TMO Quick Tip - Mail: Sending Messages to Groups

by , 7:30 AM EDT, October 5th, 2007

Apple's Mail application is tightly integrated with Address Book, which means there are plenty of ways to make the two applications work together. The two work together so well that you can drag contacts from Address Book into the recipient fields in a new email message instead of typing names -- and this trick works with Address Book groups, too.

To send an email message to a group, do this:

• Create a new message in Mail.
• Drag the group you want to send the message to from Address Book into the To field in your new message.

Drag a contact or group from Address Book to Mail's To field to add recipients.

• Continue creating your message like you normally would.

Simple, and straight forward. The problem is that everyone you send the message to will see all of the email addresses in the group. If you don't want those addresses appearing for everyone, Mail includes a preference for hiding each one from the other recipients. Here's how:

• While in Mail, choose Mail > Preferences.

Use Mail's prefs to hide individual recipients.

• Click the Composing tab.
• Uncheck When sending to a group, show all member addresses.

Mail can hide individual message recipients from each other.

Now any time you send an email to a group, each recipient will see only their own email address.

Jeff Gamet is TMO's Morning Editor and Reviews Editor. He lectures, teaches and speaks on Mac OS X and design-related topics, and is the author of The Designer's Guide to Mac OS X from Peachpit Press.

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