Windows Mobile 6.1 brings a substantial facelift and some significant enhancements to the messaging application:

• Easier email setup and improved performance
• Follow-up tags
• Enhanced Security that alerts you if you navigate to a URL or file link that is not on the device
• Threaded text messaging
• Blacklist (doesn't seem to work)
• Printing via Bluetooth
• HTML email

Configuring Email Accounts

To configure an email account on a WM6.1 device, tap Start > Programs > Messaging icon to open up the messaging application, then tap Menu > Options > New Account

Input email address and password in the spaces provided; tap Next	Tap Next to get the email settings automatically

If the Pocket PC is connected to the internet, it will attempt to retrieve the email settings for the email address. For my pocketprimer email account, no email settings were found, so I proceeded to select options and set the email options manually.	WM6.1 accommodates different types of email providers: Internet email: Internet provider or webmail provider supports POP or IMAP email Exchange server: Your organization or company provides email using Microsoft Exchange server Custom domain: Your email address is hosted by a different email provider than the domain.

Select the appropriate email provider option and tap Next. Then enter your name (this name will be displayed in the "From" field on every email you send from the mobile device) and the email account display name in the space provided and tap Next to proceed to the next setup screen to input the incoming mail server and Account type.  Tap the down arrow to the right of the Account type box and select POP3 or IMAP4. Tap Next to proceed to the next screen of options.

Enter your full email address in the User name field and Password in the space provided, then select Next.

Input your Outgoing (SMTP) mail server information in the space provided. If your outgoing email uses a port other than the default port 25, you will append your port number to the outgoing SMTP mail server information.  My pocket primer email account uses port 80 for outgoing email, so you'll notice that I've appended the port number to the SMTP mail server string (smtpout.secureserver.net:80)

Most outgoing servers require authentication, so be sure to place checkmarks in the boxes next to "Outgoing server requires authentication" and "Use the same user name and password for sending e-mail."

Tapping the "Advanced Server Settings" link allows you to

• Select SSL settings for incoming or outgoing email and/or
• Specify the Network connection you will use when retrieving email. Options include Work, The Internet, MMS, WAP, or GPRS.

Tapping Next provides a screen where you can specify:

• Automatic Send/Receive options. Send/Receive choices include manually, every 5, 10, 15, 30, 60 minutes, or once a day
• Download messages options. Choices include "Today's messages," "from the past" 3, 5, 7, 30 days or "All messages"

Tapping the "Advanced Settings" link on this page allows you to specify if you wish to send and receive messages when you tap the send button or if you wish to use an automatic schedule to send and receive messages. You can also specify if deleting messages on the mobile device also deletes them on the server or keeps them on the server.

The last Email Setup screen allows you to specify: Message format: Choices include HTML or Plain Text Message download limit: Choices include 2, 5 KB, 20KB, Headers only, or Entire message.

Tapping Finish returns you to a tabbed Options screen where you can specify Accounts, Message, Address and Storage options.

Tapping the Security button on the Accounts screen allows you to activate a warning when navigating to a URL or file link that is not on the device.

Tapping the Signatures button allows you to input unique signatures for each email and text messaging account configured on the device.

Working with Email

After you've configured your email accounts, tap Menu to gain access to the specific messaging option. Tapping Menu reveals a myriad of options, which is covered in some detail in this section.

New creates a new email message

Reply to sender, All or Forward

Mark as Read/Unread

Follow up: Allows you to set, complete and clear flags on email messages. Unfortunately, when I attempted to set a flag on an email, all options were grayed out. The Follow up option does not appear to be functional.  This option may not be available on all WM6.1 devices.

Move allows you to move email messages into other folders.

Go To allows you to move to a Folder or other email account that is set up on the mobile device

Tools allows you to sort email and manage email folders:

• Sort emails by Message Type, From, Received, or Subject
• Manage Folders: Takes you to the folder view where you can create new folders or rename or delete folders.
  • Pressing & holding the stylus on a folder prompts a pop-up menu where you can choose to create a New Folder, Rename a folder, Delete a folder or view Folder Options.
  • The Rename and Delete options can only be applied to user defined folders and the Folder Options item was grayed out and inaccessible.
• Empty Deleted Items
• Clear (message account)
• Create a New Account
• Options

Download Message. If you configured the email account to download message headers, selecting the download message option for a specific email will prompt the mobile device to retrieve the entire email message the next time the Send/Receive option is issued.

