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Electronic Mail (e-mail)

[Overview] [What is Groupmax?] Click on the graphics on this page to enlarge them.

Use this e-mail system to extend the efficiency of your office applications and complete those tasks which just cannot be accomplished with telephone or FAX.

The Groupmax e-mail system was developed by Hitachi, who is very familiar with the needs of the Japanese office environment. From large-scale to small-scale systems are available, catering to all our customers' needs. Our e-mail system features the following:

• Compliance with standard protocols for Internet mail
  Because the Groupmax e-mail system complies with the X.400, POP3, and SMTP protocols, it can be connected with other mail systems. For example, the Groupmax e-mail system can be connected with cc:Mail from Lotus by using the SMTP protocol. Therefore, if you have cc:Mail already installed, you can continue to use it. By using the POP3 protocol, mail can also be sent from other mail systems (such as Outlook or Netscape Mail) to your Groupmax system. Thus, Groupmax helps you flexibly configure your system according to your purpose and ideas.

• Useful facilities such as mail-circulars and bulletin boards
  The Groupmax e-mail system provides useful facilities such as mail-circulars and bulletin boards in addition to general e-mail. With the mail-circular facility, you can send a mail message to several addresses in a specific order, and you can get approval or comments from the recipients. With the bulletin board facility, information to be shared among workers in an organization or group can be posted on a bulletin board, so those who need information can read it when they need it. For a large-scale configuration, you can construct a company-wide bulletin board.

• Flexible operation for actual organization structure
  The Groupmax e-mail system adapts flexibly to the actual organizational structure where the system is being used. For example, mail addresses can be managed in units of departments or sections within the company. You can send a mail message to employees or to organizations, and a bulletin board can be set up for employees or for entire organizations. Moreover, if desired, you can also display Japanese names, posts, and affiliated organizations of senders in the received mail list.
  In this way, we created the Groupmax e-mail system with the construction of a large-scale mail systems in mind and taking the variety of facilities required in Japanese organizations into account. You will be able utilize the many kinds of useful e-mail facilities in your work.

• Accessible anytime and from anywhere by mobile facility
  You can extend the usage range of Groupmax e-mail by using dial-up connections over public lines, a PHS, or a cellular telephone.
  For example, while on the road you can use a mobile computer to receive and read mail, to send information you collected, and to make contact with the office by mail; so you can deal speedily with your business. Also, you can fetch unread mail before going out and check the mail contents while on the move.
  Moreover, you can connect your PC to the server only when you want by switching between online and offline, so you can read received mail at your leisure after downloading it, or you can send mail after creating the mail and connecting over a telephone line temporarily. In these ways, not only the load on the server, but also the costs for communication can be reduced.

• Corresponding in the World Wide Web environment
  You can use mail or bulletin boards of Groupmax from web browsers. Just clicking URLs in mail text or news items of Groupmax displays the corresponding home pages. As these "clickable URLs", you can set keywords such as "http://", "https://", and"ftp://".
  Groupmax utilizes to the World Wide Web environment; therefore, you can seamlessly connect the mail environment of your company's intranet to the Internet.

Fuctions of e-mail

The major facilities of Groupmax Mail are e-mail, which is basis of Groupmax; bulletin boards, which are effective for sharing information; and mail-circulars which can be used for group-centered decision making. From the wealth of mail features you will find procedures that fit the way of you do exactly.

• Overview of mail
  
  In the Groupmax e-mail system, if desired you can send mail with specified attributes (such as Urgent, Confidential, or, Request reply), and you can specify users or organizations as the recipients.
  Moreover, if you use mail in the rich text mode, you can specify styles in the message text such as font colors and point sizes, bulleted lists, or adjusted paragraphs.
  In this way, Groupmax provides a good working environment for operating mail.
  
