OfficeForLawyers.com

Do You Use The Journal?

If so, e-mail me at bens@rolandschorr.com and tell me how you're using it. Interested in collecting stories of folks making use of the Journal for tasks big or small.

Outlook Social Connector (Beta) Ships for Outlook 2003, 2007 and 2010

Microsoft has shipped a beta of the Outlook Social Connector (OSC) for the above versions of Outlook (32-bit only, for the moment) and there is now providers available for SharePoint and LinkedIn. More information here. Note - make sure you uninstall the old version of the OSC before installing the new one...

Outlook 2010 Preview

What's new in Outlook 2010 for lawyers? Read our preview to find out....

Hotmail Forbidden?!

A number of users are discovering, the hard way, that Hotmail (and Live.com) via the old WebDAV method (which has been support in Outlook) no longer works. That's because Hotmail/Live.com has stopped supporting it. You can still get your mail using POP3 or the Outlook Connector. For more information check out these articles:

The "FixOutlook" Storm

Here's an article I just wrote that addresses the questions in the FixOutlook storm about using Word to render HTML mail in Outlook 2010.

Office 2007 Service Pack 2 has shipped

If you're running Outlook 2007 then you most certainly want to download and install the Service Pack 2 for Office 2007. This supercedes the February 2009 Cumulative Update which included a number of performance and stability enhancements - all of those changes and updates are included in SP2.

Full List of Improvements in SP2 for Outlook 2007

Note: After you install SP2 - the first time Outlook runs it may start up unusually slowly. This is especially the case if you didn't install the February 2009 Cumulative Update. Also once you have Outlook running it might seem sluggish for a while. Many users (including me) are finding that after SP2 is installed the Windows Desktop Indexer wants to take a whole new pass at the Outlook Data file and so Outlook might be a little slow while the store is reindexed for searching. Be patient, once it's done (took about half a day for my 3GB+ store) performance should be quite good again.

Tip of the Moment

Did you get an e-mail message from an Outlook user and it has one or more curious "J"s or "L"s in the post? When you compose a message with Outlook 2007 or 2010 and type an emoticon like ":-)" or ":-(" (happy or sad faces) Outlook does you a "favor" and replaces those with the ASCII character for smiley or sad faces. Unfortunately non-Outlook clients can't render those characters properly so what those users will see is a "J" or an "L" where the happy or sad face was supposed to be.

You can turn off this "assistance" in Outlook by going to the AutoCorrect options. In Outlook 2007 click Tools | Options | Mail Format | Editor Options | Proofing | AutoCorrect Options. Scroll down the list to find and delete the emoticons from the AutoCorrect options. Click OK back out and now your :-) will stay that way.

Tip of the Moment Archive

Articles

OneNote and Outlook Together - A Marriage Made in Redmond! (NEW!)
Troubleshooting Outlook (NEW)
Spring Cleaning for Your Inbox (NEW) - An article with tips on how to get an unruly Inbox down to a managable size.
Outlook Social Connector (OSC)
Creating Customized Journal Entries in Outlook
Integrating Outlook and ProLaw (Under Construction) - The start of an article on integrating Outlook and ProLaw
All About the BCC - An article about how BCC works and when to use it.
Integrating Microsoft Outlook and Worldox (Under Construction) - The beginnings of an article about the integration of Outlook and Worldox
Integrating Microsoft Outlook and Amicus Attorney - An article about the integration of Outlook and Amicus Attorney
Integrating Microsoft Outlook and Time Matters (Coming Soon) - An article about the integration of Outlook and Time Matters
What's New in Microsoft Outlook 2007? - An article that quickly summarizes some of the new features in Microsoft Outlook 2007
Outlook Q&A - Popular questions and answers about Microsoft Outlook
How Do I Backup my Outlook data? - If you don't back it up, then you don't deserve to have it! Read this article for tips on how to back up your Outlook data.
How Can I Get More That 3 Priorities in Microsoft Outlook? - A quick article describing techniques for getting more than 3 levels of priority in Microsoft Outlook.

