In this section I am going to start by showing you how you can create a very basic autoresponder. It replies to emails sent to you with a message saying something along the lines of “I am away”.
Autoresponder that Says “I am away”
Let’s create your first autoresponder. It will be very simple: anyone who sends an email to your email address gets back a reply with some text in it.
To create the autoresponder, click the “New” toolbar button (if you are not able to find the button, please read the Using the Main Window chapter). On the window that shows up, select the “Autoresponder” icon, and click the “New” button. This opens the “Autoresponder” window.
Type Out of Office in the “Name” box, and click the “Reply” tab. Click the “Message” button to open the message editor window. Type your email address (e.g. myaddress@mydomain.com) or whatever email address you want this autoresponder to use in the “From” text box. Then enter Re: $(Original-Subject) in the “Subject” box, and type anything as the text of the message, for example:
Click the “Save & Close” button to save your changes. This closes the message editor.
To find out how to take advantage of the message editor’s all features, read the Composing Mail Messages chapter.
Now you are going to configure the autoresponder to download messages from your POP3 account and tell it which SMTP server it should use to send emails. Click the “Mail Settings” tab, click "Incoming Mail Accounts" and click "Add" to set up a new account.
Type the account's email address in the "Email address" text box and the server address in the "Server name" box. Enter POP3 account user name and password in the other two text boxes (“User name” and “Password”).
Mark the “Leave copies of messages on the server” check box. With this option turned on, the autoresponder does not remove emails it downloads from your email account; you will be able to download and read them using your email program. Make sure the check box labeled “Do not leave a copy of a message that triggered an action” is not marked.
You can check if settings work by clicking the "Test Account Settings". Correct any errors before proceeding any further.
Now that you have configured the POP3 account, set up the SMTP server. Click "OK" to go back to the "Mail Settings" window, and click the "Outgoing Mail" tab.
Click "Add" type the name of the SMTP server you want to use in the "SMTP server name" text box. The autoresponder will use the SMTP server to send replies.
Note: If the SMTP server requires authorization, you can configure that using the same window (“My outgoing mail server requires me to log in” and “Authenticate by connecting to POP3 server” check boxes). For more information about incoming/outgoing mail configuration, read the Downloading and Sending Mail chapter.
You can test the server after you click "Test Server Settings".
Click “OK” to confirm the changes, and click "OK" again to go back to the “Autoresponder” window. The program automatically pre-selects the newly added account and server.
Click "OK" to finish the setup. Congratulations! Your autoresponder is now fully configured!
Testing the New Autoresponder
You are now going to see if the autoresponder works but before you do that, make sure it connects to the POP3 server as often as possible, so you do not have to wait too long for the reply (read Time Between Mail Downloads).
To test the autoresponder, open your favorite email program (or your web-based mail), create a new message, and type "This is a test" as the subject. Send the message to the autoresponder’s email address.
Wait a minute or two for the message to reach the mailbox and download new mail using your email program. If you configured the autoresponder correctly, the reply to your email (Re: This is a test) should be right there in your inbox.
To see a report of your autoresponder’s activity, use the "Incoming Mail” tab on the main program window. Read this section: Monitoring Program Activity to find out more.
Disabling the Autoresponder
Sometimes, you may want to temporarily disable an autoresponder. This is useful if you do not want it to process incoming mail for a while. For example, you may disable your “I’m away” autoresponder while you are ... well ... not away.
Double-click the autoresponder’s icon and clear the check box labeled “Use while processing mail”.
To turn the autoresponder back on, mark the check box.