The following articles were included in our Exchange Messaging Outlook (EMO) newsletter published on June 10, 2021.
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Today's Highlights:
- Outlook.com and Office 365 +Plus Addressing
- “The properties of the message have been changed”
- Restore the “Good” Room Finder
- Are profile pictures sent with email?
Outlook.com and Office 365 +Plus Addressing
Both Outlook.com and Office 365 Exchange mailboxes support “plus” addresses.
If you are unfamiliar with plus addressing, you can add a plus sign and keyword or tag to your alias when you give out your address. This allows you to use a unique address for every service you sign up for, if you want and can keep them straight.
For example, you could use youralias+emo@ to sign up for this newsletter.
You can filter on the address and if you get spam or unwanted mail sent to that address, create a rule (for words in the recipient address) to delete mail containing that keyword.
Plus addressing is enabled on all Outlook.com accounts.
By default plus addressing is disabled on Office 365 Exchange Server, because plus signs were allowed in SMTP addresses in Exchange server.
Administrators can enable it on the server, using the PowerShell cmdlet
Set-OrganizationConfig -AllowPlusAddressInRecipients $true
Notes:
Some web forms don't support plus signs in the email address field.
You cannot send mail or reply using a plus address. If you use a plus address with a site or service and need to send an email from the address you signed up with (such as to contact support), you won’t be able to send mail using the address. You will not be able to unsubscribe from mailing lists by email either.
“The properties of the message have been changed”
For the past couple of weeks or so, users have reported an annoying prompt stating “The properties of the message <subject> have been changed. Do you want to save changes?” when closing an HTML message containing an attachment they replied to (or forwarded).
The error message does not come up if you open the message in the reading pane and reply or forward.
In addition, affected users may not be able to forward calendar invitations.
If you are affected by this bug, it is fixed an upcoming update. The fix was released to in the preview channel Version 2016 this week and will be coming to other builds in a couple of weeks or so.
Microsoft Support article on the bug: "The properties of the message have been changed" prompt when forwarding/replying in Outlook
Restore the “Good” Room Finder
Microsoft updated the room finder in Outlook meetings and removed the Suggested Times feature and the thumbnail calendar to view availability, annoying the users who came to rely on it.
Microsoft released a registry key to revert back to the original room finder. You need to be using version 14026.20244 or higher and add ShowLegacyRoomFinder to the registry. After restarting Outlook, you’ll have the old room finder dialog back.
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\Options\Calendar
DWord: ShowLegacyRoomFinder
Value: 1Note: Once more work is done to the new room finder (to restore the features users want), this key will be deprecated.
If you want to use the older Room Finder dialog but don't want to edit the registry, I have a reg file available for download at ShowLegacyRoomFinder
Are profile pictures sent with email?
I'm asked that question a lot. The answer is “it depends”.
If you send email to Outlook.com addresses, they will see your Microsoft account profile photo. But if the recipient address is not on the Outlook.com servers, they will not see your photo.
If the recipient is using Gmail and sees a photo for you, you have a Google Account using your address.
Another source of user photos from Gravatar, but it mostly used for website logins and I’m not aware of any email services that use it.
New & Updated Office 365 KB Articles
June 2021 updates for Microsoft Office
New & Updated Outlook KB Articles
Description of the security update for Outlook 2013: June 8, 2021 (KB5001934)
Description of the security update for Outlook 2016: June 8, 2021 (KB5001942)
Other Resources
June 2021 updates for Microsoft Office
Microsoft released these security and nonsecurity updates for Office in June 2021.
Create a Hyperlink on an Outlook Custom Form
If you need clickable links in a custom form, you can use VBScript code and a Label field or Command buttons to make clickable links.
Fixed: Autocomplete is messed up in Outlook
Users are reporting a problem in Outlook 2019, 2016, and Outlook 365: the autocomplete list opens upward, not downward, and the autocomplete lines are wider than normal. Some users report the X is missing to delete autocomplete entries.
Meeting Request Spam
Spammers discovered a better way to get your attention: meeting requests. A meeting request spam will add a tentative appointment to your calendar (or an accepted meeting, if you autoaccept appointments) and pop up a reminder to get your attention.
New App bar in Outlook.com
Users are starting to see a new app bar in Outlook on the web, on the left size of the window, not at the bottom of the folder list – and it has buttons for the online versions of the Office apps. Office 365 Premium subscribers should be familiar with the app bar in this
Outlook is not saving preferences
When closing and reopening Outlook, options for Mark as Read, Send Immediately, Save sent items and others revert back to the defaults.
Reset reminders closer to Meeting time
Use VBA to reset a meeting reminder to 5 minutes before meeting begins, so you don't forget.