In an effort to combat the spread of computer viruses, Google’s Gmail does not allow you to send or receive executable files even if they are in a zipped format. Although many blogs have reported ways around this, most of these violate Google’s terms of service, and your Gmail account could be terminated. The simplest way to is to upload your files to a free online hosting service, and then email the URL to your recipient. Some choices include: Mega Upload , You Send It , Send This File.

Does an empty email inbox sound like an unattainable goal? Here’s advice from two savvy bloggers who claim it is possible. Narendra Rocherolle’s “Clearing Your Inbox with Minimal Pain” and Leo Notenboom’s “Taming Email.” For more on stress-free productivity, pick up a copy of David Allen’s “Getting Things Done.”

Although most of us have been using email for years, there are some basic rules of email etiquette that are worth repeating. For example, when replying to a message, be sure to include enough of the previous message to give context to your reply. For more email tips, read EmailReplies, Learn the Net , or Dynamoo.

Recent increases in spam mail can be traced to botnets. According to Leo Notenboom, “a botnet is a networked collection of computers infected with software that can be remotely controlled to awaken and perform some task. Typically that task is to send email. Lots of email. Lots of spam.” You can protect yourself from getting infected by running anti-spyware and anti-virus software, and keeping it updated. Learn more from Ask Leo.

In its default configuration, HotMail does not display clickable links. You can change this for all messages from all senders (not recommended), or for a single message for one time use, or for all messages from a sender you trust. The last two alternatives can be chosen by clicking on one of the following options at the top of your message screen. “Enable all message content (once)” means turning on clickable links and other live Internet content for one time use. “Never disable content from this sender” means that you trust this sender, and all messages from him will have clickable links and live Internet content.

If your inbox is overrun with spam, and your ISP (or corporate mail server) does not offer a spam solution that works for you, you can try using Google’s free email service Gmail as a front-end spam filter. Read more in this article from Jeremy Zawodny: Using Gmail as My Spam Filter.

Although text messages (also known as SMS or Short Message Service) are designed for cell phones, it is easy to send a text message to a cell phone via email. Most cell carriers provide a unique email address based on your ten-digit phone number. To find your cell phone’s SMS email address, try this page from Tech Recipes. Or to send a message when you don’t know the user’s cell service, try Teleflip.

Be careful of your tone in instant messages and email, because a recent study shows that the recipient has only a 50-50 chance of correctly understanding whether you were being sarcastic or honest, or what you really meant by your message. Research conducted by psychologists Nicholas Epley of the University of Chicago and Justin Kruger of New York University reveals that the emotional meaning behind a message is often lost. Read more from Wired.

Email can be tremendous time sink, so even small improvements in efficiency can have a big effect. I like the five email tips Merlin Mann shares his 43 Folders blog. Tip Number One: “Either turn off automatic checking completely, or set it to something reasonable, like every twenty minutes or so”

Posting your email address on a web page in a machine readable format is simply asking for trouble because thousands of robots crawl the Web looking for email addresses to add to spam mailing lists. One way to avoid this is not use text or HTML (which is machine readable) but instead put your email address in a graphic that can only be read by a human being.E-Mail Sigs is a free tool that creates graphics for nine of the most popular email services, including Gmail, Hotmail, AOL, MSN and Yahoo!