Searching for Messages

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After you have been using Outlook Express for a few months or more, your mail folders will undoubtedly contain lots of messages. As a result, it might become extremely difficult to locate an old piece of mail quickly. The Edit menu's Find command provides an easy way to search for messages from or to a particular person, messages that contain a specified text string in the header or message body, messages that arrived during a specified period of time, flagged messages, or messages with attachments. To search for a message:

1. Choose Find from the Edit menu and Message from the submenu to display the Find Message dialog box, shown in Figure 19-17.
2. Specify one or more search criteria. (If you specify multiple criteria, the Find Message command locates messages that meet all criteria.)
3. Use the Browse button to specify a folder to search. Select or clear the Include Subfolders check box as appropriate.
4. Click Find Now.

You don't need to type complete words; the Find Message dialog box reports success if the text you type appears anywhere in the specified field. Text searches aren't case sensitive.

Found messages appear in a list at the bottom of the dialog box. You can work with the messages here exactly as you do with messages in the main Outlook Express window.

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To purge old mail messages, use the Received Before option in the Find Message dialog box. Then delete the messages that Outlook Express finds.

Figure 19-17. The Find Message dialog box finds messages that contain the text you specify anywhere in a particular field.

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Find a Message the Moment It Arrives

If you leave the Find Message dialog box open, the system continues to monitor incoming messages, adding appropriate ones to the list of found messages. This can be handy if you receive a large volume of mail and need to watch for mail that covers a particular topic.