Accessing E-mail Using Webmail (RMail)

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Introduction

RMail is Ryerson’s main E-mail system. It is accessible with an E-mail client such as Mozilla Thunderbird and Microsoft Outlook, or via a web browser. This section of the User’s Guide focuses on Webmail as viewed with the Mozilla Firefox Three web browser.

Webmail allows the user to:

**Note: The Webmail Options menu will need to be used to check your space quota, forward your E-mail, or set a vacation message regardless of whether you are using a web browser or an E-mail client to access RMail. To change your password you must use my.ryerson self serve.

Video Tutorials

CCS offers free video tutorials as alternatives to the text based instructions on the User's Guide. To view the video tutorials for Webmail, visit the links below:

**Note: Links lead out of User's Guide to RyeCast page

• Part One - Logging In & Interface Functions (2:36)
• Part Two - Composing a Message (1:56)
• Part Three - Options & Folders (1:56)

Starting Webmail

To access RMail using a Web browser, perform the following: click on File Open Location, or click the Location Bar in the web browser and type the following URL: https://mail.ryerson.ca (***The 's' in https is required.***). Press Enter.

When the login screen is displayed, enter your my.ryerson user name and my.ryerson password. For security reasons, your password will appear as asterisks. Click Login.

**Note: You may attempt to login with an incorrect password up to five times, after which your account will be locked for one hour.

Exiting Webmail

To end your Webmail session, Click on the Log Out near the top right corner of the web browser window. This terminates your connection to the mail server. On exit, depending on your Webmail Options settings, messages in the Trash folder will be purged from your account.

**Note: Always exit Webmail before you leave the computer by logging out. This prevents others from using your account and obtaining access to your personal messages.

Webmail Screen Layout

RMail displays as a web page when you access it with a web browser. Use the icons and tabs to navigate between your folders and messages. The tabs provide quick access to your Folders, Inbox, Address Book, and Options, and the icons in the toolbar allow you to manage your messages. The help button on the top-right corner offers pointers on using Webmail screens. Message totals are provided at the bottom of the Inbox and Folder screens.

Fig. 1 - RMail Inbox

The default view after you login is the Inbox and this is where all your incoming E-mail is delivered. From the Inbox tab, your messages are listed by Received Date. Also displayed on this screen are the Sender, Message Size, Subject and Attachment (indicated by a paper clip icon) headings used to describe your messages in the list.

A checkbox beside each message enables you to move the selected messages to a different (existing) folder for storage, or to the Trash folder for deletion. To display the contents of a message, click on the Subject. If you wish to forward or reply to a message you must first open it.

The Options tab is where you go to change Account Settings, such as your password, screen configuration and your E-mail forwarding preferences.

At the top of each screen, icons provide quick access to useful commands. These icons change according to the displayed screen. The following table lists icons you will come across in the Inbox tab after logging into Webmail.

From the Inbox tab, your messages are listed by the Received date. Also displayed on this screen are: sender, message size, subject, and a paper clip icon if there is an attachment. A checkbox beside each message enables you to move messages to a different (existing) folder for storage, or to the trash folder for deletion. To display the contents of a message, click on the subject. In order to Forward, Reply, Reply All or Delete a message you must first open it.

Composing an Email Message

To begin creating an E-mail message, click  the Compose icon. An E-mail can be composed from the Inbox tab, the Folder tab, or the Addresses tab. All E-mail messages are comprised of three parts: the Header, Subject, and the Message Text. The image below shows the message composition window for Webmail.

Fig. 2 - Compose Message Window

Header

This is the area where you specify the recipients of the E-mail. Type the E-mail address of the person you are sending the E-mail to in the To, Cc or Bcc textbox. An example is provided in the image above where jsmith@ryerson.ca is typed in the textbox beside the To field. You may also select addresses from your Address Book using the Address icon in the Toolbar, or by using the Address Button beside the To, CC, or Bcc fields.

The three types of recipient textboxes serve different purposes when sending an E-mail and can be explained as follows:

For recipients who have an E-mail address ending in @ryerson.ca, you can simply type their user name in the To, Cc or Bcc fields, i.e. jsmith for the recipient with an E-mail address of jsmith@ryerson.ca. Otherwise, you will be required to type the full E-mail address, i.e. jsmith@scs.ryerson.ca for the recipient with an E-mail address of jsmith@scs.ryerson.ca.

