Setting up the screen your way

Module 2: Reading email · Reading time: 8 minutes

Learning objective: After this lesson you know the webmail layout, and you can deliberately set up the message list, the moment a message counts as read, the language, the time zone and the appearance.

Key concepts: folder list, message list, preview pane, List options, sorting, List mode, thread, Mark messages as read, time zone, Interface skin

Three columns, each with its own job

After you log in, you see a screen in columns. In the image you see the menu and folders on the left, the message list in the middle and the open message on the right.

• The folders: Inbox, Drafts, Sent, Spam, Trash and your own folders. The number after a folder is the number of unread messages. Below the folders is a small bar that shows how full your mailbox is.
• The message list: the messages in the selected folder. At the top you find Select, Threads, Options and the search box.
• The preview pane: the message you click in the list. Above it are the buttons to reply, forward, delete and more.

This layout is also called the three-column model. The advantage is that you can quickly go through a list without opening and closing each message. You will see the downside further on: just clicking a message makes it count as read.

Almost everything you set here is stored in the webmail itself, with your mailbox. So it does not matter which computer you log in on. But it only applies to the webmail. The mail app on your phone has its own settings for sorting and display.

The list: sorting and List mode

Click Options above the message list to open the List options. In the image you see three choices:

• Sorting column: for example Arrival date, Sent date, sender, subject or Size. With None, the messages appear in the order in which they arrived in the folder. Note the difference between the two dates: the Sent date is the Date header, which the sender fills in (lesson 1.1). If the sender's clock is wrong, or a spammer sets a date in the future, that message stays at the top for days. The Arrival date is the moment your server received the message; your own server decides that, not the sender.
• Sorting order: descending puts the newest or largest at the top, ascending the oldest or smallest.
• List mode: List shows each message separately, Threads groups messages that belong together.

Sorting by size is a handy trick when your mailbox is filling up (lesson 5.4). Sorting by sender helps when you want to go through all the mail from one customer. For everyday work, most people find date, descending, the most convenient.

Threads: handy and sometimes confusing

In lesson 1.1 you saw that every message has a unique identifier, the Message-ID. When Ahmed replies to an email from Sanne, his mail program adds two headers to the reply that refer to that identifier: In-Reply-To (the message he is replying to) and References (the whole chain). This lets the webmail build a thread: the original message with all replies below it, including your own replies if they are in the same folder.

Threads are handy when you email back and forth a lot about one subject, for example with Ahmed about his bridal bouquet. You see the whole conversation together and do not miss a reply.

They are confusing in these situations:

• A program leaves out the reference. Some programs or forms do put Re: before the subject, but add no References. Then the reply appears on its own in the list, or is grouped by subject only.
• Same subject, different conversation. Grouping by subject can put together messages that have nothing to do with each other, such as ten emails with the subject "Factuur" (invoice) from different suppliers.
• A new subject in an old chain. If Daan replies to an old email to ask something new, his question disappears into an old thread. That is why you always start a new email for a new subject (lesson 3.2).

If in doubt, turn Threads off; you can always turn it back on. The webmail remembers this choice per folder. So you can keep your Inbox as a list and only use threads in a folder with a long customer correspondence.

When does a message count as read?

This is the setting that makes the most difference, and few people know about it. In lesson 1.2 you saw that read is a flag on the server. The webmail sets that flag under Settings > Preferences > Mailbox View, at Mark messages as read. The choices are immediately, after a number of seconds, or never.

If it is set to immediately, this happens: in the morning Sanne goes through her Inbox with the arrow keys to see what has come in. Every message that briefly appears in the preview pane counts as read. Including the question from Ahmed she still had to answer. On her phone it is no longer bold either. A week later she has forgotten there was an open question.

With after 5 or 10 seconds, a message only counts as read when you actually look at it for a moment. If you use your unread messages as a to-do list, you are better off choosing never and marking messages yourself with Mark > As read. There is no right or wrong choice, but it should be a deliberate one.

More settings that matter

• Rows per page (Mailbox View): 50 by default. More per page means less paging, but the list loads a little more slowly.
• Refreshing (User Interface): how often the webmail checks for new mail. With the Refresh button you do not have to wait.
• Language and Time zone (User Interface): the times in the list are converted to your time zone. With Auto, the webmail uses your computer's time zone. If that is wrong, emails seem to have arrived an hour too early or too late. That is awkward when you need to prove when something arrived.
• Interface skin (User Interface): the look of the webmail. At WebOké you choose between WebOké, Stretched Elastic (wider, for large screens), Aurora and Workbench.
• Dark mode: use the Dark mode button at the bottom left of the menu. The same button is then called Light mode.

In practice: how it works in the webmail

You find the list settings above the message list under Options. The rest is under Settings > Preferences, in User Interface and Mailbox View. Remember to click Save for each section. The steps are in the Roundcube manual under The screen at a glance, The message list, and Language, appearance and dark mode. Other webmail, such as Gmail or Outlook.com, works in a similar way: there too you can turn off threads and choose when a message counts as read, although the buttons have different names.

Summary

• The webmail has folders, a message list and a preview pane; your settings apply to the webmail, not to your other devices.
• With Options you choose the sorting and the List mode: List or Threads.
• Threads follow In-Reply-To and References; without those references, or with the same subject, they can mislead you.
• Mark messages as read decides whether just looking already counts as reading; choose deliberately.
• Check your time zone, otherwise the times in the list are wrong.

Quiz

Exercise

Exercise D2.1: Your layout. Deliberately set three things in the webmail: choose whether to turn Threads on or off (Options above the list), choose a sorting, and under Settings > Preferences > Mailbox View choose when a message counts as read (immediately, after a number of seconds, or never). Click Save and work with it for a day. Then answer these questions: Why did you choose these three settings, and does that suit the way you work with email? Was there a message that would otherwise have been marked as read without you really reading it? Do the times in the list match your computer's clock?

Further reading

Where steps in the webmail are described, they apply to the WebOké webmail; other webmail works in a similar way.

• Roundcube Webmail 2.1: The screen at a glance
• Roundcube Webmail 2.2: The message list: sorting and threads
• Roundcube Webmail 2.3: Language, appearance and dark mode
• Roundcube Webmail 10.1: The most important settings
• Free course Email in order: setting up and making sure it arrives properly 3.1: Folders and syncing: why you have two "Sent" folders
• RFC 5322, Internet Message Format, on Message-ID, In-Reply-To and References: https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc5322