Send/Receive provokes the mobile device to activate a data connection (if no connection is active) to retrieve and send email.

MMS Options takes you to a series of screens where you can specify how MMS and Text messaging is handled on the mobile device (discussed in the MMS / Text Messaging section below).

The Menu options are context sensitive so when you create or edit email messages, tapping Menu brings up some different options:

Add Recipient takes you to your address book Check Names compares manually entered email addresses against those in your address book Insert Picture, Voice Note, or File Save to Drafts Spell Check Cancel Message Message Options allows you to set the priority of the message (High, Normal, or Low) as well as Security, Permission, and Language

MMS / Text Messaging

Windows Mobile 6.1 brings a much improved and more versatile MMS / Text Messaging user interface to mobile devices. MMS and Text Messaging are now handled under MMS Options (previously windows mobile operating systems handled these separately).

After you open up the messaging application, tap Menu > MMS options to edit Preferences, specify blacklist preferences, and review and edit server settings,

Preferences tab

Preference settings are similar to those under WM5.0 with a few notable differences:

• Retrieval Mode can be set to auto, manually, or auto in Home Network; WM5.0 settings were to retrieve messages immediately or not at all.
• There's an option to disconnect from network after sending or receiving messages

BlackList tab

The BlackList tab provides a way to block phone numbers from being able to send text messages to your cell phone . . . a very useful option that has been missing from windows mobile phones.

I was glad to see a Blacklist option, but I can't figure out how to use it.  If you have been able to use this option, please post a comment and tell us how it works.

Servers tab

Here you can program the specific MMS/Text messaging settings for your cellular service.

AT&T is my cellular provider and these settings were automatically configured on the device.

About tab

The About tab provides information about the MMS software version on the device.

Threaded Text Messaging

WM6.1 organizes text messages into threaded conversations. I have worked with SMS-Chat on my WM5.0 hw6925, so I was interested to see how SMS-Chat compares with WM6.1's threaded text messaging.

Threaded text messaging organizes text messages into conversations by rolling them up by contact.	Tapping a contact name shows the detailed messages in the conversation.

An odd thing I noticed after I spent some time exchanging text messages was that the more I text messaged, the narrower the white space got where I input messages. The space got so narrow that I could not see what I had typed, making it impossible to proof messages before I sent them. This issue has been reported by other users, so I believe this is a defect in the way threaded text messaging is implemented under WM6.1.

If you don't like threaded text messaging, you can turn it off by modifying the registry.

I like the way threaded text messaging works, but prefer the SMS-Chat software to the threaded text messaging feature under WM6.1. SMS-Chat provides more features and it was just more comfortable working with that software.

My Conclusions & Wish List

The modifications in the messaging application are nice, but the messaging application is still deficient in many ways:

• The automatic email setup worked very well and made email setup very easy for traditional email accounts.
• The blacklist function is a much needed enhancement for windows mobile devices but there needs to be some clear documentation about how to use this function
• Threaded text messaging is a great enhancement to windows mobile devices, but the bug needs to be addressed to make it a more enjoyable experience. 

Since I work with several email accounts on a daily basis, I would like to see the following enhancements in future releases:

• A way to copy and paste an email account into a new email account. For instance I have several MindSpring email accounts. The only differences between these accounts are the login name and password. I would like to set up one account, and then copy and paste that account to a new account. Then I could change the username and password to make the new account operational.
• A way to retrieve email from all programmed email accounts at the same time. When retrieving email now, I must select a messaging account, retrieve the email there, then select the next messaging account and retrieve the email there. 

NOTE: The screenshots in this article are of the IPAQ 910c.  Some of the options you see may be unique to the IPAQ 910c and may not be available on other WM6.1 devices.

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