SCS User's Guide

Your SCS e-mail address is <your username>@scs.uiuc.edu. To read your SCS e-mail, you may access our webmail system at https://mail.scs.uiuc.edu/ . In addition, you may use any POP or IMAP mail client (such as Eudora) from your own computer, or log in to your UNIX account and use a command-line mail reader such as pine.

If you have begun using the NEW SCS mail server (mail.scs.uiuc.edu), that webmail system is accessable at https://mail.scs.uiuc.edu/. If you want to be able to read your e-mail from polaris using Pine, please download this pinerc file, and then transfer it to your polaris account and name it ".pinerc". Then log into polaris and start Pine; you should be prompted for your username and password to connect to the new server via IMAP.

Please note that your NetID (your @uiuc.edu e-mail address) is the responsibility of CITES (campus-level computing services), not SCS. In addition, you should be aware that your @uiuc.edu address is not a "real" e-mail address, but is a redirect pointer that can send e-mail to your SCS account, or any other e-mail account you choose. If you are an incoming student, this address will probably be set to send mail to <your netid>@students.uiuc.edu, NOT to SCS! There is no problem with this, but please do not contact us with problems about your students account; that service is provided by CITES.

To use webmail, just go to https://mail.scs.uiuc.edu/ and log in with your SCS user name and password.

For POP or IMAP mail, use "mail.scs.uiuc.edu" as both the incoming and outgoing e-mail server (if you are on campus or using UIUC dialup) and use your SCS user name and password to retrieve your e-mail. If you are off-campus, use "mail.scs.uiuc.edu" as the incoming mail server, but you will need to get the name of you internet service provider's mail server to use for outgoing mail.

SCS has SPAM filters in place to cut down on the volume of unsolicited e-mail (SPAM) recieved by our users. These filters are highly effective and rarely mistakenly mark a message as SPAM. However, it can happen, so all SPAM e-mail you recieve will be stored in a mail folder called "SPAM" in the directory "mail/" in the home directory of your SCS account. Messages in this folder are held for 30 days and then automatically deleted. If you are using Pine to read your e-mail, this folder should show up automatically in your folder list if you have recieved SPAM. In webmail, there is a link with instructions on how to read your SPAM mailbox. If you are using another mail client, the procedure for reading this mailbox will vary. If you do not want SPAM filters to be used on your account at all, please go here https://mail.scs.uiuc.edu/filter-config/ and disable spam filtering.

If you need to set up e-mail forwarding for your SCS e-mail address, just go to https://alchemy.scs.uiuc.edu/passwords/scripts/userfwd.php and log in with your SCS user name and password.

If you would like to set up a vacation message on your account, please access our automated vacation-message entry system at https://mail.scs.uiuc.edu/vacation/ and log in with your SCS user name and password.