After a long weekend we all like to brag with our coworkers about how
many emails end up in our inbox. Yes spam is part of our online society.

After receiving 400+ emails after one weekend I decided it was time to
change things.

I started use Mozilla’s Suite and sometimes I would test Thunderbird
as my email program, and it’s not that much different than Mozilla Suite,
and both are great for:

• Organizing folders and files
• Managing (spam) junk email

Managing junk email

Mozilla Suites & Thunderbird offer easy to use junk email controls
with advanced security features.

From the main menu bar click on tools and click on Junk
Mail controls.

This image on the left is how I set my controls.

The controls are fairly simple:

• If the sender is in my address book then they will not be listed as
  junk.
• If the email is considered to be junk then it goes to the junk email
  folder and will be deleted after 14 days (Default).
• Thunderbird will also sanitize any html from any scripting included
  in the email.
• To mark or un-mark an email as junk: In the email list there will be
  an icon on the email row that can be turned on or off.

When you first start Mozilla or Thunderbird mail
expect about a 2 week learning curve. That’s right the junk mail controls
will learn what you consider junk by an algorithm that looks at the sender,
subject and the body of the message.

You may want to wait until you address book is a
certain size before you turn on the controls.

Managing folders

Mozilla & Thunderbird make it simple to add and direct incoming emails
to spicific folders. Why create folders? Simple: When dealing with groups
or subjects, it’s easier to follow and find information.

There is also a search feature that I use several times a week. This
saves lots of time.

Security features

Among the new security features in Thunderbird 1.5 are Kerberos
authentication and integration with server-side spam filtering. There
is also a built-in phishing detector to help protect you against e-mail
scams, providing an “extra line of defense” in preventing users from getting
caught up in e-mail identity-theft and information-theft scams.

Some of the new improvements in Thunderbird include automatic spelling
checking as the user types a message and auto saving as drafts. You can
also receive rss feeds as email messages.

June 11, 2006: Thunderbird is listed on PC World’s Best 100 Products
for 2006.

Know after a long (3 or 4 day) weekend there maybe 400+ emails coming
in, but there are only about 5 spam emails in my inbox.