Coming Soon: See Your Network in Microsoft Outlook, using Outlook Social Connector…by Elliot Shmukler

http://blog.linkedin.com/2009/11/18/linkedin-microsoft-outlook-connector/

Avete un lungo indirizzo di email in una colonna di un file Excel, e volete sfruttarlo appieno all’interno del vostro Microsoft Outlook? Semplice.

Eliminate tutte le colonne dal foglio Excel in oggetto, lasciando solo quella relativa agli indirizzi email da importare in Outlook. Salvate il file Excel in formato “.csv”, il famoso “comma separated values”, ovvero valori separati da virgola. Più o meno.
Fatto ciò, andate in Outlook, cliccate su:
File–>Importa ed Esporta–>Importa dati da altri programmi o file
A questo punto scegliete l’opzione “Valori separati da virgola o file .csv” e sfogliate il contenuto del vostro PC alla ricerca del file Excel salvato in precedenza.
Sarebbe opportuno, prima di fare ciò e se non volete aggiungere i destinatari alla vostra rubrica di Outlook, creare una cartella di tipo “contatto” dove andare ad inserire il nuovo elenco.
Scegliete, appunto, la cartella in cui importare l’elenco precedentemente salvato in formato “.csv”, ed il gioco è fatto. Il vostro nuovo elenco destinatari è pronto all’uso.

Updated 2009-11-25
Outlook and other mail programs have implemented most of what I previously recommended and the new spam/junk filters really help out. However, I would still view email in plain text because some junk still gets through.

Updated 2002-01-07
There is a way to at least stop HTML email from attacking you. See Secure Email under the How To Demos for details and instructions. The instructions protect you from all the viruses I have seen being generated by this HTML email… without having virus protection software. 

Published 2001-02-24

This stuff really sucks! It is so intrusive and there is no way to turn it off in Microsoft Outlook. Before you had to worry about attachments in your email… now you have to worry about your email. Companies are sending their website to you. With non-HTML email you were safe(except attachments)… with HTML email anybody can tell if email was sent  to a valid email address, whether you read the email and they can get your IP address. Just about everything they could detect in the browser. All very easily. They can even use ActiveX, Java and JavaScript to extend what they can do. With this information they know who you are and can then track your movement in the site and relate that to you specifically. THIS IS NOT GOOD!
I find that 95% of my HTML email is some form of junk mail. How many people do you talk to that use HTML instead of simple text for email? Other than business ads not many? 
SPAM networks can use HTML email to confirm email addresses are valid much easier. Once your email ID is on their network(and validated) you will see even more junk mail.

It was headache enough with attachments and all the SPAM you had to wade through… now you have to worry about what that SPAM email is doing.

How do you stop it?

I haven’t figured out a way yet. Anybody got any ideas. It should be simple for Microsoft to put one of the filter options as “content type” for message rules. Then we could do this easily. Until then I create new rules and keep trashing stuff.

On a side note all this HTML email is making it difficult for companies that don’t SPAM you. Now I have to compete with people that intrude on your life with this HTML email as well as other web sites. 

Do us all a favor and yell at Microsoft. This is something that can easily be fixed.

You can organise a meeting in Microsoft Outlook using the following methods:

Method 1

1. Go to your Calendar, display the date when you would like to hold the meeting, and click on your preferred time slot. (You could just double click the time for your meeting on the Calendar)
2. Click the Plan a Meeting icon , (on the Advanced toolbar, if the toolbar is not on display, right click on any empty space around or below the menu bar, and click advance ), or Actions > Plan a Meeting.
3. Click on Add Others to add email addresses and names of participants from your address book.
4. Click on Make Meeting (this action displays a new window containing subject, location, and text area for more information)
5. Type the subject of the meeting and the details including location.
6. Click on Send

With this option, you don’t need to select the date of the meeting.

Method 2

Responding to a Meeting request
When you receive a request to attend a meeting, you will see it in your Inbox with a different icon – .

To send the organizer a response if you will be attending is pretty easy.

