WAM - General (5)
When you use a Webmail service like Gmail®, Hotmail®, AOL®, etc., your emails are sitting on their servers. Even many corporate/private email systems are setup the same way. Whether they are hosting their own webmail or if they’re using Godaddy® or Gmail® for their own. Webmail allows you to access your emails through a standard web browser like Internet Explorer, Firefox, or Safari from the internet, usually with no applications or additional software required. All of the work is done by the server that is hosting the Webmail pages.
Email clients are another way to access emails. This is a program that is installed on your computer that will interact with the remote email servers to access your emails. Two common email clients are Outlook and Thunderbird. These clients usually access emails in one of two methods:
One method is that your client program simply downloads any new emails from the email server to your computer. The email client then allows you to read, reply, compose, delete, organize those emails. This method is called POP (Post Office Protocol).
The other method is where your client program interacts with the email server similar to your Webmail. The emails remain on the server, but your client obtains the lists of emails and allows you to go through them to read, reply, compose, delete, and organize. However, they remain on the email server.
Whether it’s through Webmail or through your email client like Outlook, with your emails on your email server, they can begin to pile up. Your webmail service usually has a size limit which you have to remain under (or perhaps upgrade to a paid premium service). Additionally, even if you don’t “see” all your emails, they are there, and the Webmail program or your email client has to sort through them to display emails or to allow you to organize them. This can make your email “experience” slow and clunky. You may have also seen emails disappear only to reappear a few moments later. Those emails are important, and you want to keep them. We hear all the time of emails being “lost” sitting on email servers like this (even the “Big Boys”), and there simply isn’t any recourse.
Enter WAM. With WAM, you can get those emails off the email server and onto your computer where it’s safe. The entire message, folder layout, and any file attachments are downloaded. WAM can automatically delete the message from the email server OR leave it there for you to delete yourself later. Don’t worry, WAM won’t spend time trying to download them again, it’ll keep track of messages it’s already downloaded.
You’ll have the peace of mind of having those old emails and the files on your computer where it’s safe. You can then back them up to a thumb drive or whatever backup solution you use for your computer. Your Webmail or email client will be faster, and more stable. It will reduce (if not eliminate entirely) disappearing emails by decreasing the number of emails it has to sort through and juggle.
Any email services that you can access via IMAP or POP. Some examples are Gmail®, Yahoo®, AOL®, Hotmail®™, MSN®, Outlook.com®, and Juno®, just to name a few.
If you check your settings in your Webmail, you should see a setting for IMAP and/or POP3.
Specific settings are provided in the FAQ : WAM – Program Use.
Absolutely! If you’re using POP3, then you can only download messages in the Inbox, but if you’re using IMAP, then you have full functionality.
Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 10.
If you are using Windows 7 or up, you’ll want to run the installation file as Administrator. You do this by right clicking the installation file, and selecting “Run as Administrator”.
When you purchase Webmail Archive Manager (WAM), you’ll automatically receive an email with your registration key. The program will be registered to your email address.
In the program, click on About, then click the Register button. Enter your information there.
WAM - Program Use (10)
The data file is where all the information for your emails is stored. It’s a separate file. In the “Advance” menu option, there are some tools that you can use to create new data files, connect to different ones, and so on. This is primarily for the advanced user, and isn’t necessary for anyone to use.
Absolutely not. This is primarily for the advanced user. Most users will never do anything with data file.
Webmail Archive Manager does not to be online to work. It has to be online during two functions only.
1. When you are downloading emails from your webmail email account.
2. When you are submitting your registration key to unlock the program.
Other than those two times, you can run WAM offline.
For Outlook:
1. Click on Tools then select Account Settings from the menu.
2. Find the email account you are checking, the second column should be “Type” and it will tell you if it’s POP or IMAP.
3. If you don’t see it there, go ahead and double-click the account.
4. In the new window (Titled “Change E-mail Account”), look under Server Information and find Account Type. It will say POP3 or IMAP.
For Thunderbird, the instructions are similar.
1. Click on the “Hamburger” in the upper right corner of the window.
2. Select Preferences then select Account Settings.
3. In the left pane, click on Server Settings.
4. In the right pane, find Server Type and it will say IMAP or POP3.
I know that I have attached files in different emails that have the same name. Do I need to do anything about those? How will I keep them straight?
WAM will handle those files automatically. It uses a numbering system like this: if the file is named pictureofben.jpg and there are three (3) of them, then the first will be named pictureofben.jpg, the next one downloaded will be named pictureofben(1).jpg and the next one will be pictureofben(2).jpg.
The program will keep them separated and attached to the correct email message.
Many Email Providers have Special Folders in your account. These are folders that are in the account when you started, and you usually can’t delete them or change them. They often have a special meaning. Here are some examples:
All Mail = All your emails from all your folders.
Sent Mail = Emails that you’ve sent.
Important = Emails that are flagged a certain way.
