Compose a new email message

Open Mail and click Compose (or press c in the message list).

Recipients

Type an address into To and finish it with a comma, Enter or Tab: it becomes a chip. Start typing a name to pick from your contacts. CC / BCC adds those fields.

• Paste a list. Paste several addresses at once, separated by commas, semicolons, new lines or spaces, and each becomes its own chip.
• Remove one. Click the x on a chip, or press Backspace in the empty box to remove the last one.
• Fix one. An address that does not look right shows in red. Double-click it to edit it. TALISK_HQ will not send until it is fixed.
• Stop suggesting one. Point at a suggestion and click its x (on a phone the x is always there). It is not suggested again from this mailbox, even after new mail from that address. If the person is saved in your Google or Outlook contacts, TALISK_HQ asks first: Delete from Google contacts removes them there too, Only stop suggesting leaves your address book alone. Click Undo (or Suggest again) to bring the suggestion back.

Attach files

Click Attach file (the amber paperclip at the left end of the toolbar above the message, in the composer and in the reply box alike), paste a file, or drag files from your computer onto the message. A dashed outline shows where they will land.

• An image dropped onto the text of your message goes in inline, where you dropped it, just as if you had pasted it.
• Any other file, or an image dropped anywhere else on the composer, is added as an attachment.

How much you can attach. All the files on one message together can be up to 25 MB when it leaves from a Gmail or other email mailbox. From an Outlook mailbox the limit is 3 MB in total, and files over that cannot be sent from an Outlook mailbox through TALISK_HQ yet; share them as a link instead. The limit is the same in the full composer, the reply box and on your phone. If a file would take the message over it, TALISK_HQ says so as you attach it and does not add that file, and a message that is over the limit does not send. If your provider refuses a message for size anyway, TALISK_HQ tells you the limit rather than showing the provider's own wording.

Format your message

The toolbar above the message has the same controls in the full composer and in the reply box inside a thread. On a narrow reply box it wraps onto a second row rather than hiding anything.

• Bold, Italic, Underline and Strikethrough change the selected words.
• Text size offers Small, Normal, Large and Huge.
• Text colour opens a palette: a row of text colours and a row of highlights. Default text colour and No highlight take a colour back off.
• Bullet list, Numbered list, Increase indent, Decrease indent and Quote shape a paragraph. Press Quote again to take the quote off.
• Align left, Align centre and Align right line a paragraph up.
• Insert link links the selected words. Click a link in your message to change its address or its words, or to remove it.
• Insert image puts a picture from your computer into the message where your cursor is, just as pasting one does.
• Emoji opens a small set of common emoji.
• Undo last edit and Redo last edit step back and forward, and Clear formatting returns the selected words to plain text.

The formatting is written into the message the way mail apps expect it, so it arrives looking the way you left it, whichever computer you wrote it on.

On your phone

Tap New email at the top of Mail to write a new message. The phone has the same recipients and the same formatting, sized for a thumb:

• To works the same way: finish an address with a comma to make a chip, or pick a contact as you type. + Cc / Bcc adds both fields.
• The toolbar above the message has Bold, Italic, Underline, Text colour, Bullet list and Insert link. Tap More formatting (the three dots) for text size, strikethrough, numbered lists, indents, quote, alignment, Insert image, Clear formatting, and Undo last edit and Redo last edit. For emoji, use your phone's keyboard.
• The clock button beside Send opens Send options: send it later, or ask to be reminded if nobody replies. See Snooze and reminders.
• A phone message is sent exactly like one written on a computer, formatting and all.

Keep writing later

Click the minimise button (the line beside Send at the top right of the composer). The message shrinks to a bar at the bottom of the mail area, so you can read and open other emails. Click the bar to bring it back, with everything you wrote. Its x closes it and keeps it in Drafts.

Send

Click Send, or press Cmd+Enter (Mac) or Ctrl+Enter (Windows). You have a few seconds to undo it.