Outlook/Outlook Express Index
Adding addresses to the toolbar
Attachments appear as field codes
How can I get Outlook to show and print the day as well as the date in weekly view? I've trawled through the Help file and countless unintelligible options, and can do everything except for this simple task.
Microsoft does give you a clue to this in the Help file, but as it's in a footnote to 'Displaying the Japanese year'. I'm not surprised you couldn't find it. And it's one of those 'trick questions' so dear to Redmond, where the answer isn't where one would expect it to be. You have to go to Windows Control Panel, Regional Settings. In the Date page, set the long date style to 'dddd d MMMM yyyy'. Click on Apply and Outlook will display weekdays as well as dates. You can experiment with the date format 'ddd', for example, gives 'Mon' instead of 'Monday', and 'dd' instead of 'd' adds a leading zero to a single-figure date.
How can stop my computer trying
to dial up my ISP every 10 minutes?This could well be because Outlook Express (or Outlook) is set to check for new mail at 10-minute intervals. You can turn this off from the Tools, Options, General dialog in Outlook Express, or Tools, Options, Mail delivery in Outlook 2000.
Once I've read any incoming mail I automatically delete the messages and they're sent to my deleted files folder. Subsequently, I may do one of two things: permanently delete a message or print it out. I often have a large number of messages to print, but can't print them en masse by hitting Select All and Print. Even if I do, only the first of the messages is printed out as if I had selected just that message and sent it to print.
You should be able to select multiple messages in an Outlook folder and print them at will. If you want each message to appear on its own sheet of paper, you must make sure that the 'Start each item on a new page' check box in the Print Options frame is selected.
If you don't do that, each message will be printed one behind the other, overlapping pages willy.nilly. But that doesn't always happen, so try selecting that option and see if that helps your printing problem.
Another thing that can stop printing is if any of the messages you're trying to print are in HTML format. There are a number of potential problems here. For starters, HTML messages don't always print on the first time of asking, and the only sure way of getting them to print is to actually open them and print from the open message.
When HTML messages are involved, often some of your print options disappear. The option that enables you to start each message on a new page might not be available, or you might not be able to choose the number of copies you want printed, the number of pages or even how you want them collated.
Whether or not these items are available depends on the print format type selected: if you've gone for the Memo Style, you might find that the items mentioned above have gone walkies. Select the T able Style, for example, and those items will come trotting back home again. This is due to the fact that if you choose Memo Style, the message has to be printed using the print formatting techniques for your browser. The workaround enables you to print in Memo Style, but requires you to open the HTML message first. Go to the File menu and you'll get the same Print dialog box that Internet Explorer uses, and you'll also find that some, if not all, of those missing print options have come back again.
I recently received an email from a friend of mine that says in the header 'undisclosed sender and undisclosed recipient'. How the heck did he do that? And how can I do it using Outlook Express?
When a message is addressed through the archaically named Bcc: (blind carbon copy) field, the recipient appears in the To: field as undisclosed recipient. The Bcc: field is normally used to avoid giving multiple recipients access to one another's addresses. This field is only visible if you select All Headers from the message's View menu.
As for undisclosed sender, that's easily accomplished. Choose Accounts from Outlook Express's Tools menu, click the Mail tab, select your main account, click Properties, then change the name on the General tab to undisclosed sender. If you also change the email address, the recipient won't be able to reply directly.
Your real email account can still be determined from the message header (displayed by choosing Properties from the message's File menu). There's a technique often used by hackers by which you could completely falsify the originating email account but I'm quite sure you wouldn't want to do that.
Whenever a friend of mine sends an email from Outlook Express 5.50 the email arrives in full. However, when anyone tries to open it, an error message is displayed on the recipient PC first:
"Internet Explorer An ActiveX control on this page might be unsafe to interact with other parts of the page. Do you want to allow this interaction? <Yes> or <No>?"
Regardless of whether you say 'yes' or 'no', the e-mail can be viewed as normal. However, when an email is sent to the USA the font and background change to white on grey which, needless to say, cannot be read easily. It doesn't matter what font, background colour or font colour are used. Ever heard of this?
The obvious question to ask is why there is an ActiveX control (a type of program) embedded in the page at all. I would suspect a virus, though it could just be a misguided attempt to create 'pretty' notepaper for emails. ActiveX controls were created to allow more intelligent internal websites. A good example of their use is the Windows 98 Update Wizard, which runs an ActiveX control to determine the versions of installed operating system modules and hence allows Microsoft's website to create a tailored list of updates for you.
Since an ActiveX control is a compiled program, its purpose cannot readily be discerned without running it. Unlike JavaScript, which was designed to execute only inside a tightly controlled 'sandbox', Microsoft placed no restrictions on what an ActiveX control can do. Once you say 'yes' to run an ActiveX control, or if your security settings allow it to run without warning, it can create or alter files, reformat your hard disk or undertake all kinds of mischief.