In the same way, to communicate with people outside Ryerson, you must know their full Internet (E-mail) address. Think of it as a house address. The post office needs a name, street number, city, province and a postal code to deliver E-mail. The computer address consists of: the user’s name, their mail server’s name and the location. The general syntax is: 

userid@computername.location.countrycode

The user’s name is generally their ID, for example, jsmith. An example of a full E-mail address would be jsmith@ryerson.ca. E-mail addresses can end with a country code, such as .ca for Canada, as described in the general syntax above, but it can also have other endings such as .com for businesses and .edu for educational institutions in the United States. If you want to send an E-mail to an account outside of Ryerson and you are unsure of their E-mail address, you can have the other person send you an E-mail first; their E-mail address will be in the from field of your received message. 

Remember, your E-mail address is your my.ryerson_user_name@ryerson.ca. E.g. jsmith@ryerson.ca

Subject

From the recipient fields in the Header, use the mouse or press the Tab key to move to the Subject field. The subject is generally a brief description of what the E-mail message is about and is the first part of your message that the recipient sees in their Inbox.

Message Text

Use the mouse or press Tab to move from the Subject field to the Message Text. This is where you can enter your full message. By default, Webmail provides you with a plain text editor. To use the HTML text editor that allows you to style your fonts, bullets, embed hyperlinks and so on, you need to use Internet Explorer or any other web browser that supports HTML messages. Mozilla does not support HTML. The benefit of using plain text is that any mail reader can display it, which is not true of HTML messages.

Adding Attachments to an Email Message

In addition to typing an informative message in the E-mail, you can also attach files from your local hard disk to your outgoing E-mail messages. The file can be a text file created by a text editor like Notepad, a binary file created by a word processor, or a file from a graphics program or spreadsheet application. 

Fig. 3 - Uploading a File

Browse through the folders and select the file you wish to attach to the E-mail message; then click Open. As an example, the image above shows that the graphics file titled Winter.jpg is selected to be attached to an E-mail. Once you click Open, the File Upload window will close and you will be brought back to the Attach File window where you will see the link to the file you just selected in the textbox beside the Browse button. Then click the Add button to add the file to your list of attached files; you will see the file name appear in the box below. Repeat this process until you have selected all the desired attachments.

Fig. 4 - Attaching Files and Confirming

Once you have selected all the files you want to attach to your messages, click the Attach button at the bottom right corner of the window. You will see the name(s) of the attached file(s) in the header of your E-mail message, above the Subject, and a copy of the Attachment will be sent with the message. 

**Note: Files larger than 5 MB cannot be attached (Max size: 5 MB). A “File too large” error will be displayed. A work around to this restriction is to use a client, such as Outlook or Thunderbird. Using these email clients, the RMail system allows messages to be sent up to 30 MB in size, including attachments and the body of the message itself. Also, for the purpose of controlling the spread of viruses, .exe files are not permitted as attachments.

Sending an Email Message

When you create a message in the Compose window, there are icons at the top of the window for easy access. The icons include:

By using the Send icon, the mail message will be sent out to the recipients specified in the Header of the E-mail. 

Webmail does not immediately tell you if you have used an invalid E-mail address when you type an address in the To, Cc or Bcc fields. Any RMail addresses that are incorrect will be identified when you click send. An error message similar to the one below will pop up asking you to correct or delete the erroneous RMail address. 

Mail that is incorrectly addressed and sent somewhere other than RMail is initially sent, but is eventually returned as “undeliverable” to your Inbox.

Sent Folder

E-mail messages which you have previously sent are stored in the Sent folder in RMail (provided that you have selected the service in the Options tab – refer to the Managing your RMail Account section for more information). In the main window of RMail, click the Sent tab or click the Folder tab then click the   Sent link to access the Sent folder.

Reading Your Email

When you log into Webmail, your Inbox is displayed by default and it lists all the emails which have been sent to you. You may click the Inbox tab to display a listing of your received messages at any time. To refresh the list with your latest messages, click the Get Mail  icon.

By default, every time you open Webmail, messages are sorted from newest to oldest. To change this, click the Options tab > Appearance menu > Message List View section > Sort Messages dropdown box > Oldest First.

Fig. 5 - The RMail Inbox

You can also temporarily sort your mail by the From, Subject, Read/Unread, or Size field by just clicking on the arrows  beside the field headers. Information displayed for each message is: date received, sender, a paper clip graphic (attachments), size and the subject. All unread messages are highlighted with an envelope displayed to the left of the message, and all read messages have a page icon.

