Outlook Express Stationary-Using and Creating

Outlook Express stationary allows you to create personalised and attractive messages for emails and newsgroups. Outlook Express comes with some basic stationary but there are many sources of stationary on the Internet, and most of it is free! If you can't find it on the Internet, then you can always create your own.

Outlook Express stationary is basically an HTML file (web page), hence it can contain images, backgrounds, coloured and unique fonts, and even sound. The stationary serves as a template for your email and allows you to send attractive email and even email with sound.

Because it is an HTML page the email client that receives it must be capable of receiving HTML email.

How to obtain free Outlook Express Stationary

There are many sites on the Internet offering free Outlook Express Stationary just go to your favourite search engine and type free Outlook Express Stationary. Here is a selection of a few of the sites offering free Outlook Express Stationary.

• Thundercloud
• Microsoft
• Stationery heaven
• Sandrasue

Beware Spyware

There are many sites that offer free stationary and in return they install customised search toolbars in Outlook Express and Internet explorer. Some of these are can be classified as Spyware and should be treated with caution. If you are in any doubt than don't use it. A very common one with Outlook Express is hotbar. You may want to read the following before using it- Hotbar and spyware.

How to Install your free Outlook Express Stationary

When you obtain your Outlook Express Stationary from the Internet it will come in one of the following two formats.

• Standard HTML files
• .EML files

Standard HTML files

A normal web page consists of a .htm file which contains all of the HTML formatting commands, and if used, associated image and sound files. Thus a piece of stationary containing images and or sound will actually consist of two or more files. These files are normally zipped together in a self-extracting .exe file. If you download the file into a suitable directory on your machine and then double click it will place the HTML files in the stationary directory. Most of the problems with this type of stationary tend to be because of file references to files in the wrong directories.

EML files

This is a newer way of offering stationary and in many ways its is much simpler than the standard HTML method. In this format all of the HTML files mentioned above are combined into a single .eml file. If you look at an .eml file in windows it displays it as a message icon to use this file just double click the file and Outlook express will open up in a new message window. These files are often distributed as .zip files. You need to unzip them into a suitable directory to use them. Unlike the HTML files the directory you use is not important.

Advantages of .eml format:
1. You can name file anything that you want without effecting the stationery itself as it is self contained and doesn't reference external files.
2. You can store it any directory i.e. it does not need to go in the stationary directory.
3. Less files
4. The .eml format seems to work on any computer.
6. It is easier to delete, as you don't need to know how many files and which files make up the stationary as it is only a single file .eml.

Disadvantages of .eml format:
1. You cannot preview it in the Outlook Express "preview pane", as you can with other stationary. You can however preview them using windows explorer.

Spelling

I am aware that the correct spelling is stationery not stationary. However, it is a very common spelling mistake to use stationary instead of stationery. In fact more people search on stationary than stationery and hence my use. If you want a memory aid for remembering the correct spelling then here is one.