Netbooks: The Missing Manual

Chapter 6. Email and Web Browsing

Email is the driving force that first motivated many people to invite computers and the Internet into their homes. The millions of electronic epistles that fly through the air between computers, smartphones, and handheld organizers have become an indispensable part of daily personal and professional life. No wonder the U.S. Postal Service has been losing business the past 15 years.

You may be surprised to know that the first email message was sent way back in 1971. Twenty years later, the World Wide Web—the interconnected system of electronic pages containing everything from academic papers on Johannes Gutenberg to video clips of dogs riding skateboards—became another reason to go out and buy a computer.

It’s small wonder, then, that the netbook’s ability to keep a near-constant connection to email and the Web makes them the hottest-selling computers on the market today. This chapter shows you how to get your netbook’s email and web browser fired up and ready to go so you, too, won’t miss a thing.

Setting Up an Email Program

You have two common ways to get email on your netbook: through a web-based mail (webmail) site like Yahoo, or from your Internet service provider and an email program like Outlook Express. Both methods have their pros and cons. But you may not have to choose one way to get email. You can, for example, download your Gmail email into an email program most of the time, so you can organize it better, but also check it on the Gmail website ...