Do you receive many email messages from the same person? Do you receive many email messages with the same subject? Would
you like to have all of those messages go into a separate mailbox (folder)? This is called "filtering" and here is how you can do it.
Many systems on campus scan mail to check for SPAM (junk mail). The subject line of these messages is then prefixed with *****SPAM*****. If you want you can filter this mail by its Subject. For example, if you want to filter the SPAM mail you could:
Using Outlook
- using Outlook on your PC go to the Tools menu and select Rules Wizard
- select Apply Changes to Inbox then click the New button
- select Start from a blank rule and Check messages when they arrive then click the Next button
- select with specific words in the subject and type the text *****SPAM***** or what ever the words are that you wish to filter
- click the Add button
- click Next
- from Rule Description click on Move it to the specified folder and a window will open up for you to select a folder or create a new one then click OK
- click Next
- click Next
- type a Name of the rule: for example, junk or spam
- click Finish
You could have selected the Trash mailbox for your SPAM. However, you might want to be sure that the messages being flagged as SPAM are truely that. On occasion you just might find something in your Junk mailbox that is not SPAM. For more information on SPAM, and what determines SPAM, please read Reducing SPAM at the University of Waterloo.
- instead of selecting specific words in the subject select Where the From line contains people
- type jcool or some userid on which you wish to filter.
All of the mail you now receive from userid jcool will be "filtered" into the mailbox folder "jcool." If you wanted you could filter the mail by Subject. For example, if you were on the ABC Committee and received a great deal of mail, you could filter the mail by making a few changes in the example above:
Using Outlook Express
To filter SPAM using Outlook Express (providing you are not using IMAP to process your mail) you
go to the Tools menu and select Message Rules
click New Mail Rule and a Properties window will appear
from Select the Conditions for your rule: select Where the Subject line contains specific words
from Select the Actions for your rule: select Move it to the specified folder
from Rule Description click on Where the Subject line contains specific words and a window will open for you to type *****SPAM*****
click Add to close the window
from Rule Description click on Move it to the specified folder and a window will open up for you to select a folder or create a new one then click OK
type a Name of the rule: for example, junk or spam
click OK
Using Outlook
To sort by any of the fields you simply click on the name of the field at the top. For example, to sort on Sender you just click once on Sender. You will notice a little up arrow appears beside Sender. That means that Outlook will continue to sort by Sender, i.e., the userid from which the mail is coming. To stop this and have the mail appear as it arrives, just click on the Date header.