1. Open the request, and select one of the meeting responses:
2. When you select any of these you then have the option to:
   1. Edit the response before sending – e.g. if the date is not convenient you could suggest an alternative.
   2. Send the response now – the person arranging the meeting will be notified of your response.
   3. Don’t send a response

If the organizer cancels the meeting, Outlook would automatically send a mail to all recipients with a subject indicating meeting cancellation. Outlook would also delete the entry from your calendar.

One thing we all need to be aware of is that, we won’t optimize the tools in Outlook if it is not used as a desktop organizer.

The new build introduces the revolutionary QuoteWerks Communicator SPAM filter neutralizer and includes an enhanced Microsoft Dynamics CRM integration, improved Maximizer integration, and support for QuickBooks 2010 (USA and Canada).

ORLANDO, FL November 23, 2009 — Aspire Technologies, Inc., a leading provider of sales quoting software solutions for the global small and mid-markets, announced today the release of a new build which includes over twenty-two new features.  Included in the build are numerous features designed to help companies of all sizes reduce their cost-of-sales and improve sales worker efficiencies.

Build 51 improves some existing integrations and also adds some new features for users.  The most notable features include:

• Support for QuickBooks 2010 (USA and Canadian versions)
• New enhanced Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 integration (including support for Multi-tenancy, quote entity support, and more)
• Improved Maximizer integration for Maximizer 10.0 and 10.5

<sp>
In this release, the new QuoteWerks Communicator was introduced.  The QuoteWerks Communicator enables Aspire Technologies, Inc. to periodically send messages to QuoteWerks users informing them of build updates, new features available, and other pertinent information.  These messages are received and viewed from within the QuoteWerks application. These messages are designed to be sent infrequently so as to not inundate the customers with messages.  It also enables the users to reply directly to the messages that they receive.  They can send questions and suggestions about the product allowing for bi-directional communication for purposes of feedback and to gauge customer responses to new features.

“Our customers often upgrade their systems and applications to take advantage of new features and technologies.  It is crucial that we inform our customers when we release new integrations and functionality, ensuring that their combined CRM and accounting solutions continue to work seamlessly with QuoteWerks.  Often however, customers are unaware of new additions to QuoteWerks because email SPAM filters trap or discard our build announcement emails, disrupting legitimate email communication between us and our customer base.  The new QuoteWerks Communicator will allow us to keep our customers informed and alert them when new features are available,” comments John C. Lewe IV, President of Aspire Technologies, Inc.

A full list of all the features added in Build 51 can be viewed here.

The new QuickBooks 2010 integrations, enhanced MS CRM integration, and improved Maximizer integration (plus more) are available in Build 51 or higher of QuoteWerks version 4.0.  Visit http://www.quotewerks.com/updates/UpdateAgent.asp to download build 51.

About Aspire Technologies and QuoteWerks^®

Aspire Technologies, the creators of the award winning QuoteWerks^® sales quoting software, is the leading provider of sales quoting software with its award winning QuoteWerks^® application deployed to thousands of businesses and

enterprises worldwide. QuoteWerks^® integrates with leading CRM and accounting packages, along with IT
distributors D&H^®, Ingram Micro^®, SYNNEX^®, and Tech Data^®, enabling businesses in all industries to integrate QuoteWerks^® seamlessly into their existing environments.  Aspire Technologies is headquartered in Orlando, Florida and is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner.  For more information please visit www.quotewerks.com.

QuoteWerks is a registered trademark of Aspire Technologies, Inc.  Other trademarks referenced are the property of their respective owners.

Sin duda, quien lo tenga todo en webmail no se ha de preocupar, pero la gente ( como yo ) que utilizamos un gestor de correo, para almacenar todas nuestras cuentas de correo, contactos, calendarios y RSS, si se nos estropea o tenemos algún problema, lo pasaremos mal.

Outlook trae una herramienta para la reparación de archivos.pst.

La herramienta se llama SCANPST.EXE y la podemos encontrar aquí:

C:\Archivos de programa\Microsoft Office\Office12

La ejecutamos

Ahora elegimos el archivo PST.

