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Working with Outlook items, folders, recipients; dealing with security; writing event handlers | ||
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Am I dealing with my email the hard way? Any suggestions?
I just wanted to check and make sure I’m not doing things the hard way like I usually do. I have a real tendency to go down a path and then realize that there are simpler ways to do things. At work, most of our computers are running Outlook 2002 and we’ve recently upgraded our Exchange server to 2007. By the end of the year, I think all our computers will be brought up to Office 2007. Please allow me to lay out a couple pieces of the puzzle so you can see where I’ve ended up at. 1. I work in a manufacturing environment. We deal primarily with 4 types of emails. Emails that relate to Orders, Quotes/preliminary projects, Personal, or General Business. 2. Our email boxes are limited to 166 mb. Don’t ask me why, I know space is cheap, but they just do. I think they do it because it really bogs the exchange server down. 3. Archiving and storing my email is a MUST as I constantly have to refer back to old emails for multiple reasons. 4. Every quote has a directory on our server and every order has a directory on our server. Not only do we store engineering data, project information, but we store the emails too. 5. We have a Database that we track our orders and quotes with that I use to help with email filing. 6. I’ve tried the custom forms, but it seemed really hard to do with the older server, I think things have changed with ES 2007 which is why I am asking. Here’s the way I deal with my email: I’ve borrowed heavily from Sue’s book and this website. When I send an email out, my program catches it on the way out and codes it with information used for filing purposes. 1.) A small form pops up first to ask the nature of the email: Business, Personal, Quote, or Order. 2.) If it is a quote or order, another form pops up for you to “Code” the email with the right filing information. (Order or quote number and project name) If it is personal or business, it bypasses the filing process and is stored in the “Sent items” box. I could do more, but haven’t at this time. 3.) The filing information is pulled from out database (Job number and name) and a storage path string is built from the information. This way if someone knows the name, but not the number they can find it that way and vice-versa. 4.) When I “code” the email, it stores the archive directory path in the “billing information” field to store/save the email on our data server. 5.) Not only does a copy of the email get archived in our directory structure, but the program also moves the email out of the “Sent items” box to a folder (named with the project number and name, if it doesn’t’ exist, it creates it) in a Personal (.pst) file. This way the email is not counting towards your 166 mb limit. Everyone here is so used to looking at their emails in outlook and it is a hassle to look at them in a directory, but very useful to have if you’ve purged a lot of old emails and then someone asks you about a really old job. I’ve surprised several people with being able to come up with emails that are 3 and 4 years old. So, am I doing this the hard way? I just got a new computer with Outlook 2007, Windows 7, and installed the Business contact manager. Is there a better way of managing mail using that? I’ve read a little about Custom email forms and started working on some and ran into road blocks with us all having Outlook 2002 instead of a newer version. I think when we all upgrade I can build custom forms that will let you have a specific custom field for the order number and would make it oh so much easier to process and file my email. I’m not asking for someone to lay it all out for me and do my work for me, but any suggestions thoughts, possibilities, etc. would be most appreciated. If anyone is interested I will gladly share my code with you. It’s a little rough as I prescribe to what I call the Malcolm X approach to programming “By any means necessary! Kelly Sprayberry 20-Nov-2009 11:17 |
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Vic
20-Nov-2009 15:37
Hi. Seems quite complicated tracking system. I suggest to use MS Office SharePoint Server 2007 Team Sites instead of directory structures. http://download.microsoft.com/download/d/8/c/d8c39d0d-724a-40fb-9855-d4fba7ed7848/SharePointTeamSites_GS_E.ppt |
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Anonymous
20-Nov-2009 15:40
The owner of my company wants to know more about the Office Sharepoint server system. I'm looking into it a little, but I'm hoping to find someone here in Atlanta that can give us a good "Dog and Pony Show" on it. Thanks for the input |
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Kelly Sprayberry
20-Nov-2009 15:41
Woops, the above post was me if you couldn't figure it out. Thanks for the input Kelly |
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