Electronic mail ("email") works very much like postal mail. You receive mail at your own "address," and you send mail to
others at their addresses.
All email addresses have the same elements. Here's what one looks like:
username@yhti.net
The name before the "@" symbol identifies the recipient of the mail; it can be the name of a person, a position, a
department, or a company. For YHTI members, it is their username, or email ID. The information that follows the "@"
symbol identifies the computer to which the email is sent.
Furthermore, hostnames have two parts: the specific name of the host (which can itself have many parts) followed by a
period (a "dot") and a suffix indicating the "domain" classification of the host server, or in some cases, the country of
the server. Some typical suffixes are:
- com (for companies)
- edu (for educational institutions)
- gov (for U.S. government)
- mil (for U.S. military)
- net (for service providers like YHTI)
- org (for nonprofit organization)
Countries also have suffixes.
- ca (Canada)
- it (Italy)
- ja (Japan)
If you have used a computer to type a letter, then you have most of the skills needed to send email. The only difference
is that with regular mail you would have to print out the letter and put it in a mailbox, but with email you press a key
or two and the letter is transmitted electronically to the emailbox of the recipient, who can typically read your letter
within a few seconds.