Given the possibility of viruses, I strongly recommend everyone to configure their email program to disable any kind of program in emails, including ActiveX controls, VB Scripts, Java and JavaScript. Microsoft introduced these features mainly to provide for automated workflow processing in corporate environments -for example, automating expense claims by email - and didn't really consider the dangers of their use on the net, until virus authors demonstrated them.
Since then Microsoft has been releasing a long series of security updates, aimed at preventing or warning against potential viruses. However it has been necessary for Microsoft to compromise between the strict security necessary on the internet and the rules appropriate in a corporate environment, which may want to use these advanced features. In theory, this can be done by means of 'security zones', but these complications increase the possibility of error, and once a virus has entered the 'trusted' zone of a corporate environment (perhaps via a portable computer used at home), rules permitting, programs in internal emails can allow it to spread unhindered.
As the average home or small business user has no need for these features, which are much more likely to be used by a virus than a well-intentioned user, it will be safer to disable them totally. This can be done in the Security tab of the Internet Control Panel. It follows that no-one should ever attempt to include any kind of script or ActiveX control in an internet email -it will inevitably be mistaken for a virus and cause alarm.
Of course there are many who still hold the view that email is meant to look like email and not like fancy web pages. To these users, who probably started using email when modems still ran at 300bit/s, any attempt at adding html or rich text is simply a waste of bandwidth. Now, though, at least 80 percent of users read mail using Microsoft's Outlook or Outlook Express programs and almost all email software -even the venerable Eudora and Pegasus Mail -have been forced to handle HTML and rich text mail. These long established email clients have seen a new popularity in corporate and government use due to their immunity from most email viruses.
I use Outlook Express to check my email at the office, but sometimes I work from home. If I want to have access to my recent emails, I have to remember to forward them to myself. And I have to remember to just Send, not Send/Receive. If I receive other emails at home, I have to do the same thing before going back to the office. It's a mess. Surely there's a better way?
There is indeed a better way. On both the home and office systems, launch Outlook Express and select Accounts from the Tools menu. Click the Mail tab, double-click the mail account you're using, then click the Advanced tab. Check the boxes titled Leave a copy of messages on server and Remove from server after x day(s). Five days is the default for the latter.
Now, when either copy of Outlook retrieves messages, it will leave them on the server so that the other system can retrieve them as well. Each copy retrieves a message once, and after five days, Outlook will remove the message from the server.
I'm experiencing problems with Outlook 98 (8.5.5104.6). I run Office 97 (SR-2) in Windows 98 (2nd Edition, 4.10.2222 A), IE 5.50.4134.0600IC (update q269368). Whenever I create/edit/reply/forward emails, the toolbars appear in a different order than I want them. The Send bar is above the menu bar. I can re-order it but it then reverts back if I restart my PC. I can't customise/reset the toolbars as they're greyed out. This appears to have started after I changed from Microsoft Word as editor to plain text and then back again.
I've not actually come across your problem before, but if anyone else has, please sing out In the meantime, I hope that reading Microsoft Knowledge Base article QI 87831, and any others it links to, might perhaps help you out.
Could you recommend a good Outlook 97 Support/FAQ site please? I have Microsoft Exchange Server 5.5 on the back end and I'm having some problems with the client.
I don't usually do recommendations of any kind because it always upsets somebody who feels left out But I don't think I'll get too many nasty emails if I suggest that you visit Sue Mosher's site at www.slipstick.com, in addition to the Microsoft Web site, of course.
Two of my friends regularly send me email messages from the same foreign university. Recently their messages have arrived showing times that are several hours different than they should be.
I'm using Outlook 98. Is there an easy way to fix this problem so that this doesn't happen?
This isn't an Outlook 98 problem. In most cases, problems with time stamps stem from the sender. If the sender's system time is set improperly, that person should reset the time using the appropriate utility (such as the Date/Time applet in Control Panel). What you describe, however, sounds as if the mail server at your friends' university is set wrong, because both users' time stamps are incorrect.
The best thing is to tell your friends to ask whoever is in charge of the mail server to check its time and reset it if necessary.
In response to your comments on Talk21 ('Talk's Not Cheap', Helpfile, Shopper 145) you may be interested in the programs I have at
http://jump.to/bob_nicholls In particular, WebbyPOP provides an interface between Pop-based e-mail programs and Web-based e-mail systems, Hotmail and MailCity.I don't have much spare time to keep the programs up to date, generally it's whenever there is a change to the Web e-mail systems or a change is required to my programs, so there are no guarantees that they will always work. Also, they are not pretty.
