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How to Setup Email on a “Smart” Phone

For being so called "smart" devices, many people seem to have a lot of trouble setting up their phones to send and receive email.

Luckily every mail program I've come across expects just a few pieces of information.

One caveat about the following information, it does not cover using an Exchange server. But then again I've yet to see a phone that can access Exchange.

Incoming Mail Server: Sometimes called a host, same thing. This is also the server that's concerned with which mail protocol (IMAP or POP3) to use. If possible it is generally  better to use IMAP as it is a much more robust setup. This may setting will generally look something like:

mail.yourdomain.com

Many times the mail. is optional. But it depends entirely on your server setup. (Your domain's MX record should point to the same place, so if all else fails check that.)

Outgoing Mail Sever: Yet again sometimes called a host. This will use the SMTP protocol. This will generally look like:

smtp.yourdomain.com

Yet again, it will depend on how your server is setup.

Incoming Port: This is a standard port number. 110 for POP3 and 143 for IMAP unless the system administrator configured a custom port. There are a different set for SSL connections, but I'm too lazy to look them up right now.

Outgoing Port: This is also a standard port number, port 25 with a different one for SSL.

This is where lots of people will run into problems. Most phone carriers have blocked port 25 (as have must ISPs), this is to prevent their network from being used as an open relay for Spam to be sent through.

What you will notice if you have the above mentioned problem is that you can receive email, but you can't send email.

Many hosting providers have alternate ports configured to allow for sending email, you'll have to talk to them about which number to use in that case.

Outgoing Server Requires Authentication: This will be check box, usually listed with the outgoing server port number. This is a security provision to keep unauthorized mail from being sent through a server. The credentials for this are generally the exact same as your incoming mail server.

Secure Password Authentication (SPA): This is a password encryption protocol and single-handedly the most mis-enabled setting by Mac Users* . I haven't seen this in use much, probably because it creates a mess with clients that don't support it.

A note about authentication: if you mail program asks you for a type of authentication, most likely it will be password.

Username and Password: Why do I feel the need to cover this? Well this is one of those common problems. If you're in a shared environment, you'll have to use your entire email account as your username. It will be in the form:

account@domain.com

The reason for this is that that there may be many mailboxes under a specific domain named "admin" or "local.dumbass" so the domain is needed to identify one "local.dumbass" from another.

Passwords ARE case-sensitive! (http://alltech-nologic.com/2010/08/intelligence-apparently-casesensitive/)

*Yes, I need to put a plug in about Mac Users. 50% of the people I deal with are Mac users and they're generally the dumber half. Although I suppose these people would be just as clueless if they were using Windows and even more clueless if left to their own devices on a Linux machine. That being said, how Apple manages to make something as simple as a mail program almost un-configurable is beyond me entirely.

--Update-- 9/4/10

I've been informed by a friend that most new smart phones support exchange. Everything from Android to the iPhone (go Blackberry?).