These special folders usually show up in WAM under a bracketed folder. For example, Gmail’s special folders show up under the folder [Gmail].
The main thing to remember about special folders is that they’re usually a virtual type folder. They usually show you emails that are actually in some other folder or folders. If you download, for instance, the All Mail special folder, then ALL your emails will be downloaded to that folder in WAM. When WAM encounters those same emails in the other folders (where you had put them), it will consider it a duplicate email, and not download it. The result is that ALL your emails will be in your All Mail folder instead of the separated folders where you put them.
So, you’re going to want to select YOUR folders first, and download them. Then, you can go back and select the Special Folders to download. The messages have already been downloaded won’t be downloaded again. Anything that was missed in the first download will get picked up now.
While you are viewing messages, you can move messages around and also reorganize your folders. That means you can add folders, delete folders, and move folders to different places. It’s perfectly safe so feel free to experiment.
Here are the controls:
- Press the <Insert> key to add a folder to the folder that you currently have highlighted. Just type in the name you want for that folder
- Press the <Delete> key to delete the folder that is currently highlighted (there are rules for deleting folders, see the other FAQ).
- Click a folder name to change it.
- Click and drag a folder to move it to a different location. You drag it by holding the left click button down while you move to another folder.
When Webmail Archive Manager (WAM) accesses your webmail email account, the first thing it does is download the folders in your account. Sometimes when there is a special character in the name of the folder such as an ampersand (&), the email provider has trouble referencing that folder name. USUALLY the email provider handles these special characters just fine, and it doesn’t affect anything. WAM tests this by trying to access that folder back to the email provider. If the email provider returns an error during this test, that means they aren’t handling that special character. It’s those folders that are reported as “Problem Folders”.
The simplest way to fix these folders is to print out the list from WAM, and log in to your webmail email account, and rename those folders without the special character. For instance, OA & B Materials can become OA and B Materials.
It really depends on how big those emails are. Emails with file attachments and/or images embedded in the email will take longer to download than an email with just text or maybe html. You can just leave the program running (if you select to skip emails with errors), and come back to it later.
It really doesn’t take very long to download even when there are attached files. An account that had 16,000 emails with file attachments only took about half an hour to download. Once you’ve run WAM to download your emails once, each subsequent download takes a lot less time. Usually it’s just 10-15 minutes.
Most emails download really fast. So fast, you don’t even see it or couldn’t even see a progress meter display before it flashes off. WAM only brings up a progress meter if the download is of a size that will take more than a second or two to download. It just shows you the progress meter so you can watch it’s progress, or at least know that it’s DOING something when it takes a little longer.
WAM - Troubleshooting (10)
Absolutely nothing. We won’t help you diagnose your Windows installation or your hard drive, but we WILL help you with our software.
Support is free at MaxEdge Software.
You can post on our Forum or Chat with us at this website.
You can also email us at support @ maxedge.com, and we’ll respond within 24 hours.
These usually occurs when you’ve changed the installation folder on a Windows 7 or higher computer. Microsoft has altered which folders are “writable” or not. We follow their recommendations on installation locations based on their new layout. If you change the installation folder, you may have changed it to a folder that Windows doesn’t allow the program to access or write to.
If you are having errors, uninstall WAM, and reinstall using the default installation folder or at least make sure you’re installing to a folder that WAM can write to. Your data file should remain intact.
Sometimes there are folders that you see while you are in webmail that don’t show up in WAM when you go to download messages. These “special folders” are for specific uses such as Drafts, Archive, Sent, Important (other custom names). They are usually created by your email provider and often can’t be deleted. They are different than the folders you can create, delete, and move around.
WAM should still be able to see these “special folders”, but occasionally the email provider will make them “invisible” when communicating to their server. If you’d like to download messages in any special folders that you don’t see, just create new folders in webmail. You can then transfer the messages to the new folder. WAM will be able to see this new folder.
When you try to delete a folder in “View Messages”, the program requires that it be empty of messages and other folders. If it’s not, it will not allow you to delete it. You simply need to start at the “lowest” folder, remove the emails by moving them or deleting, then move or remove that folder.
This is because if you delete a folder with messages or other folders in it, the program has to decide what to do with those messages and folders. It’s best if you explicitly decide where they should go rather than WAM deciding where to move them.
You can reorganize the folders and where emails are stored while you are viewing the emails that you’ve downloaded. However, when you go to download new emails, WAM will read the folders as they are in your webmail (at your email providers server). All you have to do is download them, and you can move them once they are in WAM.
If you don’t want to have to move your emails or folders after downloading, just change the way you have it organized in your webmail to match the way you have it in WAM. Then they will download to the same folders.
When you highlight a part of a message or maybe an email address, and you want to copy or cut so you can paste it in another application, simply use the shortcut keys.
