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Email Issues

Excessive email traffic can be one of the greatest causes of slow computer networks in schools. We can all contribute to better network speeds by thinking about the way we use email.

Principals and Teachers

Email a link, not a document
Consider storing documents on a shared drive, which other people can access from within your school. That way, when emailing the documents to other people within your school, you can email the file path instead of the document. If you need to send documents as attachments, consider attaching a compressed version of the file. Compress a file by using a file-compression software program such as WinZip, which comes free with many operating systems. These walkthroughs can help you to this.

Schedule emails
If you need to send an email with an attachment, and it is not time-critical, consider sending it outside of teaching periods.

Network Managers

Is there excessive email use throughout the school?
Monitor people's email use from month to month. If their email volume appears excessive due to large attachments and so on, promote strategies to minimise the bandwidth used, such as emailing links instead of files.

Students

Use email only when necessary
Do you send emails to your friends in class? Do you send messages to people that you will be talking to later in the day? Your use of email can slow down the computer network for everybody, including you. Use email to communicate with friends only when you will not have a chance to talk to them later in the day.

Internet mail accounts
Many of you use Internet email accounts such as Hotmail and Yahoo. MSN Messaging is also being used by a lot of students. Checking your mail and sending messages can slow down the network for everyone. Do these things before or after school, or during lunch time.

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