client to an email server on the sender's network or at the sender's ISP. In most cases, an SMTP server (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) handles outgoing mail. It sends the message (broken into units called packets, which consist of binary data) to the recipient's mail server. In the case of most home users, this will be a server at the recipient's ISP. In most cases, you connect to your ISP's POP3 mail server and download your mail to your email client program (if you have a corporate mail account, you may instead connect to an IMAP server like Exchange, in which case the mail remains on the server and you can read it from any computer running an IMAP client program. Major mail clients such as Outlook can be either POP3 or IMAP clients).

As you can see, the message passes through a number of machines on its way to you. It also passes through routers (devices that forward mail from one network to another) as it makes its way through the Internet. Packets can get lost at any point along the way, but there are mechanisms in place to see that individual lost packets get re-sent. The most likely culprit when an entire message fails to reach you is a firewall or spam filtering software. Firewalls are set up at the perimeter of a network to protect it from attack, by keeping certain types of packets out. A firewall can keep all POP3 mail out, by closing the port (entry point to the network) used by the POP3 protocol. Firewalls can also keep out packets that originate from a particular IP address or domain name. Spam filtering programs can be installed on the mail server or on your desktop machine. They are set to recognize mail that fits certain criteria (such as containing keywords or originating from particular domains) and discard it. Some spam filters use "black lists" that are lists of domains from which spam has originated in the past.

Some ISPs install spam filtering software on the mail servers. Unfortunately, all anti-spam software is subject to some "false positives" - mail the software recognizes and treats as spam when it's actually mail that you want. This can be because a spam mail was sent from someone in that domain in the past (not necessarily the same sender), or because the mail contains a key word that's associated with spam, or even because someone dislikes the sender and falsely reports him/her as a spammer to those who maintain the black lists. Spam filtering is the most common source of "lost" newsletters and other email that was sent to you but didn't get to your mailbox.

What can you do about it? Some ISPs provide a way for you to view the mail that was "caught" by the spam filter so you can check for mail you wanted to receive, and retrieve it. Some ISPs will also put requested domains on their "white lists" so that mail from that domain gets through even if it meets other spam criteria. Your first step, when you suspect you're not getting all the mail that's being sent to you, should be to call your ISP and ask about their filtering policy and system. Spam filters serve a very necessary purpose, but it's frustrating when they keep out the mail that you do want.