In a message window, you can use the icons across the top to Compose a new message, Reply to the sender of the message, Reply to All recipients and the sender of the message, Forward the message to another person, Delete a message or Move the message to another folder.

Fig. 6 - Elements of the Message Window

Sender Attached Files Message Body

Use the Previous or Next buttons to scroll through the messages in your Inbox. You can also add the sender’s and other recipients’ E-mail address to your Address Book.

**Note: The maximum message size allowed for receiving (sent to an RMail account) is 25 MB

Saving & Viewing Attached Files

If someone sends you an E-mail with an attached file, you can view or save the file. Attachments are displayed "Inline" (default) or "As Links" in the mail message.

1. Inline – Plain text or graphic files (GIF or JPG) display within the body of the message.
2. As Links - An attachment requiring additional software for viewing, such as Microsoft Office Word documents, spreadsheets, etc., display as a link under the Subject of the E-mail message. If you receive an attachment, click the link and a window will pop-up with the Open, Save or Cancel options. From here, choose to Save the file to a place on your local computer. When the file is done saving, you may click the Open option to view the file or Close to close the download window and view the file at a later time.

**Note: You should assume file attachments contain viruses unless you know otherwise. The safest procedure to follow is to save the file attachments and then scan them with your anti-virus software. Only open the file after it is confirmed to be virus-free.

Printing to a Local Printer

To print an E-mail message:

1. Open the message
2. Click the Print option in the browser to use the browser's print settings to print the E-mail.

If you want a printer-friendly version of the E-mail message, click the Printable icon; a new window will appear with the printer-friendly version of the E-mail. To print the message you may click File > right click Print on the browser's toolbar, or click Print (only applicable to Internet Explorer) to print using the browser's print settings.

Printing problems? If your printouts only show the E-mail toolbar, make sure you click the body of the message before printing. As the Webmail page is made up of frames, this will make the frame that contains the message the "active frame" for printing.

Managing Your RMail Account

Webmail provides an Options tab for you to maintain your E-mail account. From this section of Webmail, you can change your password, forward your E-mail to an alternate address, set up a vacation message and, check your disk space usage and quota.

Shown below is an image of the Options screen in Webmail. The left panel contains a menu with a list of option categories. Click on a menu item to display its related options and properties.

Fig. 7 - Options Menu

**Note: Some of the options available in this tab, such as forwarding your email and setting a vacation message, take time to process. You may have to wait up to 10 minutes after enabling the option for it to become active.

The functions of the categories in the left panel are described as follows:

Organizing Your Messages Using Folders

All messages are kept in folders in your RMail. Select the Folders tab to view the folders listing. 

By default, the Inbox, Drafts, Sent, and Trash folders exist in your account. Messages sent to you are delivered to your Inbox, messages you delete are moved to the Trash, and copies of messages you sent are stored in the Sent folder.

Fig. 8 - RMail Folders

Create A Folder

You can organize your messages by creating several smaller subject-oriented folders and move messages from the Inbox to these folders. Additionally you can create sub folders by selecting, for example, the drafts folder and then following the same process as a below to create the sub folder.

To create a folder, click the New icon and a pop-up window similar to the one to the right will appear and prompt you for a folder name. Type in your folder name, then click OK. The new folder will automatically appear in your Folder list.

All folders are created under your Personal folder and are saved on the E-mail server. You can access the folders from any location – on campus or at home. You can use the Rename icon to rename folders as required. Keep in mind that the system folders (Inbox, Drafts, Sent and Trash) cannot be renamed.

Move Message To Folder

Messages can be moved between folders. To do so, begin by selecting the Inbox tab to display the list of messages in your Inbox. Click the checkbox to the left of the message to be moved then click the Move Messages To Folder drop box in the toolbar to select the destination folder. 

Delete Messages

To remove unwanted E-mail messages, select the message you want to delete (click the checkbox beside the message) and then click the Delete  icon in the toolbar. By default, when you logout from Webmail, these messages will be expunged from your account. To clear some space immediately, select the Folders tab and click the Empty Trash button beside the Trash folder.

If you do not want Webmail to remove the messages in your Trash each time you logout (i.e. you want to manually empty the Trash yourself), you can set this in the Options tab, under the Settings menu.

Share Folders With Other Users

This option enables one user to share the messages in their Personal folders with another user. Users sharing a folder can add to the folder and view the messages.