Ahora le damos a Iniciar para hacer la comprobación de errores.

Después de pasar las 8 fases nos mostrará los errores.

Hacemos la copia de seguridad y le damos a reparar.

Este mensaje ya nos dice que el archivo de  Outlook está reparado.

According to this Wall Street Journal article, Microsoft says its 2010 version of Outlook will include a window allows users to review information about the email sender like: their photo on Facebook etc, what they are saying on Twitter and other social networking sites.

What will this mean?  This should compell more people with client-facing postions (like lawyers, for example)  to more fully utilize social networking, monitor their own profile, photo and messaging.  They will want to make sure that they are presenting themselves in the best possible light on social networking services.

It will also blur the line between the private and public spheres.  People who have used to Facebook or Twitter to just have fun may need to re-think that approach.

Build 50 includes 12 new features highlighted by the compatibility with Windows 7 and a new PDF generator.

ORLANDO, FL November 17, 2009 — Aspire Technologies, Inc., a leading provider of sales quoting software solutions for the global small and mid-markets, announced today the latest build of QuoteWerks sales quoting software (Build 50) is now available for download and purchase.

Build 50 includes new features designed to enhance the user’s ability to create quotes quickly and accurately.  The most notable feature is the new PDF generator.  The new and improved PDF generator no longer requires that a printer driver be installed and alleviates the inconvenience and complexity of installing these drivers.  Organizations often set user restrictions which limit the ability for drivers or new software to be installed by non-administrators.  Although this is a helpful security setting, installing required drivers for software becomes increasingly difficult and user rights usually need to be modified to allow the install to continue.  Utilizing a PDF generator that does not install drivers not only eliminates this issue, but it also allows the CPU to operate without another process running too.

Additionally, the new PDF generator includes the ability to flag PDF’s as Read-only.  This option can also be enhanced to prevent the recipient of the file from copying text out of the PDF.  Organizations can use this feature to make it more difficult for customers or prospective customers to alter the quote.  Furthermore, users can now embed fonts into the PDF making the file even more tamper-resistant since only the characters embedded in the file are used which also reduces the size of the document.

Coupled with the above features, users can also activate the option to have the PDF generator automatically detect hyperlinks in the PDF file.  This option will underline and color the link blue and allow the hyperlink to be clicked.

By installing this new build, users will also be completely compatible with Windows 7 since the only previous issue involved the PDF generator which has been updated in build 50.

“With the release of Windows 7 it is very important to offer our customers a solution that functions seamlessly with it as well as previous versions of Windows.  Currently, QuoteWerks is 100% compatible with Windows 7 and the new PDF generator expands the functionality users can implement to ensure their quotes are accurate,” says Vice President of Operations of Aspire Technologies, Inc. John Lewe.

The new PDF generator and compatibility to Windows 7 is available in Build 50 or higher of QuoteWerks version 4.0.  Visit http://www.quotewerks.com/updates/UpdateAgent.asp to download build 50.

About Aspire Technologies and QuoteWerks^®

Aspire Technologies, the creators of the award winning QuoteWerks^® sales quoting software, is the leading provider of sales quoting software with its award winning QuoteWerks^® application deployed to thousands of businesses and enterprises worldwide. QuoteWerks^® integrates with leading CRM and accounting packages, along with IT distributors D&H^®, Ingram Micro^®, SYNNEX^®, and Tech Data^®, enabling businesses in all industries to integrate QuoteWerks^® seamlessly into their existing environments.  Aspire Technologies is headquartered in Orlando, Florida and is a Microsoft Certified Partner.  For more information please visit www.quotewerks.com.

QuoteWerks is a registered trademark of Aspire Technologies, Inc.  Other trademarks referenced are the property of their respective owners.

QuoteWerks has just created a new community page specifically for ConnectWise users.  The new page includes many features tailored for users and some helpful videos as well.

