TCP/IP Email

Email is one of the most important uses of TCP/IP.

You Don't

When you write an email, you don't use TCP/IP.

When you write an email, you use an email program like Lotus Notes, Microsoft Outlook or Netscape Communicator.

Your Email Program Does

Your email program uses different TCP/IP protocols:

• It sends your emails using SMTP
• It can download your emails from an email server using POP
• It can connect to an email server using IMAP

SMTP - Simple Mail Transfer Protocol

The SMTP protocol is used for the transmission of e-mails. SMTP takes care of sending your email to another computer.

Normally your email is sent to an email server (SMTP server), and then to another server or servers, and finally to its destination.

SMTP can only transmit pure text. It cannot transmit binary data like pictures, sounds or movies.

SMTP uses the MIME protocol to send binary data across TCP/IP networks. The MIME protocol converts binary data to pure text.

POP - Post Office Protocol

The POP protocol is used by email programs (like Microsoft Outlook) to retrieve emails from an email server.

If your email program uses POP, all your emails are downloaded to your email program (also called email client), each time it connects to your email server.

IMAP - Internet Message Access Protocol

The IMAP protocol is used by email programs (like Microsoft Outlook) just like the POP protocol.

The main difference between the IMAP protocol and the POP protocol is that the IMAP protocol will not automatically download all your emails each time your email program connects to your email server.

The IMAP protocol allows you to look through your email messages at the email server before you download them. With IMAP you can choose to download your messages or just delete them. This way IMAP is perfect if you need to connect to your email server from different locations, but only want to download your messages when you are back in your office.

Ektron CMS400.NET Version 7.6 delivers all of the flexibility and features you need to deploy the Web site you want, quickly and efficiently. learn more...       6 ways to take your site to the next level with Ektron: Create site stickiness through social networking. Keep it personal, relevant and interactive and they'll come back for more. Keep it open. Your site needs to be ready and able to connect to outside services. Ektron's open API gives you maximum flexibility. Streamline content and document management. Users need to quickly and intuitively find and add information. Empower your content authors. Reduce IT bottlenecks by allowing business users to create and edit Web content and forms. Climb to the top of search rankings. SEO tools, URL aliasing and eCommerce for your digital marketing strategy Add powerful Web 2.0 tools like blogs, wikis, forums, geo-mapping, rating systems and RSS feeds easily. See why there are 20,000+ Ektron integrations worldwide. Request an INSTANT DEMO or download a FREE TRIAL today.