Webmail
Webmail is an email service that can be accessed using a standard web browser. It contrasts with email service accessible through a specialised email client software. Examples of webmail providers are AOL Mail, Gmail, Mailfence, Outlook.com/Hotmail.com, Yahoo! Mail and IceWarp Mail Server. Additionally, many internet service providers provide webmail as part of their internet service package. Similarly, some web hosting providers also provide webmail as a part of their hosting package.
Webmail access is made possible through webmail software, such as Roundcube or SquirrelMail, installed and running on the email server.
As with any web application, webmail's main advantage over the use of a desktop email client is the ability to send and receive email anywhere from a web browser. Its main disadvantage is the need to be connected to the Internet while using it.
History
Early implementations
The first Web Mail implementation was developed at CERN in 1993 by Phillip Hallam-Baker as a test of the HTTP protocol stack, but was not developed further. In the next two years, however, several people produced working webmail applications.In Europe, there were three implementations, Søren Vejrum's "WWW Mail", Luca Manunza's "WebMail", and Remy Wetzels' "WebMail". Søren Vejrum's "WWW Mail" was written when he was studying and working at the Copenhagen Business School in Denmark, and was released on February 28, 1995. Luca Manunza's "WebMail" was written while he was working at CRS4 in Sardinia, with the first source release on March 30, 1995. Remy Wetzels' "WebMail" was written while he was studying at the Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands for the DSE and was released early January 1995.
In the United States, Matt Mankins wrote "Webex", and Bill Fitler, while at, began working on an implementation which he demonstrated publicly at Lotusphere on January 24, 1995. Matt Mankins, under the supervision of Dr. Burt Rosenberg at the University of Miami, released his "Webex" application source code in a post to comp.mail.misc on August 8, 1995, although it had been in use as the primary email application at the School of Architecture where Mankins worked for some months prior.
Bill Fitler's webmail implementation was further developed as a commercial product, which Lotus announced and released in the fall of 1995 as cc:Mail for the World Wide Web 1.0; thereby providing an alternative means of accessing a cc:Mail message store.
Early commercialization of webmail was also achieved when "Webex" began to be sold by Mankins' company, DotShop, Inc., at the end of 1995. Within DotShop, "Webex" changed its name to "EMUmail"; which would be sold to companies like UPS and Rackspace until its sale to Accurev in 2001. EMUmail was one of the first applications to feature a free version that included embedded advertising, as well as a licensed version that did not.
Hotmail and Four11's RocketMail both launched in 1996 as free services and immediately became very popular.
Widespread deployment
As the 1990s progressed, and into the 2000s, it became more common for the general public to have access to webmail because:- many Internet service providers and web hosting providers began bundling webmail into their service offerings ;
- many other enterprises also started offering webmail as a way for their user communities to access their email ;
- webmail service providers emerged in 1996 as a free service to the general public, and rapidly gained in popularity.