Outlook Express Folders

Email messages are stored in folders in Outlook Express. Each Outlook Express folder has a corresponding database file where the messages are actually store. Folders allow you to organise messages and are invaluable when you have large amounts of email.

 Outlook Express creates some default folders that you can use. In addition you can create your own folders that more accurately reflect the way you work.

The default folders

When you first open Outlook Express you will see a folder called Local folders which is used by all pop3 accounts. This folder contains the default folders, they are:

Inbox, Outbox, Sent Items, Drafts, Deleted items

Each on of these folders is associated with a database file of the same name the database files have a .dbx extension. These folders cannot be deleted.

All email sent to any POP3 account will go into the inbox folder. That means that if you have multiple POP3 email accounts configured in Outlook Express then emails sent to any of the accounts will go into the inbox.

Each identity has its own local folders! So if you want to separate email from different POP3 mail boxes then configure one identity to access mailbox1 and the other identity to access mailbox2.

Creating Addition Folders

If you have lots of email messages then the best way of organising them is to create separate folders for each type of email. You could place email from your mom in one folder and from you son in another folder etc.

You can even configure message rules to move email automatically into the folder. New folders can be created under any of the default folders with the exception of the deleted items folder. I personally prefer to create all my folders underneath the inbox folder.

To create a new folder

1. Right click the folder where you want to create you new folder and choose new folder.

2. Give the folder a name and click ok.

3. The folder appears as a subfolder of the inbox

Viewing messages in Folders

Even though you have created additional folders to organise your email you still find that you have a lot of messages in the folder. The views option allows you to control what messages are visible. Outlook Express comes with some predefined views for email they are:

• Show All Messages.
  This view shows all the messages in one of your folders, such as your Inbox—new and old, read and unread. This is the default view for each folder.
• Hide Read Messages.
  This view hides all the messages you've read, leaving only the messages you have not read.
• Hide Read or Ignored Messages.
  This view hides messages that you have read or that you have applied the Ignore Conversation command to.

Although these default views are rather basic  it is possible to create your own custom views in much the same way as you create message rules. Once created the view can be applied to the appropriate folder. To learn how to Create your own custom views then see this tutorial Creating Custom Views in Outlook Express.

Sorting Messages in Outlook Express

Another way of managing messages in a folder is to sort the messages by their message properties. This allows you to display the messages by the date received , message sender etc. To learn how see the tutorial Sorting Messages in Outlook Express.

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