There are two steps to sharing folders – the folder’s owner must make the folder available by selecting it to be shared and the users sharing the folder then need to subscribe to the folder. In this manner, both accounts can use the folder, and the owner of the folder can also define the folder’s type of accessibility.

Share A Folder

This option can be used to share a folder with other users. In the Folder tab, select a folder by enabling the circle  to the left of the folder name, then click the Share icon in the toolbar. In the Shared Folder window, enter the user names that can access the folder.

Fig. 9 - Sharing a Folder

You may use the search button to bring up your Address Book if you are unsure of account names. If you are using the Address Book, then once you click OK, the user(s) you searched will be added to the table at the bottom of the Shared Folder window. Otherwise, if you already know the user name and type it in the User ID textbox, click Add to add it to the table. If the user you are trying to add does not exist or is not on the same storage server as you, you will receive a pop-up error message indicating Invalid User.

When the user is successfully added to your list of users for the folder, click on the drop down menu under the Permissions heading to set the permissions of the folder for the chosen user. You may set the permission to Read only, Read and Write, or Read, Write and manage access.

Fig. 10 - Selecting Shared Folder Permissions

Near the top of the window, there is a checkbox to Enable direct delivery of email to folder, which, when selected, will direct email from the shared users to the shared folder. When you have finished adding users and setting their permission levels to the folder, click OK. The users who are granted shared privileges can now subscribe or unsubscribe to use the folder when using their own RMail accounts.

To remove a user from the shared folder, select the folder in the Folder list then click the Share icon in the toolbar click the Remove button to the right of the permissions drop down menu.

Subscribe And Unsubscribe To A Folder

Both subscribe and unsubscribe are used with the Shared Folder option. If someone shares a folder with you, you must subscribe to it to access the contents of the folder.

When you click the Subscribe icon in the toolbar of the Folder tab, a new window will appear for you to search your available shared folders.

Fig. 11 - Subscribing to a Shared Folder

In the drop down menu, select All Shared Folders, then click Go. All available shared folders will be displayed in the table below. Select the folder(s) you wish to subscribe to by selecting the checkbox to the left of the folder(s), then click Subscribe. The window will close and you will see the shared folder under the Subscribed Shared Folders heading in your Folders tab, below your Personal folders.

When you no longer require access, select the folder and click  the Unsubscribe icon in the toolbar to remove the folder from your Folder list.

Fig. 12 - Folders and Shared Folders

Organizing Your Addresses

The Address Book helps you to keep a list of E-mail addresses you use frequently. You can add addresses while reading an E-mail message or by manually adding entries directly into the Address Book.

Address Book Layout

The Addresses tab displays a list of all your stored E-mail addresses. The entries are sorted by Display Name in forward alphabetical order by default, but can be changed to be sorted by reverse alphabetical order, or by forward or reverse alphabetical order according to the E-mail address simply my clicking the arrows in the table headings.

Fig. 13 - Address Book

The follow table describes the function of the icons in the toolbar of the Address Book:

The drop down menu to the left of the search icon (View drop down menu) allows you to view your contacts according to groups. By default, the –All option is chosen which displays all of the contacts in your address book, including groups which are placed at the end of the list. The general options in this drop down menu are All, Groups only, and Unfiled. The Groups only option will display the names of the groups which you have created in your Address Book, and the Unfiled option will display all the contacts in your Address Book which are not part of a group.

If you have created groups, then the name of the groups will also appear on this drop down menu, for example, the New Group group above. When a group is selected from the View drop down menu, it will list each individual contact within the group, unlike Groups only which will display a list of your created groups. If Groups only was selected from the example above, then the only entry which would appear would be the "New Group" group title.

Add an Address

As mentioned earlier, there are two methods to add E-mail addresses to the Address Book: while viewing an E-mail or by directly adding it to the Address Book.

While Viewing an Email:

To save addresses from a sent or received E-mail, first open the message.

• Click the Add Addresses icon in the toolbar to add all E-mail addresses listed in the header of the message to your Personal Address Book. This option takes the addresses from the To and Cc fields.
• If you wish to save a single E-mail address in the message, click on the address in the header. A New Contact window will appear with the contact’s First Name, Last Name, Display Name and E-mail Address fields completed. Click OK to add the entry to your Address Book.
  **Note: The New Contact window will be further explained in the Update an Address Book Entry section.

Directly Into the Address Book:

To manually add an address by directly adding it to into the Address Book

• Click the Addresses tab in the Webmail main window.
• Click the New Contact  icon in the toolbar and a New Contact window will appear.
• complete the necessary fields then click OK.

