letter leaving one location and ending up precisely where it should at the other end seems impossible -mind-bogglingeven howeverboth -mail and its real-world equivalent have several aspects in common that improve the likelihood that they'll actually work as intended the following sections examine what happens when you write an -mailclick sendand the recipient receives it on the other end you might be surprised at what you discover viewing -mail as you do letter the best way to view -mail is the same as how you view letter when you write letteryou provide two pieces of paper as minimum the first contains the content of the letterthe second is an envelope assuming that the postal service is honestthe content is never examined by anyone other than the recipient the same can be said of -mail an -mail actually consists of these componentsmessagethe content of the -mailwhich is actually composed of two subpartsheaderthe part of the -mail content that includes the subjectthe list of recipientsand other featuressuch as the urgency of the -mail bodythe part of the -mail content that contains the actual message the message can be in plain textformatted as htmland consisting of one or more documentsor it can be combination of all these elements envelopea container for the message the envelope provides sender and recipient informationjust as the envelope for physical piece of mail provides howeveran -mail doesn' include stamp when working with -mailyou create message using an -mail application as part of the -mail application setupyou also define account information when you click send the -mail application wraps up your messagewith the header firstin an envelope that includes both your sender and the recipient' information the -mail application uses the account information to contact the smtp server and send the message for you the smtp server reads only the information found in the message envelope and redirects your -mail to the recipient the recipient -mail application logs on to the local serverpicks up the -mailand then displays only the message part for the user