Mail Accounts and Sending

To send email, or to read it from your mail server, GpgFrontend needs to know your mail account. This page shows how to add one and how to send a message.

You only need an account to send and fetch mail. Everything else in GpgFrontend works without one.

New in v2.2.3

Mail accounts and sending are new. Before, you had to send messages with a separate email app.

Two Words You Will See

Your mail provider runs two kinds of servers:

• IMAP is the server that keeps your mailbox. GpgFrontend uses it to read your mail.
• SMTP is the server that sends mail out. GpgFrontend uses it to send.

Your mail provider’s help pages list the address of each server. They often look like imap.example.com and smtp.example.com.

Open the Mail Accounts Page

1. Click Edit > Settings.
2. In the Features group, click Mail Accounts.

Add an Account

If you have no account yet, the page says No mail accounts yet. Click Add an Account. If you already have one, click Add Account… under the list. The Add Mail Account window opens. It has four steps: Account, Servers, Check and Review.

1. Your Account: type Your name (as people will see it), your Email address, and your Password. Click Continue.
2. Servers: GpgFrontend fills in the servers for you, from your address.
   • Choose what the account is for: Send and receive, Receive only or Send only.
   • Check the servers under Server settings. If they are wrong, click Edit, change them, and click Done.
   • Some providers want a login name that is not your email address. If yours does, click Edit, open Login usernames, and fill in Incoming (IMAP) and Outgoing (SMTP).
   • Click Continue.
3. Connection Check: GpgFrontend signs in to each server, without sending or changing anything. The check starts by itself. When everything works, click Continue.
4. Review: check the details. Turn on Use as the default account if you want this account to be offered first when you send. Your first account always becomes the default.
5. Click Add Account. The window closes, and the account appears in the list.
6. Click OK at the bottom of the Settings window to save.

Nothing is saved until you click OK. If you click Cancel, your changes are thrown away.

On a Mac

The Settings window is called Preferences and has no OK button. There, your changes are saved when you close the window.

Changed in v2.2.4

Adding an account is now a guided window that finds your servers for you. Before, you clicked Add and filled in the Identity, Receiving (IMAP) and Sending (SMTP) sections yourself.

How GpgFrontend Finds Your Servers

• For well-known providers, such as Gmail, Outlook.com, iCloud, Yahoo, GMX or Posteo, GpgFrontend already knows the servers.
• For other addresses, it asks your DNS server (the internet’s address book) where the mail servers for your domain are. Before it does, the first step tells you so. Nothing is looked up while you type.
• If nothing is found, it guesses addresses such as imap.example.com and smtp.example.com.

The Source line under Server settings says where the servers came from: built-in settings for your provider, found in DNS, guessed, or Entered by you. If it says the servers were guessed, check them with your provider’s help pages.

If the Check Fails

Each server shows Connected or Failed, with the reason. You can:

• Click Back, fix the servers, and click Continue. The check runs again by itself. To run it again without changing anything, click Retry.
• Tick Add this account anyway and fix the connection later, if you want to set it up later in Settings.

Click Stop to stop the check. Nothing is then verified.

Change an Account

Click an account in the list to see its details. They are in three parts:

• Account: Display name, Email address and Password.
• Servers: for receiving and for sending, a Use this account to receive or Use this account to send box, the Server, and the Connection type.
• Advanced (click to open):
  • Reply-To: where replies should go, if not to your email address. Leave it empty if you are not sure.
  • Incoming user name and Outgoing user name: usually your full email address. Leave the outgoing one empty to send without signing in.
  • Sent folder: leave it empty. It shows Discovered automatically. Type a folder name only if your copies of sent mail end up in the wrong place.

You can turn on receiving, sending, or both. An account that does neither cannot be used.

Connection Choices

The Connection list decides how your password and mail are protected on the way to the server. In the Add Mail Account window, the same list is called Security. The first two choices use TLS. TLS is the standard way to encrypt the connection between your computer and the server.

Choice	When to use it	Port it uses
TLS (recommended)	The best choice. Use it unless your provider says otherwise.	IMAP 993, SMTP 465
STARTTLS	When your provider asks for it. It also encrypts the connection.	IMAP 143, SMTP 587
None (this machine only)	Only for a mail server on your own computer. Not encrypted.	IMAP 143, SMTP 25

You do not type a port number. The port follows your choice, and GpgFrontend shows it next to the list, for example Port 993.

None (this machine only) only shows up when the server is your own computer, such as localhost. For any other server, the connection is always encrypted.

Password

Type the password for your mail account in the Password box.

When you come back later, the box is empty and shows Leave blank to keep the stored one. Leave it empty to keep your saved password. Type a new one only to change it.

No Sign-In Through a Web Page

Some providers let other apps sign in through their own web page. This is called OAuth2. GpgFrontend does not support it yet.