The new page also officially announces the new integration between QuoteWerks and ConnectWise and when it will be released.  Moving forward, users will be able to use a QuoteWerks native integration to link to ConnectWise.  This will allow the link to be updated on a more consistent basis as well as allow QuoteWerks to troubleshoot the link directly instead of ConnectWise.  This link will be completely written and supported by QuoteWerks.

The link will have all the features currently in the ConnectWise link plus some new features not currently available.

The community page also contains many links to features, videos, and layouts that may be useful for companies in the IT industry.

To view the new page, please click here.

I have a theory – buggy Microsoft ActiveSync code combined with the out of control use of smartphones for corporate email (ok, I’m part of the problem) has resulted in meeting madness.  Madness I say.   MADNESS.  Here is one example of how Outlook gets confused: I accept a meeting, sometimes on my smartphone, sometimes on my PC.  Everything is fine until I want to delete the meeting from my calendar later on… but I can’t – I’ve somehow become the meeting owner and if I delete the meeting I delete it for everyone.  And I can’t decline the meeting because somehow I own it!  This lands in the fingerpointing deadzone of tech support.  Very hard to reproduce – seemingly random (but nothing digital is actually random – everything digital is deterministic even if the root cause is hard to find).  Sprint can’t help – not fair to expect they could help.  Palm (I’m a Pre owner) can’t help – perhaps it is their implementation of ActiveSync… except iPhone and BlackBerry users have experienced the same problem.

So I have to point the finger squarely at Microsoft – Outlook should be able to handle and prevent situtations like this – ActiveSync is the gatekeeper to 3rd parties accessing Outlook.

And when you point the finger at Microsoft… well, I guess I’ll just have to live with the problem.

See www.psixpda.com

When you add a contact to your email address book or send an email from your own account did you know you can personalise this in Microsoft Outlook?  So instead of using the same standard email that you are sending to or from i.e. instead of info@name.co.uk you could alter it so that it shows up as Comapny Name (for instance Your Admin Assistant) in the recipient’s in box.   Also you could alter the display name of the recipient so that it is more personalised when the recipient opens the email and sees the “To” field at the top.

To change it:

• For your own email account to change how your name is displayed in the recipient’s in box, go into – Tools/EMail Accounts/Change existing account/Change/ – then change the Your Name field.  Make sure the email address field however is fully correct.
• To change how recipient’s see their own name go into – Contacts/Choose the contact you wish to change/change the Display Name As field.  Again make sure the email address field is fully correct.

If you need help with this function please do not hesitate to contact me.

TechRepublic has a post on 10+ tips for working In Outlook’s Calendar view.

If you are tired of typing your contact information in Outlook everytime you type up an email, here is a tip that will help you with that. I’m using Outlook 2007 as an example and it’s basically the same for all versions of Outlook.

Once logged in to Outlook, go to Tools in the Top Menu & select Options.

In the Options panel, click on the tab labeled Mail Format and select the box that says Signatures. Your panel should now look like this:

Example of Signature Panel

You will be clicking on New to add a signature on the panel above. It will ask you to name it. If you see in my example above, I created two signatures.

One is my MAIN signature which goes on every new email I send.

The second is a REPLY signature that is used whenever I reply to an email.

I do this because I don’t want my main signature every time I reply. My reply signature has only my name on it. It’s good email etiquette, you don’t want you main signature all over the place. Especially on those emails you go back and forth with the sender. It can make it difficult to read.

You have the options of adding a picture, a link and to format the text as you wish. Always remember that simple is better.

Make sure to set your defaults on the right side as shown on the example. Those options designate which signatures you want Outlook to use for the specific tasks I mentioned above.

Now, every time you type up a new message your customized signature will automatically appear.

Android PC-Suite
Now there’s a novel name for Android’s Synchronisation software, where have I heard the name ‘PC Suite’ before? obviously not a trade name otherwise that huge Finnish company would have something to say
Ok, so, out of the box of the ‘T-Mobile Pulse’ is one of those mini-CDs, with quite a selection on it, including a ‘User Guide’ PDF, which is the norm now, rather than a hard copy. Anyway, back to Synchronisation… The Android PC Suite, as far as I can first see, isn’t a suite as such, rather just a way of synchronising the Calendar and Contacts with Microsoft Outlook.