Useful. I was hoping someone would do this. Also, I see that Outlook Express 5 now allows you to access Hotmail. Unfortunately, changes in Web sites mean that such utilities need constant updating.
Attachments appear as field codes
Outlook 97 suddenly shows all my attachments as '{embed Outlook.file Attach}'. How can I correct this so they show the icon and file name as before?
This happens when you use Word 97 as your email editor with the Picture Placeholder option enabled in the Word email template and Show Field Codes enabled in Word. To fix this in Outlook, choose Options from the Tools menu, click the Email tab, and note the name of the MS Word template used. Next open that template in Word, choose Options from the Tools menu and click the View tab. Clear both the Picture Placeholders check box and the Field Codes check box and click okay. Now save the modified template.
Please can you provide me with some guidelines as to the best ISPs. I have tried Genie and Netscape thus far and neither seem to be that reliable, with regular loss of connection and so on.
No. In general you get what you pay for. Free ISPs will vary in quality according to the number of subscribers and current capacity -it may take time to add extra capacity to meet increased loads. At present, new offerings such as free or reduced rate phone calls to your ISP are just being developed and we can expect to see many more market shifts.
The growing number of free ISPs has increased volatility as subscribers frequently switch between several ISPs to see which one suits them best. If a free ISP offered better-than-average service, publishing that fact could attract an excessive amount of new business, so reducing the level of their service quality.
I would recommend that users obtain a permanent e-mail address that is unaffected by changes in ISP. You can do this through many different organisations, but for UK use it is far preferable to use a service such as Mail.com, Yahoo, or Bigfoot.com that offers mail redirection, rather than one that requires you to read your mail online.
Up to now I've been with BT Click and my e-mail account has been with in.talk21.com. I'm happy with my e-mail there, I can remember the address and everything. They claim you can keep your account with them whoever your ISP is. Today I switched Telephone Company to Telnet and added greatxscape as an ISP. I get an e-mail account there but it is quite a mouthful to remember. I thought I'd keep my in.talk21 e-mail account and access it through my new ISP. I use Outlook Express, and it tells me my user ID or password were not recognised. If I connect via BT Click (which I've left in place for now) there is no problem.
I don't understand why in.talk21 recognises me through BT Click but not through greatxscape. The ID and passwords are the same.
Didn't you realise that Talk21 is all part of a BT campaign to get your money?
Technically, BT's adverts are correct because you can access Talk21 's Web-based interface from any ISP. Despite all its advertising as a service designed for British needs, Talk21 works in a similar way to the many free US Web-based e-mail services. It gives you the advantage of being able to read your e-mail from home, school, office, or anywhere there is a Web connection, but you have to be online to do it. And of course BT's local call charges make that rather expensive.
To solve this problem, Talk21 also allows you to access your e-mail through a 'PoP' mail server -which downloads the messages to a mail client such as Outlook Express. Once you have downloaded the mail you can log off, reply offline and then log back in to send replies.
Unfortunately, as many have discovered, the Talk21 PoP server in.talk21.com can only be accessed from BT's Click service -BT checks the IP address you have logged in at and refuses connections except from BT Click nodes.
BT's official explanation that this is to prevent spamming does not hold water. To prevent spammers using its service it only has to block connections to the outbound server out.Talk21.com. The inbound server accepts connections for inbound mail (after all. it would not be much use if it didn't) but blocking PoP mail connections from outside only prevents its members from reading their own mail.
But then what did you expect for free? Why should BT provide free e-mail if it's not making any revenues from it? I just wish that it would be honest and make it clearer to the customers. It would be marvellous if some software developer would write an application that automatically downloads mail from these Webbased services. Similar offline mail readers have been around for online services such as CompuServe for many years.
I like the idea of a permanent e-mail address that does not change when you change to yet another service provider, but UK users need to be able to read their e-mail offline. For that reason, the only services I can recommend are those that provide mail forwarding to your own PoP mail-box, such as the one provided by Mail.com (formerly Iname). Mail.com offers free Web access with hundreds of different domain names available but you can add Pop-3 access for US$39.95 a year (about £25).
There are also the free e-mail forwarding services from Yahoo.com and Bigfoot.com. While there are many other companies offering free PoP e-mail or forwarding, they come and go frequently as many are not based on a sound business plan. Yahoo! and Bigfoot pay for their services by sending you advertising material.
Among Outlook's many talents is the ability to keep a 'journal' of meetings and task requests, emails, and all the Excel and Word files you work with, noting the time and date of opening, saving and closing. Unless you really need this facility we recommend that you turn it off (Tools, Options, Preferences, Joumal Options). It can add substantially to the time taken to open, close, and save files: as the journal grows, so does the delay.
