Email, short for "electronic mail", is one of the most widely used features of the Internet, along with the web. It allows you to send and receive messages to and from anyone with an email address, anywhere at anytime in the world. Email was originally written as "e-mail", but is now more commonly written as "email" without the dash.
Email uses multiple protocols (set of standards) within the TCP/IP (Transport Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) suite. The widely-known protocol that has been used when it comes to sending emails is the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) while other popular protocols for receiving information via email is the Post Office Protocol 3 (POP3) or Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP). There are a multitude of different programs and applications that have been specifically designed to access email accounts for both a web-based email and non-web-based email services, which includes the Microsoft Outlook for a desktop computers that has a Microsoft Operating System, and the Gmail application installed on the smartphone which functions on either an iOS or Android system. This links directly to the email service of the user.
Email messages were initially encoded in American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) text. However, it was extended by Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) to carry text in other character sets and multimedia content attachments. International email, with internationalized email addresses using UTF-8, was also standardized but not widely adopted. Today, email supports HTML, which allows emails to be formatted the same way as websites. HTML email messages can include images, links, and CSS layouts.
Today, the term email is often used to include both browser-based electronic mail, such as Gmail and Yahoo! Mail, and non-browser-based electronic mail, such as Outlook for Office 365. However, a distinction was previously made defining email as a non-browser program that required a dedicated client’s application and an email server. The advantages to using non-browser email are integration with corporate software platforms, enhanced security and absent of advertisements.
First Ever Email Sent
Ray Tomlinson is credited as the inventor of email in 1971, he developed the first system able to send mail between users on different hosts across the ARPANET, using the @ “at” sign to link the user name with a destination server. By the mid-1970s, this was the form recognized as email. By 1996, sent electronic mail supersedes that of mail sent through postal.
TYPES OF EMAIL
There are several services in existence that all were created to be sending and receiving electronic mails over the Internet service. The first one on the lists is now the widely in used all over the world.
- Web-based email
Many email providers have a web-based email client, such as Gmail, Outlook.com and Yahoo! Mail). This allows users to log into the email account by using any compatible web browser to send and receive their email. Mail is typically not downloaded to the web client, so can't be read without having any active Internet connection. - POP3 email servers
The Post Office Protocol 3 (POP3) is a mail access protocol used by a client application to read messages from the mail server. Received messages are often deleted from the server. POP supports simple download-and-delete requirements for access to remote mailboxes (termed maildrop in the POP RFC's). POP3 allows you to download email messages on your local computer and read them even when you are offline. - IMAP email servers
The Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP) provides features to manage a mailbox from multiple devices. Small portable devices like smartphones are increasingly used to check email while traveling and to make brief replies, larger devices with better keyboard access being used to reply at greater length. IMAP shows the headers of messages, the sender and the subject and the device needs to request to download specific messages. Usually, the mail is left in folders in the mail server. - MAPI email servers
Messaging Application Programming Interface (MAPI) is used by Microsoft Outlook to communicate to Microsoft Exchange Server - and to a range of other email server products such as Axigen Mail Server, Kerio Connect, Scalix, Zimbra, HP OpenMail, IBM Lotus Notes, Zarafa, and Bynari where vendors have added MAPI support to allow their products to be accessed directly via Outlook.
FILE TRANSFER PROTOCOL (FTP)
The File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is another standard protocol used for communication specifically designed for the transfer of files from a server-computer to a client-computer or vice-versa via a computer network. FTP is built on a client–server model architecture using separate control and data connections between the client and the server. Websites uses FTP to upload or download files from a website's server. FTP users may authenticate themselves with a clear-text sign-in protocol, usually in the form of a username and password, but can connect anonymously if the server is configured to allow it. For secure transmission that protects the username and password, and encrypts the content, FTP is often secured with SSL/TLS (FTPS) or replaced with SSH File Transfer Protocol (SFTP).
Chances are that if you have ever uploads or downloads image/video file on a social media, such as WhatsApp or Twitter then, definitely you have used a FTP technology.
The first FTP client applications were command-line programs developed before the incorporation of graphical user interfaces into the operating systems. FTP is still shipped with most Windows, Unix, and Linux operating systems.
Examples of FTP clients that can be downloaded include FileZilla Client, FTP Voyager, WinSCP, CoffeeCup Free FTP, and Core FTP.
In January 2021, support for the FTP protocol was disabled in Google Chrome (as of version 88), and has also been disabled in other major browsers, such as Firefox (as of version 88.0).
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