The Lawyer's Guide to Microsoft Outlook 2007 - ORDER NOW!

You can now order your copy of Ben M. Schorr's "The Lawyer's Guide to Microsoft Outlook 2007" from the American Bar Association. CLICK HERE

In this book you'll learn how to take better control of your Inbox, how to use the Calendar to manage appointments and schedules, maintain your address book, do mail merges with Word, use the Journal to track calls and meetings and use the Notes folder for...well...there's really not much you can use the Notes folder for, but the rest of it is really useful and cool.

Training

YES, Ben Schorr is available to come to your firm and train you and/or your staff on Outlook. It can also be done remotely. Class schedules and plans to fit most budgets. 808-782-6306 or e-mail mattir@rolandschorr.com for more information.

Resources

Here are some useful resources for lawyers to use for more information on Microsoft Outlook

Sites

Slipstick.com - One of the oldest and best sites for Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Exchange information. Funny name, but good content. Run by Outlook MVP Diane Poremsky.
Microsoft's Official Outlook Site: The official page for Microsoft Outlook. Includes tutorials, articles, downloads and links.
Outlook Tips - An interesting collection of Outlook tips; includes an RSS Feed so you can get regular tips automatically.
Outlook 2003 to 2007 Command Reference Guide: Need help figuring out how to find something in Outlook 2007 that you know how to do in 2003? This handy on-line guide will map the old command to the new command for you.
Mail Merge from Outlook - A free training video from Microsoft to get you up to speed on Outlook Mail Merging. It's about Outlook 2003, but the information generally applies to other versions as well.
Why PST Files are unsupported over a LAN or WAN link - An article from Microsoft that explains some of the technical reasons why it's not a good idea to locate your PST files on a network share.
Triaging Mail with Categories and Search Folders - A very good post from Outlook PM Tom O'Neill explaining a logical system for managing e-mail.

Tools

Calendar Printing Assistant for Microsoft Outlook 2007 - A tool from Microsoft to help you customize your calendar printing.
Addicted to Twitter? Get Twitter within Outlook with OutTwit from TechHit. I use it and find it very handy to help aggregate more of those inputs to my day. It's free!
Get Newsgroups in Outlook!? Yes. With NewsHound by Shoreline Software. What's a Newsgroup? Keep reading...
Reminder Manager helps you get a lot MORE out of your Outlook Reminders.

Forums

Microsoft offers a nice collection of free support forums for Microsoft Outlook. You can post questions, read answers or even answer some questions yourself if you like. They're free and easy and just a click away.

Microsoft Outlook Forums - For all released versions of Outlook (i.e. everything but Outlook 2010)
Outlook 2010 - For the Outlook 2010 Beta version

How to Ask a Question: When posting a question to a newsgroup please be sure to indicate what software you're using, what version of the software you're using, what SPECIFICALLY you are trying to do and what happens when you try to do that (especially any error messages you may be receiving). It is also helpful if you tell us what you have already tried in an effort to fix it so that we don't waste time telling you to try things you've already attempted.

Newsgroups

Microsoft has free support newsgroups available for nearly every product they make. In these newsgroups you can read questions and answers that other people have posted for the product or you can post your own questions and get answers from the other posters.

What's an MVP?

An MVP or "Most Valuable Professional" is a volunteer who has been recognized by Microsoft as an expert on a particular technology. You'll commonly find them in the Microsoft Support Newsgroups, but they can sometimes be found in other forums or lists. They can be very helpful but keep in mind that they are only volunteers providing assistance in their spare time.

NNTP

NNTP (Network News Transfer Protocol) is the traditional way of accessing newsgroups. The traditional Microsoft program for NNTP is Outlook Express though in Vista this has been upgraded and renamed to "Windows Mail".

Click the links below to open the Microsoft Outlook newsgroups in your NNTP reader:

Web Forums

Since NNTP is a tad esoteric Microsoft has introduced a web interface for their support newsgroups. These are the same newsgroups you get via NNTP, just in a web browser.

Click the links below to open the Microsoft Outlook newsgroups in your web browser:

Last Updated: 03/10/2010