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Greetings! Welcome to Vol. 3, No. 5, of Exchange Messaging Outlook, an occasional newsletter about Microsoft Exchange, Windows Messaging and Microsoft Outlook, both for users of Windows 95 and NT 4.0 and for organizations using Microsoft Exchange Server. Today's highlights:
Microsoft Office Service Release 2 Microsoft has released a second update for Office 97, called Service Release 2. It updates Outlook 97 to version 8.04. You can install it only if you already have Service Release 1 on your system. The list of fixes and features for Outlook 97 users includes more than two dozen items. Reason #1: It makes Outlook 97 Year 2000 compliant. If you are not planning to upgrade to Outlook 98 or Outlook 2000 (when it's released early next year), you definitely need SR-2. Other important new features:
We've posted the rest of the list at http://www.slipstick.com/exchange/ol804.htm, along some basic information on how to get this release. The Microsoft Knowledgebase includes a Summary of Changes in Outlook Version 8.04. The real quandary over SR-2 is whether to install the downloadable patch (also available on CD) or get the CD with a full updated version of SR-2. The patch will work for most people, but I recommend that, if you used the patch to install SR-1 and you connect to Microsoft Exchange Server, you should get the full CD version of SR-2. Some Exchange Server client updates will be missing if you install the SR-2 patch over the SR-1 patch. For other situations, it's more of a toss-up. Using the SR-2 patch will preserve all your existing settings. Installing the full version will mean redoing all of your personalized settings, because you must uninstall Office 97 first. Of course, you may want to have the best of both worlds: Download and install the patch right away, then order the full version on CD in case you ever need to reinstall Office 97. As usual, some of the most detailed information on this service release comes from the free weekly Woody's Office Watch newsletter (essential reading around here, even if we don't always agree on what's an annoyance and what's a feature). At http://www.wopr.com/wow/wowv3n40.shtml, they've posted a special issue with "the good, bad and ugly of Office 97 Service Release 2." I strongly recommend that you study it before you make your decision on how to update your copy of Office 97. Outlook 98 users in particular should note their advice on using the Custom Install selection if you choose to use the full CD, to avoid installing Outlook 97 components. More than a few sessions at the Microsoft Exchange Conference in Boston earlier this month dealt with Outlook 2000. There was even a lab where you could experiment with Outlook forms, server-side scripting, routing objects and other development techniques. (I sure hope Microsoft puts this self-paced training on their web site. ) Microsoft has posted a summary of enhancements for Exchange Server users at http://microsoft.com/exchange/55/gen/outlook.htm. You can also read a short description of Office 2000 and follow links to press reviews at http://www.microsoft.com/office/2000/Office/default.htm. So what else can we say about Outlook 2000 at this point (without violating any non-disclosure agreements)? Microsoft says it will release Office 2000, which includes Outlook 2000 (or OL2K, as we hardcore types refer to it), in early 1999. I think this is going to be a must-have upgrade for Outlook users. I have been lukewarm on Outlook 98, but Outlook 2000 makes improvements in many critical areas and offers an extraordinary development platform, even for those of us who are only occasional programmers. The only real disappointment is that the distinction between Corporate/Workgroup and Internet Mail Only modes, introduced in Outlook 98, persists. I really wish Microsoft would at least come up with names that aren't so misleading. We'll be adding pages on Outlook 2000 to the Slipstick Systems Exchange Center soon. For now, let me just list some of the outstanding features:
Automatic booking of resources. OL2K will automatically enter meetings on calendars that you've designated as resources. No more need to have a delegate logged into Outlook all the time. Expansion of distribution lists as attendees. Add a distribution list to the list of attendees of a meeting, and Outlook expands it. You can then remove any names that you don't want to invite to this particular meeting. Autopick "People and One Resource." If you create distribution lists of resources (such as "All conference rooms that seat 10 people"), OL2K can arrange a meeting at the earliest time convenient to all the people you've invited (or just the required attendees) and a single resource from a distribution list entered under Resources. Background color in Daily view. OL2K looks more like Schedule+, now that you can set the background color for the daily planner view. Better printing. Text wraps when printed. You can also hide private appointments without filtering the Calendar first. Save as Web page. You will be able to easily save your calendar as a very attractive HTML page. Screen tips. Popup screen tips display details of an appointment, in case the entire text is not visible on the screen. MRU list for other calendars. OL2K tracks the last Calendar folders you opened from other users' mailboxes, making it easier to open them again. Internet group scheduling using the iCalendar standard. I have not seen this working yet, but it is supposed to allow you to set up meetings with non-Exchange Server users. Add/Remove Attendees command. Invite new attendees to a meeting or remove someone from the attendees list without the need to send a meeting update message to everyone else involved in the meeting.
