There's a problem here:
If you use a popular email client like
Outlook, Outlook Express or Eudora, you will probably experience
problems
sending
email
when you're away from home. Sending mail requires an Outgoing
Mail Server or SMTP (simple mail transfer protocol) server. When
you are home, you
are connecting
directly to your ISP (Internet
Service
Provider) and you are using their SMTP server. If you look into
your 'e-mail account' settings you will see a place to enter
the SMTP server name. This will probably have the name of the SMTP
server
provided by your home ISP. It used to be that these SMTP servers were completely open and
would work for anyone, anywhere. All that has changed with the
proliferation of Spam. Most SMTP servers are now closed. They are
only available to
people who are logged in (authenticated) to their system.
When you're away from home and using Wi-Fi, you are not connected
to your home ISP. You are connected to whatever ISP is providing
the service to the hot-spot. So, when Outlook tries to send email
to the SMTP server, it will be rejected. Your home SMTP server is
not available to you because you are not logged in to your home ISP.
It actually gets a LOT more complicated than that, but this should
give you the basic idea.
What can you do about it?
The fix may be as simple as finding the setting in your email
software that says ""My Outgoing Server requires Authentication" and "Use
the same name and password as my Pop3 server". If that doesn't
help, you can call your home ISP and ask if there is any other
solution that allows you to use your same email when not connected
at home.
If your email provider has a webmail interface, that is a great
solution while you're away from home. You can read your email and
reply or send new email from any Internet connection without using
Outlook.
If your ISP does not offer either of the above solutions, you
could get another email address that is not associated with your
ISP. Lots of free ones are available like Yahoo, or Hotmail. Or,
what we recommend, is getting your own domain from a registrar like
Network Solutions or GoDaddy or Catalog.com.
If you don't like any of the above solutions, check out www.smtp.com
for a workaround to use your existing setup and still be able to
send email from a Wi-Fi connection. |
