After you have set up at least one email account on your iPad, you can read messages that you've retrieved and write new messages to send to others. As you receive messages from others, you may want to move them to different folders or just delete them altogether.
In this chapter you'll learn how to read, write, and organize email on your iPad so you can stay in touch with people wherever you and your iPad go (as long as you have Internet access, that is).
Each email account you set up on your iPad contains multiple folders for storing messages. When you receive messages, they get stored in the Inbox folder. If you have set up multiple email accounts, you'll have a single inbox that displays new mail for all accounts called All Inboxes, as well as an individual Inbox for each account, as shown in Figure 15-1.
Figure 15-1. If you want to read Drafts, Sent Mail, or any other folder, first tap the email address under Accounts.
To read your messages stored in an email account, follow these steps:
From the Home screen, tap Mail. The Mail screen appears, displaying what you last viewed.
Tap the button that appears in the upper-left corner of the screen. If you have set up multiple email accounts, a list of your email accounts appears.
Tap the email account under Inboxes that you want to use, or just tap All Inboxes to view all mail sent to all accounts. If you have set up only one email account, you can skip this step. A list of messages appears, as shown in Figure 15-2.
Tap the message you want to read. Your message appears in the right pane of the screen.
Since your Inbox folder constantly receives messages, you may want to organize them in different folders that you can create through your email provider. You may also delete messages to keep your Inbox folder tidy. Deleting a message moves it to the Trash folder. To permanently delete messages, you'll need to delete all the messages stored in the Trash folder.
To move a single message to a different folder, follow these steps:
From the Home screen, tap Mail. If necessary, tap the button in the upper-left corner of the screen to return all the way to the Mailboxes screen that lists all of your Inboxes and Accounts (see Figure 15-1).
Tap an email account. A list of folders appears in the left pane, as shown in Figure 15-3.
Tap the Inbox folder to view a list of messages.
Tap the message you want to move.
Tap the Move icon that appears in the upper-right corner of the screen. The top of the screen tells you to “Tap on a mailbox to move this message,” as shown in Figure 15-4.
Tap a folder where you want to store the currently displayed message, or tap Cancel.
To delete a single message, follow these steps:
Follow all the steps in “Reading Email” on page 110 to view the message you want to delete.
Tap the Delete icon at the top of the screen. The currently displayed message gets moved to the Trash folder.
Note
Want to clean up your Inbox quickly? Swipe a message's subject line left or right and then tap the red Archive or Delete button that appears.
To move multiple messages to a folder (or delete multiple messages instead), follow these steps:
Follow all the steps in “Reading Email” on page 110 to view any message.
Tap the Edit button that appears in the upper-right corner of the Inbox window. Small circles appear to the left of each message.
Tap the circle to the left of each message that you want to move or delete. A checkmark appears in the circle, as shown in Figure 15-5.
Tap the Delete or Move button at the bottom of the Inbox window. (If you tap the Move button, you'll need to tap a folder displayed in the Inbox window to choose which folder to move your selected messages to.)
Note
Instead of a Delete button, you may see an Archive button with certain email accounts, such as Gmail.
The simplest way to write a message is to reply to an existing message that you've already received. That way, you can send the message back to the sender's email address to provide a little context with your response without having to type it all over again. Another option is to forward a message. This lets you send a received message to someone else. If you have a wireless printer, you can also print a message so you have a copy you can review later.
To reply to a message, follow these steps:
Follow all the steps in “Reading Email” on page 100 to view the message to which you want to reply.
Tap the Reply icon (it looks like an arrow pointing to the left and appears in the upper-right corner of the screen). A menu appears listing Reply, Reply All, Forward, and Print options, as shown in Figure 15-6.
Tap Reply. A message window appears along with a virtual keyboard, as shown in Figure 15-7.
Forwarding a message can be handy when you want to resend something that somebody sent you, such as a joke or interesting picture. To forward a message, follow these steps:
Follow all the steps in “Reading Email” on page 110 to view the message that you want to forward.
Tap the Reply icon (it looks like an arrow pointing to the left and appears in the upper-right corner of the screen). A menu appears listing a Reply, Reply All, Forward, and Print options (see Figure 15-6).
Tap Forward. If the message contains a file attachment, a window may pop up asking if you want to include or not include the file attachment with your forwarded copy of the message, as shown in Figure 15-8.
Tap Include or Don't Include. A message window appears with a virtual keyboard.
Tap the To field, and type an email address.
Note
If you tap the plus sign icon that appears in the far right of the To field, a Contacts window pops up, allowing you to tap the name of a person whose email address you've already stored in the Contacts app.
Tap Send. Your iPad sends your message.
If you have a wireless printer, you may be able to print an email message wirelessly through your computer. To print a message, follow these steps:
Follow all the steps in “Reading Email” on page 110 to view the message that you want to forward.
Tap the Reply icon (it looks like an arrow pointing to the left and appears in the upper-right corner of the screen). A menu appears listing Reply, Reply All, Forward, and Print options (shown earlier in Figure 15-6).
Tap the Print button.
Rather than replying to or forwarding a message, you may want to create a new message to send to someone. To create a new message, follow these steps:
While using the Mail app, tap the Compose icon (it looks like a square with a pencil writing on it that appears in the upper-right corner of the screen). A New Message window appears with a virtual keyboard.
Tap the To field, and type an email address.
Note
If you tap the plus sign icon that appears in the far right of the To field, a Contacts window pops up, allowing you to tap the name of a person whose email address you've already stored in the Contacts app.
Tap the Subject field, and type a subject for your message.
Tap the Text field, and type your message.
Tap Send. Your iPad sends your message.
After you've received multiple messages, you may lose track of all of them. One way to deal with this flood of information is to always move messages into their own folders. Since this takes constant effort, you may find it easier just to search for a particular message instead.
You can search for text that appears in the From, To, or Subject fields, or you can search for text that appears in any of those three fields. This lets you search for messages that you received from a specific email address, messages that you sent to a particular email address, messages with certain types of subjects, or all three.
To search for a messages stored in an email account, follow these steps:
While using the Mail app, tap a folder that contains the messages you want to find. A list of messages appears.
Tap the Search field. The virtual keyboard appears along with From, To, Subject, and All tabs, as shown in Figure 15-9.
Tap the From, To, Subject, or All button at the top of the folder window.
Type a word or phrase. As you type, the folder window displays only those messages that match your search criteria.
Tap the message you want to read.
If you have set up two or more email accounts, you can choose to view messages within one account or view all of your messages at once. To view all your messages, follow these steps:
From the Home screen, tap Mail. The Mail screen appears, displaying what you last viewed.
Tap the Back button that appears in the upper-left corner of the screen to display the Mailboxes left panel.
Tap All Inboxes. The right panel displays messages from all your email accounts.
(Optional) Tap the Mailboxes button in the upper-left corner to return to the previous screen. Then tap an account name under Accounts. Your Inbox, Drafts, Sent, and other folders for that account appear.
After you've read a message, you may want to store it in another folder right away or delete it to keep your Inbox folder easy to manage. If you allow a flood of messages to fill your Inbox folder, it will be harder to find the one message you really want.
The Search feature can help you find a particular message, but to ensure that this Search feature works, train yourself to type descriptive words or phrases in the Subject field of all your outgoing messages. That way, you'll be able to search for a particular message using the Subject field.
Take time periodically to browse through your messages and weed out the ones you don't need. The less cluttered your Inbox folder, the easier it will be to find what you need when you need it.