If your provider needs it, use an app password instead. An app password is a separate password that your provider makes for one app. You create it in your provider’s account or security settings, then paste it into the Password box. It works only for mail, and you can cancel it at any time without changing your main password.

Test the Connection

1. Click Test Connection in the Servers part. It tests every server the account uses, one after the other.
2. Wait. It shows Testing…. Click Stop if it takes too long.
3. Read the result under each server. Until you test, it says Not tested.
   • Connected successfully. means it works.
   • Otherwise, you see what went wrong and a hint. For example, Check the user name and password. or Check the server address for a typo.

The test uses what is on screen right now, even before you click OK.

Trust a Server You Run Yourself

If you run your own mail server, its certificate may not be signed by a known authority. This is called a self-signed certificate. A certificate is how a server proves who it is.

When the test meets such a server, GpgFrontend asks Trust This Certificate? The window shows the certificate details and its SHA-256 fingerprint.

• Click Yes only if this is your own server and the fingerprint matches.
• Click Cancel if you are not sure. An unknown certificate can also mean that someone is trying to listen in.

If you click Yes, GpgFrontend trusts only this exact certificate for this account. Any other certificate, even a new one from the same server, is still refused. Click Test Connection again to confirm it works.

Under Advanced, the account then says Receiving server or Sending server, followed by Trusting one certificate and the fingerprint. Click Stop trusting it to undo this.

Manage Your Accounts

Right-click an account in the list:

• Set as Default: make the account the first choice when you send. Its details then say Default account.
• Disable: keep the account, but stop using it. A disabled account is not offered for sending or fetching mail, and it is never the default. Its settings and password are kept. Choose Enable to use it again.
• Remove: delete the account. GpgFrontend asks first. Its saved password is deleted too.

As always on this page, the change takes effect when you click OK.

New in v2.2.4

You can now disable an account without removing it.

GpgFrontend checks your accounts before it saves them. It tells you if, for example, an email address is missing, a server is not filled in, or two accounts use the same address.

Where Your Password Is Kept

Your mail password is never saved as plain text in the settings file. It is kept in GpgFrontend’s protected storage, which is encrypted with the Application Secure Key.

Your password is only as safe as that key. For the best protection, guard that key with your system’s keychain or a PIN.

Send a Message

1. Write your message. See Write and Protect a Message.
2. Sign or encrypt it if you like.
3. Click Send… (or press Ctrl+Enter; Cmd+Enter on a Mac). The Send message window opens. Nothing is sent yet.

If Send… is grayed out, hover over it to see what is missing.

The Send Message Window

The Send message window lets you check everything before the message leaves. At the top it says: “Ready to send. Nothing has left this computer yet.”

• Send using: pick the account to send from. Below it you see the server, the port and the connection type.
• Message: a summary of what you are sending:
  • From and To.
  • Blind copies: your Bcc people, if any. These addresses go to the mail server only. They are not written in the message, so no other reader can see them.
  • Contains: the size, and how many attachments.

When you are ready, click Send. To stop, click Cancel.

Read the Result

While sending, the window says “Sending. This window will say what happened.” The Result section then shows two lines:

• Submission: did the mail server take the message?
  • Yes, accepted by the outgoing mail server means it is on its way.
  • If it failed, this line shows the reason, and the top of the window says Not sent.
• Copy in Sent: was a copy put in your Sent folder?
  • Yes, saved to … names the folder. Many mail servers do not keep a copy of what you send. So GpgFrontend puts one in your Sent folder itself, using the account’s incoming (IMAP) server.
  • Yes, your mail server had already filed it in … means the server kept a copy by itself, so GpgFrontend did not add a second one.
  • If the account only sends, there is no mailbox, so no copy is kept. The message was still sent.

Click Details to see more, or Copy details to copy them.

When all went well, the window closes by itself after three seconds. The Close button counts down. Click anywhere in the window to stop the countdown and keep the window open.

When the Result Is Unknown

Sometimes the connection drops just after the message went out. Then the window says: “It is not known whether this was sent.”

This means the server may or may not have the message. Before you send it again:

1. Look in your Sent folder.
2. Or ask the person if they got it.

If you send it again without checking, they may get it twice.

Closing While Sending

If you close the window while a message is still being sent, a Still sending window appears. The server may already have the message. If you close now, you will not find out if it was sent.

• Click Keep Waiting to stay and see the result. This is the safe choice.
• Click Close Anyway to close the window.

To stop a send on purpose, click Stop next to Submission instead.

If Something Goes Wrong

• “No outgoing account is configured.” Add an account that can send, or check Use this account to send on an existing one. Make sure the account is not disabled.
• “No password is stored for this account…” Open Mail Accounts, select the account, type the password in the Password box, and click OK.
• The test says the password is wrong. Check the username. If your provider uses web sign-in, make an app password. See No Sign-In Through a Web Page.
• The test says the certificate is expired or not yet valid. Check that the clock on your computer is right.