  The major facilities of e-mail are:
  • Notifying users about mail arrival
  • Personal mail and organizational mail
  • Users can create their own personal address books
  • Mail can be sent in batches to multiple recipients
  • Adding mail options such as Urgent, Confidential, or Request reply
  • Using drag and drop to attach up to 25 files to mail you send
  • Confirming the status of mail you already sent
  • Replying to or forwarding mail
  • Password security for confidential mail
  • Security by encrypting the text and files attached to mail (using Keymate/Multi encryption)
  • Using an external address book to reference the registered contents of a directory server that corresponds to LDAP (using Directory Client as the external address book)
  • Editing mail text in rich text mode
  • Connecting with other mail systems
  • Sending mail from Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Word
  • Displaying sent mail and received mail by filtering
  • Using search conditions to search for recipient addresses in the organizational address book and external address book
  • Starting the application program corresponding to an attached file automatically
  • Sending mail via the Internet by using Internet addresses directly
  • Batch saving of unread mail, etc.
  • Displaying the size of each attached file
  • Specifying substitute receiving of mail while the mail receiver is absent

• Overview of bulletin boards
  

  Bulletin boards enable you to exchange information or to share data among organizations and groups. You can create a bulletin board, find a news item you are looking for in bulletin boards by specifying search conditions, and create a news item according to the access permission defined for each user or organization. Groupmax bulletin boards provide a strong environment for sharing information required for your applications. In addition, Groupmax is also outstanding from the viewpoint of security.

  
  The major facilities of bulletin boards are:
  • Displaying bulletin boards in a hierarchy
  • Finding news items by specifying search conditions
  • Creating news items and bulletin boards
  • Copying news items into other mail servers automatically
  • Attaching files to a news item
  • Setting up bulletin boards according to organizational structure
  • Setting attributes for each bulletin board
  • Defining access permission for user, organization, or user-defined groups
  • Adding aliases to bulletin boards or news items
  • Sending a news item to a bulletin board as mail
  • Displaying the number of all or unread news items
  
  
• Overview of mail-circulars
  You can set a time limit for circulation and you can require approval of mail-circulars from workers to help you finish your work on time and without mistakes. If you record the recipient addresses for a mail-circular, you can reuse them easily the next time you need to send something to those users. In this way, the Groupmax e-mail system provides a strong environment to process work items in workflows. The major facilities of mail-circular are:
  • Displaying the status of mail-circulars you sent
  • Batch setting of information for mail-circulars
  • Saving address information for mail-circulars
  • Setting a time limit for circulation to each address
  • Editing and sending saved mail-circulars
  • Attaching files to mail-circulars
  • Editing the text in a mail-circular
  • Entering comments on a mail-circular
  • Approving, disapproving, or canceling a mail-circular
  • Adding recipients in the circulation path
  • Suspending, collecting, or stopping a mail-circular
  • Confirming comments
  • Re-sending mail-circulars you have sent

Examples of using e-mail
Even the Groupmax e-mail system when used alone can provide a variety of applications. We'll introduce some examples.

• Connecting with other mail systems
  

  The Groupmax e-mail system supports the standard protocols of Internet mail such as SMTP andPOP3, so you can connect with other types of systems. For example, connecting a Groupmax system with other mail systems you use (such as Outlook or Netscape Mail) enables you to construct a large-scale mail system. Moreover, with Groupmax, you can now construct systems easily which were difficult to construct before, e.g., receive mail from the U.S. through the Internet or forward the mail to related sections.

• Using excellent filtering facilities to display and search for received mail
  The Groupmax e-mail system is equipped with excellent filtering facilities to deal with received mail efficiently. For example, each user can set up his or her own options to display only unread mail messages from the list of most recently received, or display only Urgent mail. You can also display only the mail that you received after a specified date and time, or display only mail with a specified search key in the subject, which makes it easy to find the information you are looking for.
  These filtering options help reduce the amount of mail displayed, making it easier to handle mail, thus improving mail efficiency.

Optional products
Groupmax supports a variety of options to extend each facility. For details, see the following information.

• Server options
• Client options