On this page, we describe how to access a secondary email account (usually a shared mailbox). NOTE: this is different than an email alias. An alias is a second address for a single mailbox. Aliases are maintained on the MyJH site. What is described here is adding a secondary mailbox that will hold mail separately from your primary email address. These additional mailboxes need to be requested from us.
We’ll cover two approaches. First, for Windows Outlook users, and second, for people who don’t use Outlook and would rather use the web client for access. People on other clients can probably extrapolate what to do from the instructions on this page, but if you have questions please ask.
Outlook for Windows
Shown here are screenshots for Outlook from Office 365. Outlook 2010 and 2016 are substantially the same. The Office 365 version, which is always kept the most up to date with the latest features, can be downloaded from https://portal.office.com/account#installs.
- VERY IMPORTANT: Before doing anything, log out of Windows and then log back in. This will reload the permissions you’ve been granted on the network so that your computer will know it has the right to add the mailbox.
- Click File to bring up the settings pane:
- Click the button to add an account.
- Outlook will ponder for a few minutes, then give you the option to type in an email address. Enter the email address for the mailbox you want to add (our example is adding the [email protected] mailbox).
- After clicking Connect, what happens next might depend on your version of Windows and Outlook. If it asks you for Advanced Setup information about what kind of mailbox this is, pick Exchange. This step might be skipped if you are using newer versions of the software.
VERY IMPORTANT, READ CAREFULLY, THIS IS WHERE PEOPLE HAVE PROBLEMS: When prompted to log in, use your own JHED login (with @jh.edu on the end), NOT the address of the mailbox. Your own JHED has been given access to the mailbox so you don’t use the mailbox’s password. On some systems it might try to prompt you immediately with the service account password; in that case, you should hit “Sign in with another account” and go back to use your JHED.
- After authenticating, you need to restart Outlook to see the mailbox in your client. The Outlook restart takes a couple of minutes as extra settings and email are downloaded. If it gets fussy with you a restart of Windows will help.
- These mailboxes are fully capable — they can have their own set of mailbox rules to do useful things with incoming messages, like redirect them on to a set of people, or to send back an acknowledgment that a message was received to the mailbox.
Outlook for Mac
These screenshots are for the Office 365 version of Outlook for Mac. This version, which is always kept the most up to date with the latest features, can be downloaded from https://portal.office.com/account#installs.
Go to the File -> Open menu, and pick Shared Mailbox.
Search for the shared mailbox you want to add (in this example we’re adding our helpdesk account, [email protected]!). Note that the account being used to open the mailbox is your own account. The mailbox owner will have to give you permission to open the mailbox with your JHED. Click Add when you’ve found the correct mailbox.
The mailbox will now appear in your Outlook client.
Webmail
Webmail can be accessed through my.jhu.edu or directly at outlook.office.com. Using the webmail interface is convenient if you need to add rules to a mailbox but don’t need to be constantly accessing it to check for new messages.
After logging into webmail, click on your name to open a drop-down menu. In that menu is an option to open another mailbox.
A dialog box will pop up that asks you to type in the name of the mailbox you want to open, and it has a handy search function to help with data entry. Pick the mailbox you want to open, and you will be taken straight into that mailbox.