Delete an Address

To delete an entry from the Address Book

• Click the Addresses tab in the Webmail main window.
• Find the contact you wish to remove and click on the Display Name to open the Update Contact window.
• At the bottom-left corner, click the Delete button to remove the address from the list. If the contact is part of a group, it will also be removed from the group.

Update an Address Book Entry

Each contact in the Address Book can be updated individually which is useful to customize personal information. 

To access individual contacts:

• Click the Addresses tab in the Webmail main window.
• Find the contact you wish to update and click on the Display name to open the Update Contact window.

In the Update Contact window shown below, there are four tabs - Name & Contact, Address, Notes, and Groups - which allow you to enter information regarding the contact.

Fig. 14 - Updating Contact Information

Fig. 15 - Creating Groups

When you have finished updating the contact’s information, click OK at the bottom of the window.

Using The Address Book

New E-mail messages can be created using recipients from your Address Book, either in the Address Book or in the Compose message window. 

When you are in the Address Book and your contacts are listed, select the contacts you want to place in the To, Cc, or Bcc fields of the E-mail header by selecting the corresponding checkbox in the Address Book. Then, when you have finished selecting all the contacts, click the Compose button in the toolbar and a new message window will appear with your header completed. If you want to send an E-mail to just one contact, simply click on their Display Name and a new message window will appear.

Fig. 16 - Select Compose to add Contacts

The alternative method to use the Address Book contacts is to search through the Address book while you are composing the E-mail. When you click the Address icon in the toolbar of the compose screen, a new window will appear with your list of personal contacts in a scroll box. You may search through this list and click the To, Cc, or Bcc buttons to add contacts to the Message Recipients box on the right side. You may click an entry in the Message Recipients box on the right to highlight the entry and then click the Remove button to remove the contact from the recipient list.

Fig. 17 - Contact Select Screen

If you are looking for a contact that is not in your Personal Address Book, you may click Search to search through the Corporate (Ryerson) Address Book as well as your Personal Address Book.

In the Search Address Book window:

• Click the Search Personal Address Book click the drop down menu and select whether you want RMail to Search Personal Address Book or Search Corporate Directory.
• Click the Full Name  drop down menu and indicate in the search field if you are searching for a contact with a certain Full name, First name, Last name, Email or Phone #.
• Click the  "contains" drop down menu and indicate whether your specified contact contains, is, sounds like, begins with or ends with your search criteria.
• Type your search criteria into the textbox
• Click Search

Fig. 18 - Searching Your Contact List

The search will return a listing of addresses that match your search criteria. Check the To, Cc or Bcc field for the addresses to use in your E-mail message. Click OK when ready.

Creating a Message Signature

A signature is information that is automatically appended to the bottom of every E-mail message that you send. A signature can be created by Clicking the Options tab then the Personal Information menu. From here, enter your signature in the Signature section and select the "Include this text in every message you compose" checkbox. Click Save Changes button at the bottom of the screen. Try sending yourself a message to see how your signature looks

A sample signature file:

Fig. 19 - Signature Text Field

How to Handle an Email Virus

If you have an unopened E-mail with an attachment and you are unsure of the source, you should delete the E-mail. Click the checkbox beside the message and select Move to Trash. Go to your trash folder and permanently delete the file from your E-mail. If you know the sender then you can click  the attachment and select Save As. Your next step is to scan it for viruses using your virus software. Always scan your files before opening them.

To handle viruses in general, you should make sure that you have an up-to-date version of anti-virus software, such as Sophos VirusScan which is offered to Ryerson Students, Staff and Faculty free of charge.

Sophos can be downloaded from the CCS website's Software page at: http://www.ryerson.ca/ccs/software/downloads/security/index.html.

Error Messages

The system displays information and error messages when problems occur. Below is a table detailing some of the messages you may see during your session.

**Notes: If the same error is displayed repeatedly and you have already resolved the error, try refreshing your display. Press Shift and click the browser’s Refresh/Reload icon.

Browser Font Settings

If the fonts on the E-mail screen do not appear correctly, make sure you have your Fonts preferences set up correctly.

You can set this from Mozilla Firefox using Tools > Options click the Content tab click Fonts & Colors. In this section you may specify your own default Font and Font size. If you want the browser to show the web page's own fonts, click Advanced  check Allow pages to choose their own fonts, instead of my selections above.

Fig. 20 - Browser Options Displaying Font Settings