by If you’re new to the Mac but something of an iOS veteran, this lesson will be a snap. And it should be, because Apple modeled Mountain Lion’s Mail, Contacts & Calendars system preference on the setting of the same name found on today’s iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.
If anything, the Mountain Lion version is actually easier to use because it isn’t crammed with additional settings specific to the Contacts, Calendar, and Reminders applications. Much as I love discussing the ins and outs of contacts, events, and reminders, our focus here will be on setting up email accounts on your Mac.
Adding a service
Launch System Preferences and, in the Internet & Wireless area, click Mail, Contacts & Calendars. If you took advantage of the offer to set up an iCloud account when you first configured your Mac, you’ll see an iCloud entry in the list of accounts on the left side of the resulting window. To the right of that list is a series of commonly used services, including (in the United States) iCloud, Microsoft Exchange, Gmail, Twitter, Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, Vimeo, and Flickr. At the very bottom of the list is an an Add Other Account… entry.
Your Mail, Contacts & Calendars system preference should look something like this.
To use these services, you must first set up an account with them—something that you can’t do within this preference. If, for example, you wish to set up a Gmail account, launch a Web browser (Apple’s Safari is the default) and travel to http://www.gmail.com. Create your Gmail account here, making a note of your username and password.
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