Even with all the joumalling options turned off, you can still see a history of mail sent and received on a per-contact basis: go to the Activities tab on the contact's details.
Don't go trawling Tools, Options if you want to show the days of the week in the Calendar weekly view: this option is set outside Outlook. Go to Windows Control Panel, Regional Settings, Date and set the Long Date style to 'dddd d MMMM yyyy'. The change will be reflected in Outlook immediately.
Keep your emails lean: plain text messages are less than a third of the size of HTML or Outlook Rich Text. Hence you'll be saving both yourself and the recipient storage space and connect time: in addition HTML and Rich Text messages may contain information that is unreadable by non-Outlook users. You can set this globally in Tools, Options, Mail Format; for individual recipients it is set in the General tab of their Contacts entry, or for individual messages from the Format menu in the message window.
If you're working from a dial-up connection, then it makes sense to read and compose your messages offline. You can set this from the File menu. Messages you compose will be stored in the Outbox until you click the Send/Receive button: this will instigate a dialup connection. You should also check the Tools, Options, Mail Delivery dialog: in particular, clearing the 'Check for new messages every...' and setting the 'Hang up when finished...' options will reduce your online costs.
Adding addresses to the toolbar
If you frequently mail some of your contacts, they can each have their own toolbar button. From Tools, Customise, select the Mail Message command in the File category. Drag this on to a toolbar and release. Right-click and from the context menu, first type a name for the contact, then make sure Image and Text or Text only is selected. Finally, from the same context menu, Assign Hyperlink, Open... Fill in the email address and, optionally, a default subject. Close the Customize dialog, and your new button will be ready to instantly launch a preaddressed message.
You can opt to delete certain types of message without reading them. This can be useful, say, if there's a known virus going around, or you are being spammed with junk email. Run the Rules Wizard from the Tools menu and follow the prompts. There are too many options to go into detail, but it's all self-explanatory. One point to watch is that if you tick more than one filtering criterion, such as 'Specific words in the subject' and 'Specific words in the body', both conditions must be met. If you want either to apply, make separate rules.
When you receive an email from someone, it is easy to quickly add their details to your contacts list. Double-click the message title in the In Box to expand it to a full window, though this won't work in the multipane preview mode. Right-click on the sender's address at the top, and choose' Add to contacts'.
Another way to deal with spammers is to hit the Organize button while viewing the Inbox, then turn on the Junk email feature. This gives you the option to either colour suspected junk messages, or move them to a specified folder. Having turned this feature on, you can right-click on message headers in the Inbox, and add the sender to the junk list. The same applies to' Adult' mailings.
Finally, Outlook also has some handy keyboard shortcuts. When you're looking at the calendar, Alt & Up Arrow takes you back a week, Alt & Down, forward a week; Alt & Home goes to the beginning of the week, Alt & End to the end; Alt & Page Up goes to the start of the month, Alt & Page Down to the end.
I'm using Microsoft Outlook 2000 and would like to be able to use the multiple identity facility (a number of usernames from one logon and account) offered by OptusNet. Apparently, support at OptusNet doesn't know how to configure Outlook 2000 for multiple identities and can only help with Outlook Express. I found nothing relevant there.
I'm afraid I'm not familiar with OptusNet and its offerings, but the rough equivalent of Outlook Express multiple identities can be found in the shape of user profiles in Outlook 2000. Basically, you establish a user profile for each user and set up Outlook 2000 so that it prompts you to select a profile when you start it up. You'll find all the relevant information to set this up if you search Outlook 2000 help for user profile in the Index tab. A number of entries will come up, the second of which =1 should describe user profiles and what they do, while other entries will show you how to set them up.
A friend of my daughter has had her ISP logon password allegedly stolen and used to send a malicious e-mail to everyone in her e-mail address book. This girl's parents are, it seems to me, blowing this out of all proportion with police involvement, and this may involve my daughter.
Can't the ISP identify from which PC the e-mail originated? I thought all PCs had a unique Internet ID. What is the legality of acquiring someone else's password and sending offensive emails? Surely this is between the user and the ISP to sort out?
It is possible to track the location of the connected PC during the session, using the Caller ID feature to trace the telephone call, but after the event there isn't anything in the e-mail header that will tie a particular message to the precise computer used - just the mail server at your provider. I'm no lawyer but I don't think that any crime is necessarily implied here. Theft of on-line hours? Defamation of character? A very strict interpretation of the Computer Misuse Act could possibly create a credible case but this is hardly big league stuff and I doubt the police are particularly interested.
That's assuming that the password theft actually happened, rather than the girl sending the e-mail herself and then denying culpability when her parents found out. If she is so worried about the security of her account, she shouldn't leave it on a piece of paper stuck to the monitor.