Tired of the daily slog through your in-box, trying to separate the spam from the good stuff? Reader Christian Dysthe of Gonzales, Texas, writes in with a simple suggestion: Use an e-mail filter to move messages not specifically addressed to you to a folder set aside for suspected spam. Dysthe notes that a spam message's To: field seldom contains your address--or anyone else's for that matter.

It sounds easy enough, but getting filters to work involves trial and error. Your in-box may receive e-mail forwarded from several accounts, and some legitimate messages may not be addressed to you specifically. Private and public mailing lists are likely sources, and e-mail newsletters and messages copied (cc:) or blind-copied (bcc:) to you may not contain your address either. No matter what e-mail program you use, let the filter run for a day or two, and observe the results; then adjust the filter to improve the results by adding exception addresses--e-mail addresses that are automatically approved without having to satisfy the filtering conditions--to your filter's source and destination conditions. Fight the urge to send suspected spam directly to the trash folder. Some messages--bcc's, most notably--will always slip through. Open and peruse the spam folder occasionally to find misplaced legitimate messages, and then delete away.

Here's how to set up a spam filter in each of three popular e-mail programs.

Outlook 2000: Create a folder to hold your spam ( File, New, Folder), and give it an obvious name, such as Spam or Junk Mail. Click OK. Now create a rule that looks for spam and moves it to the folder: Choose Tools, Rules Wizard, click the New button, and select Next to check messages as they arrive in your in-box. In the next screen, choose where my name is not in the To box, click Next, and check move it to the specified folder. Click the resulting specified hyperlink in the rule description box (see Figure 1), navigate to the spam folder you created, click OK, and then click Next to move on to the list of exceptions to your rule. Check except where my name is in the Cc box and, optionally, except if from people or distribution list and except if sent to people or distribution list. If you use either of these latter two conditions, click the resulting people or distribution list link in the rule description box, and add any addresses that you know aren't spam sources or destinations; then click OK, Next, and Finish to create the rule.

Outlook Express 5.x: Creating a spam filter in Outlook Express requires fewer steps than in Outlook, but here the process leaves suspected spam in the in-box and moves the good stuff to another folder. Create a destination folder ( File, New, Folder) and name it Filtered Mail; then click OK. Choose Tools, Message Rules, Mail, and click the New tab (but if this is your first rule, you won't need to click that tab). In the Conditions box, check Where the To or CC line contains people (scroll down to find it) and, optionally, Where the From line contains people; then click the resulting contains people links in the rule description box. Itemize e-mail addresses, mailing lists, newsletters, and other known nonspam sources and destination addresses as appropriate, and click Add. Click Address Book to enter names from your address book. Once you've entered all the acceptable addresses, click OK. Now check Move it to the specified folder in the Actions box, click the specified link in the rule description box, and click OK twice to save the rule.

Netscape Messenger 4.7x: Create a spam folder. Select File, New while in a folder or Explorer window, and then select Folder and enter a name. Now open Messenger and start your filter ( Edit, Message Filters). Click New, select to or CC from the first drop-down list of criteria, click doesn't contain in the second, and type your e-mail address in the last field on the line. Click More to enter additional filter criteria (additional e-mail accounts, known source or destination mailing lists, and e-mail newsletter addresses, for example). Choose Move to folder, select the spam folder you just created from the last drop-down list, and then click OK twice to save the filter.