About IMAPIMAP is short for Internet Message Access Protocol. In layman's terms, IMAP is a set of rules that programs use to transfer information between a client program like your web browser (or Outlook) and a server computer, very much like POP3. IMAP has some advantages over POP3 and is similar to HTTP in mail capabilities. Late in 2007, Google added free IMAP support to its free Gmail service. This combination offers major benefits. IMAP allows information to be synchronized between the mail program (Outlook) and the IMAP account (Gmail). When you connect Outlook to an IMAP account, Outlook creates a new set of mail folders that corresponds to the folders in the IMAP account. All the folders and messages in the IMAP account appear the same in Outlook. And Outlook keeps things synchronized too. Delete a message in Gmail and it gets deleted in Outlook too. Delete a message from one of the Gmail folders in Outlook and it gets deleted from Gmail. Move something, read something, create a new message, whatever you do, the IMAP connection ensures that what appears in Outlook matches what appears in Gmail. This is a great feature for anyone who wants access to their mail from more than one location and isn't connected to a Microsoft Exchange server. Set up IMAP access to the same Gmail account from multiple copies of Outlook and you can keep all the mail on that account synchronized between all your computers. Or use the web-based Gmail interface (mail.google.com) to work with your mail while you are on the road, knowing that the next time you start Outlook, it will automatically connect to your Gmail account and synchronize all the changes for you. If you use Gmail and Outlook, you should definitely consider setting this up. Complete instructions on doing so are posted here on the site, and it only takes a few minutes to do, so you really have no excuse not to give this a try. Note: Gmail and IMAP only support e-mail. This means that your calendar, contacts, and tasks won't be synchronized. This page offers basic information about IMAP. You really don't need to know more than this, but if you want a more detailed explanation, I suggest you look at the relevant Wikipedia entry.
From here you can:
|