There’s also an option to sync with the free ‘Outlook Express’ but obviously just for contacts, as OE doesn’t have a calendar; not the last time I looked anyway.

Maybe with future releases of the Android PC Suite, we’ll see more of a ‘Suite’, a better name for this first release perhaps would have been better named ‘PC Sync’. I had hoped with the name ‘PC Suite’ to have seen sync of ‘Notepad’ too; but this must be down to the ‘Gorilla’ hold Microsoft have of the sync between Android and Outlook, similar to the scenario of Apple’s iPhone in-sync with Outlook. I also thought the ‘Suite’ would have had include some kind of media (Pictures/Images/Music/Videos) transfer between the Android and a PC. On the other hand, when the Android is connected to a PC via the Micro-USB & USB lead, the Android allows the PC to see it’s memory card; thus enabling easy file transfer via drag & drop.

5th Nov 09
IMPORTANT! Oh dear, I’ve just realised that it doesn’t look like this ‘PC Suite’ supports ‘BACKING UP’! So how do Android users back up their data to keep it safe? I’ve searched for the keyword ‘back up’ in the Android Market place and unfortunately at present it doesn’t look like Android users can back their data up; other than sync’ing Calendar & Contacts with Outlook.

QuoteWerks 4.0 Build 51 Release Overview
Build 51 includes over 20 new features. We will spotlight the improved Microsoft Dynamics CRM integration, Maximizer integration, re-designed select email window, QuickBooks 2010 support, and more! Additional time will be allotted for questions from the attendees.

Title: QuoteWerks 4.0 Build 51 Release Overview
Date: Thursday, December 3, 2009
Time: 3:00 PM – 4:00 PM EDT

After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.

Space is limited.
Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/361831065

Please visit the QuoteWerks website for more information.

I know this post comes a bit later though, but I would like to share everyone on Windows Live Mail application which was developed by Microsoft as part of the Windows Live Messenger and those packages.

Recently, I reformated my notebook from Windows Vista Business to Windows 7 Professional. Yea, I know everything wipes out except for some of my old documents. And I realised, hey, my Windows Mail (another alternative for Microsoft Outlook) was deleted. Okay, I could not find any application which I can use it to check my company emails since I have to use my company email account to access those important emails from clients. Guess what, and I went to google and I search on Windows Mail or Microsoft Outlook for Windows 7 Operating System. There seems to be no hope though I tried one solution which was to use the Windows Mail files and folders in the Windows Vista and copied over to the Windows 7 C Drive. The end result was failed! I was quite worried about this since I could not even copy those emails to my personal email account such as Gmail. So I continued to search, and I saw Windows Live Mail application which can be used as another alternative. But of cause since I was busy with work, so I did not bother to try it until today. My notebook is installed with Windows Live Messenger and not Windows Live Mail because I dislike unwanted applications to be installed onto my notebook. It took me 5 minutes to install the application. And I have managed to link it up to my Gmail and my company email. I was happy that my Gmail setup takes less than 20 seconds since the application was clever enough to identify it as a Gmail account through the Gmail account domain name. But of cause for those specified ones like company emails, the settings have to be configured correctly.

If you do not have Windows Mail or Microsoft Outlook applications in your computer to setup your company emails, then why not install Windows Live Mail application and simply configure your company email account settings given by your system administrator or network administrator?

I have been using Microsoft OneNote 2007 ever since it was released, as I was using its predecessor, OneNote 2003. OneNote is a highly flexible note taking software, which can help you sort and organize information without putting too much effort into layout. Just paste, send, or drag-and-drop nearly any content from any kind of application into it and an editable, indexed copy will remain in your notebook. It was the most innovative software I had seen from Microsoft in years and it is highly useful for any brainstorming or research activities on the internet. I use it next to daily for years now. Only recently have I seen more impressive software (& service) by Microsoft in the form of LiveMesh.

