Digital Streets

Outlook is Microsoft’s popular personal information manager and part of Microsoft Office.  It has email, calendar, contact management, task and note taking functionality.  I’ve been a long-time user of Outlook and really enjoy the latest version of the application. Here’s the second part of the list of the tutorials on Outlook 2007 at Tech-Recipes:

• Turn Off Attachment Preview  - Outlook 2007 has a new feature that allows you to preview attachments and documents if the handler is available for that filetype. However, some users do not use (or like) this functionality.

• Avoid Appointment Conflicts by Viewing Calendars in Overlay Mode - If you are running multiple calendars, it is easy to accidentally schedule conflicting appointments and cause yourself some unwanted headaches. Outlook 2007 makes it easy to find conflicting appointments by using Overlay Mode which superimposes one calendar ontop of another. The scheduled appointments for both calendars show, making it simple to find and correct conflicts.

• Using Alt+Number to View Multiple Days on Calendar - Viewing multiple days (2,3,4,…10) on your Outlook Calendar can come in handy when viewing your upcoming schedule, especially if the days cross multiple weeks or months.

• How To Use Voting Buttons in a Message - You can use the Voting Buttons to get responses from a group of colleagues to see what the majority of them are leaning towards. This comes in handy when getting feedback for a meeting date and location or for figuring out where everyone is going to meet after work. Outlook tallies the votes for you so that they can easily be assessed.

• Assign Tasks to Other People - When utilizing Outlook in an Exchange environment, you are able to assign tasks to another person that is on the network. This can simplify things for a manager or department head who needs to quickly hand out assignments to his/her employees.

• Sending Status Reports for Assigned Tasks - If you have been assigned a task, you might need to submit a status report at some point prior to completion of the task. This could be used to detail why the task has not been completed or why the task needs to be amended.

• Change the Color of Overdue and Completed Tasks - By default, Outlook changes the color of overdue tasks to red and completed tasks to gray. If these colors aren’t to your liking, you can change them so that they standout better.

• Get Classic 3-Pane View - Outlook 2007 defaults to a 2-pane view. Here is how to get your new outlook to preview and read your messages just like it was in previous versions.

• Change Quick Click Settings for Flagging Email - By default, Outlook sets the due date on emails you flag (by clicking on the flag column in your Inbox) as Today. If your schedule is busy, this default setting may not work for you. To change the default Quick Click setting, follow these steps.

• Add a Reminder to a Flagged Email - If you have some important emails that need to be followed up on and flagging them doesn’t seem to be enough, you can add a reminder to the flag. The reminder will pop up at a given time, notifying you about the email.

• Review Responses to a Meeting Request - Instead of having to search through your Inbox to figure out who accepted or declined the meeting invitation you sent out, let Outlook do the work for you. In a few simple steps, you can get a full listing of all invited attendees and their corresponding response to the invitation.

• Delete Old Appointments to Reduce the Size of Your Mailbox - Appointments (particularly those with attachments) can slowly add up over time. If you work for an organization that limits mailbox size, available space is always a critical item. Instead of having to search through your calendar month by month, you can simply pull up a list of all appointments and then choose those that you no longer need and delete them.

• Change Quick Click Settings for Categorizing Email - By default, Outlook sets the category on emails you select (by clicking on the Categories column in your Inbox) as Red Category. If you often are categorizing your email as something other than Red, you can change the default Quick Click setting.

• Change the Highlight Color for Keyword Searches - By default, Outlook highlights the word(s) you search for in yellow. This can be difficult to see as it does not stand out very well. To make your keywords really stand out, change the highlight color to something that is more easily seen.

• Edit, Delete and Create New Email Categories - Outlook gives you a handful of generic categories to start organizing your email. You can customize these existing categories, as well as add categories of your own.

• Create a Distribution List - If you frequently email the same group of recipients, a distribution list can be a real time saver. Instead of having to add each individual contact one-at-a-time, you can simply add the distribution list to your email and you have included all of those contacts in one step.

• Automatically Add People You Email to the Safe Senders List - If you want Outlook to never treat the email from people you send to as junk mail, have Outlook automatically add them to the Safe Senders List.

• Show the Total Number of Items in a Mail Folder - Outlook’s Navigation Pane, by default, shows the number of unread items in each Mail Folder. You can change each folder to instead show the total number of items in that mail folder. This is a great way to get a feel of how much email you are actually holding on to. It also is quite useful for monitoring how many messages are in your Deleted Items and Sent Items folders.

• Disable Deleting of Meeting Request from Inbox When Responding - By default, Outlook deletes a meeting request from your Inbox once you respond to the meeting request. While Outlook does add the meeting and its details to your Calendar, it is much easier to also have these details in your Inbox for easy reference.

Outlook Tutorial Round-up Part 1


Outlook Tutorial Round-up Part 3