Personal Distribution Lists in the Contacts folder. That's right. The main reason for keeping that Personal Address Book around is going to disappear. Activities tab to show items related to contacts. The Journal tab on the Contact form goes away, replaced by an Activities tab that can show not just Journal entries related to a contact, but any type of item related to a contact, no matter what folder it's in. This looks like it will go a long way toward solving the "Public Folder Journal" problem. You also can manually link any item to any contact. Improved mail merge with Word. You can select contacts and initiate a merge from within Outlook.
Unified offline folders checklist. No more marking each folder in your mailbox for offline use. OL2K offers a single dialog where you can check or uncheck folders for synchronization. Multiple synchronization groups. Synchronize only essential folders when you're at the end of a 14.4kbps connection, but everything when you're connected to the LAN at your desk. Define a different synchronization group to fit every connection situation. Download OAB during sync. Downloading the Offline Address Book as part of a mailbox synchronization is an option on the new unified synchronization checklist.
Run now! You can run any rule against any folder at any time. New actions. Automatic printing and running an application as a client-side rule actions. IMAP support. Rules run on IMAP mailboxes, which means that Net Folders should be supported.
Personalized menus. Menus adapt to the way you work, first showing the commands you use most, then displaying less frequently used commands. Outlook Bar shortcuts to files. The Outlook Bar can contain shortcuts to Web pages and files, not just folders.
Find Public Folder. You can still search Public Folders only one at a time, unless you add an index server, but this new feature at least lets you search the names and descriptions of all the folders in your organization. It's also easier to send a link to a public folder to another user. Folder Home Pages. This is one of the most exciting features demonstrated at MEC. You can enhance any folder with a view that summarizes the contents of subfolders with an Outlook Today-like Folder Summary Control, displays administrative messages and adds navigation controls. Instant groupware, anyone?
Run from Server installation option. No more kludges to make Outlook work in an Office "run from server" environment. Extensive group policies. Policy support includes control over the folder home page, even in the user's private folders, and all of the settings on the Tools | Options dialog. More deployment tools. Custom Installation Wizard and Office Profile Wizard to customize setup, choose components and set preferences. Let's keep going down the list of enhancements, turning to those that will particularly interest developers:
We're beaming from being in very honored company as one of the recipients of the 1998 Microsoft Exchange Pathfinder Awards. Microsoft executives presented these at MEC '98 earlier this month. The Slipstick Systems Exchange Center received the Exchange Community Builder Award. We're proud to be able to bring users, administrators and developers together to find solutions. The full list of winners:
You can get more information on the winners and their solutions at http://www.microsoft.com/exchange/community/pathfinder.asp and see the Exchange Server Deployment Honor Roll listing 16 organizations with more than 50,000 Exchange seats deployed. The publisher of my Outlook and Exchange client books has changed its name from Duke Press to 29th Street Press and is marking the occasion with a special offer. You can get either of my books at 29% off the cover price by ordering directly from 29th Street Press between now and September 30. Click on one of the links below, then type the following code at the order page, where it says Enter discount code: INHDWEB:
New and updated utilities
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