If anybody is using OneNote 2007 in a Microsoft Windows Vista 64 bit enviroment (possibly also Microsoft Windows XP 64 bit) they will notice that the virtual printer is missing, which enables users to send print-outs from any program with printer capability to OneNote. This issue has been discussed by the OneNote developers and widely criticized by OneNote users. This is due to the lack of 64bit support of the Microsoft Office Document Imaging (MODI) component.

This feature is based on OCR’ing from a .tiff file if I understand it right. So basically you run OneNote with a command line switch pointing it to any .tiff file, and OneNote will automatically OCR this file and add it to the unfiled notes section. So we need to create a .tiff file and automate the process of opening OneNote with the correct command line switch. A long time ago I saw a solution with a commercial virtual printer, similar to PDF creation solutions, by Niels Kaiser. So I thought the same should be possible with the open source and more importantly free PDF Creator. I have been using this solution for maybe a year now but never got around to documenting it. So here it goes:

1) Install PDF creator with the command line switch /UseINI, so you can use different .ini configuration files.

2) Create a new printer using any printer driver installed.

2.1) Launch the properties dialog of the newly created printer. (If you got UAC running, you’ll need to do it as Administrator)

2.1) Go to the drivers section and select PDF Creator as driver.

2.2) Go to the ports section and select PDF Creator.

2.3) Click configure below the ports selection and under command line switches put the following

-PPDFCREATORPRINTER -OptionsFile”E:\Eigene Dateien\shared\PDFCreator\PDFCreator_onennote.ini”

Of course, you can change the path to point to wherever you want to put your .ini file containing the configuration for PDF Creator.

3) Create an .ini file in the path specified. I suggest copying the default “PDFCreator.ini” file, found in your user folder (“C:\Users\SOMEONE\AppData\Roaming\PDFCreator”) to another folder.

3.1) Open the .ini file and change the following properties:

AutosaveFilename=onenotetemp
AutosaveFormat=5

…

RunProgramAfterSaving=1
RunProgramAfterSavingProgramname=C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office12\ONENOTE.EXE
RunProgramAfterSavingProgramParameters=/insertdoc “<OutputFilename>”

…

AutosaveDirectory=E:\Eigene Dateien\Dokumente\
LastsaveDirectory=E:\Eigene Dateien\Dokumente\

Of course you should change the paths specified as needed. Alternatively you can copy and paste my config (I could only attach as .doc) into your .ini file, provided you have the same paths as me.

If you are looking for a different solution to this particular problem, you could go stick to a 32 bit OS or try the XPS solution put forward by David Rasmussen, one of the OneNote developers long after the release. I for one have never tried his solution since I already had a working one.

Of course you can always try different products, and the biggest competitor to my knowledge is Evernote. I fiddled with it some time ago, but prefered OneNote for the tight integration with other Microsoft products, namely Internet Explorer and Outlook, though Evernote does have some other advantages over OneNote. You can find a more detailed comparison here. But recently I’ve been looking into Evernote again, mostly because of their impressive iPhone application. The only comparable solution to accessing and using my notes on the go I found for OneNote was MobileNoter, which, for me, simply didn’t work – but maybe it will work in your system.

PDFCreator_onennote

Too may tasks on your admin to do list?  Feel you are stretched here, there and everywhere with no time for real work?  Here is a way of tackling them:

• First take a deep breath!
• Order them in priority – what needs to be done now, tomorrow or next week?
• Allocate the time they will take next to them
• Delegate what you can – either to a colleague, secretary or relative
• Draw up a schedule, could be handwritten, typed or a wallchart.  Microsoft Outlook also has a good electronic calendar, task list and reminder system
• Give yourself a little treat when you have completed a stage of them
• For the future allocate a little bit of each day to general admin tasks
• Look at ways of saving your time by delegating more if you can (ahem that is where we can help if you like!)
• Limit activities such as web browsing and email to a minimum, they can take up too much valuable time
• If all else fails go outside, take a walk, have a long break and come back refreshed.  Nothing is ever too important that it cannot wait for a little while!