Although the early days of the email used purely text email, technology has improved vastly, allowing people to send any kind of document through email in the form of attachments. For UWB staff who use Outlook, attachments are probably a familiar concept, but Outlook Web Access 2003 (OWA) does use a somewhat different interface, which deserves our attention.
To begin, start composing a message like you normally do. When you are ready to attach the file you want, click on Attachments: button as shown below:
You will now see an "Attachments" window like below. You now need to find the file you want to attach, so click Browse...
Now search for the file. When you find it, click on it to highlight it, and then click Open.
Now the path to the file should appear in the "Choose a file to attach" window. Click Attach at this point to actually attach it to the email:
After a few moments, the file will appear in the bottom window. It is now attached to the email, so you can click Close.
At this point, you will be back to the email you were writing. Go ahead and finish the email and send it off. The file(s) attached will be sent out with the email!
When an email comes in with an attachment, it will show up in the email list with a paper clip next to it. Click the message to open the email. In the right pane, you will see the attached file(s) listed next to Attachments:. For example, the file attached to the email below is Business report.doc.
To open the attachment, you can just click on the filename listed in the email and it should open. If the file does not open, it might be that the file type is something not readable by your computer. This usually means you are missing the right program to read the document. For example, if you don't have Microsoft Word on your computer, you can't read Word documents. If you don't have Acrobat Reader, you cannot read PDF files, and so on.
When you open an email with an attachment, you will often see a warning like this:
Computer viruses are now rampant on the Internet these days, and often send themselves by email to other victims. These viruses look like emails with attachments, but if you open that file, the virus is activated and infects your computer. From there it will attempt to infect other people around you!
Take the warning above to heart. If you get an unexpected email attachment, even if it appears to be from someone you know, do not open it, until you are sure it is safe. If the attachment is from someone you don't know, just delete the email right away.
By being street-smart, you can protect yourself from viruses and other malicious code on the Internet.
If you have further questions, please do not hesitate to contact the IS Helpdesk at (425) 352-5275 or email us at help@uwb.edu.