- Copy = Press the <Ctrl> key and hold, then press the letter “c”
- Cut = Press the <Ctrl> key and hold, then press the letter “x”
- Paste = Press the <Ctrl> key and hold, then press the letter “v”
Gmail has a special folder called “All Mail”. It’s a virtual folder (not real) that has…well, all your emails in it.
The problem is if you select that folder to download, then ALL your emails get downloaded into that folder. When WAM comes across those same emails in the other folders (the folders the emails actually are located), it doesn’t download them because it already has.
So, don’t select the “All Mail” folder when downloading from Gmail. Of course, it’s entirely up to you, but I wouldn’t download Trash or Junk either. 🙂
You can see the FAQ on “What are special folders” for more information.
If you use Gmail, then this is an issue that will affect you. It’s not really a big deal, but one of those annoyances that we sometimes have to deal with. Google has come up with their own authentication process. It adds additional security when you log into your Google or Gmail account. Unfortunately, they categorize any app not using THEIR process as “less secure”.
Your password is encrypted in WAM. The connection to Gmail is also encrypted with the latest, most secure protocols. Fortunately, there’s a way to set your account to allow “less secure apps” access. Remember, access is still very secure even if it’s “less” secure. If you are concerned, you can always switch it back after you’ve downloaded your emails.
Here are the step by step instructions:
- Sign in to your Gmail account at www.gmail.com
- There’s a “gear” icon in the upper right corner of the window, click the down arrow.
- Select “Settings” from the drop down list.
- Find the “Accounts and Import” tab and click on it.
- The first item in the list is “Change account settings:”
- Click on the link “Other Google Account Settings.”
- A new browser window or a new tab will open, this is your Google account.
- In the left window labeled “Sign-in & security”, click the third link down “Connected apps & sites.”
- In the main window, look down to the last entry called “Allow less secure apps:”, it is probably “Off”. Turn it “On” by clicking the slide bar.
- Close this browser window or tab.
- Sign out of Gmail.
That’s it! You’re all set, and the test connection from WAM will work now. You will probably get an email telling you what you’ve done. Follow the same steps if you want to turn it back off.
Sometimes WAM encounters a message that it has trouble breaking into its different parts. Since it’s not just “dumping” everything into a visual message like on webmail or in an email client, it won’t process that message. This error is because the message is not formatted correctly. These are almost always spam emails or incorrectly configured bulk senders. Skipping them is not usually a problem, but to be sure, they are left on your webmail email account. If you remove the messages you’ve downloaded, you’ll see these messages as left in your account, and you can review them to see what the problem might be.
If you feel a legitimate message is being reported as an error, please, feel free to forward the message to support @ maxedge.com so we can evaluate it to see why that particular email is causing an error.
WAM - Installation (10)
Just download the installation file from http://maxedge.com/downloads.
It will be a “zip” file, so you’ll need to extract it. In Windows Explorer, just right click the file.
Once the installation program is extracted (a single .exe file), you’re going to double click it to run.
If you are using Windows 7 or up, you’ll want to run the installation file as Administrator. You do this by right clicking the installation file, and selecting “Run as Administrator”.
Just follow the prompts after that.
Email Server: imap.aol.com
Port: 993 (check SSL)
Username: Your full email address
Password: Your password (it’s encrypted in the database for security)
Email Server: imap.mail.att.net
Port: 993 (check SSL)
Username: Your full email address
Password: Your password (it’s encrypted in the database for security)
Email Server: imap.comcast.net
Port: 993 (check SSL)
Username: Your full email address
Password: Your password (it’s encrypted in the database for security)
Email Server: imap.gmail.com
Port: 993 (check SSL)
Username: Your full email address
Password: Your password (it’s encrypted in the database for security)
You also have to make sure that IMAP is “turned on” in your Gmail account:
1. Sign in to Gmail.
2. Click the gear in the top right .
3. Select Settings.
4. Click Forwarding and POP/IMAP.
5. Select Enable IMAP.
6. Click Save Changes.
Note: This setting is not available while using the basic HTML view of Gmail. To enable IMAP, use the standard view instead
Email Server: imap.secureserver.net
Port: 993 (check SSL)
Username: Your full email address
Password: Your password (it’s encrypted in the database for security)
No IMAP Settings, only POP3.
Email Server: pop.juno.com
Port: 995 (check SSL)
Username: Juno Member ID (do NOT include @juno.com)
Password: Your password (it’s encrypted in the database for security)
Network Solutions provides email services for your own domain.
Note: Substitute your actual domain name for “yourdomain.com”.
Email Server: mail.yourdomain.com
Port: 143 (clear SSL box)
Username: Your full email address
Password: Your password (it’s encrypted in the database for security)
Email Server: imap-mail.outlook.com
Port: 993 (check SSL)
Username: Your full email address
Password: Your password (it’s encrypted in the database for security)
Email Server: imap.mail.yahoo.com
Port: 993 (check SSL)
Username: Your full email address
Password: Your password (it’s encrypted in the database for security)