Features in Outlook
Features In Outlook
There are several features that can be easily used in Microsoft Outlook. Below we will talk about a few features that may be useful here at Colorado College.
1. E-mail Categories
E-mail Categories can be very useful for marking specific e-mails according to a specified group. You could receive many e-mails from a specific business over a period of time and instead of moving those e-mails into a different folder you can put all those e-mail into a specific category, making it easy to find them in the future. They can also be useful for marking e-mails that need specific attention or that you would like to note for future reference.
First you will need to make sure that you are viewing categories in your mailbox (If you already see the section “Categories” then you do not need to do this). Right-click on any existing section in your e-mail (I.E., “From”, “Subject” or “Received”) and select “Customize Current View”.
Then select “Fields”.
On the next screen you will see “Available Fields” and “Show these Fields in this order:”. Under “Available Fields” browse down until you see “Categories” and select it. Then you will need to click on the “Add ->” button to add it to your current view.
Click on “OK” then “OK” once more. You should now see “Categories” as one of the sections when viewing e-mails!
Now you can set the Category for any e-mail that you wish and organize your e-mails according to that. On Microsoft Office 2007 all you need to do is right-click in the Category area of the e-mail that you wish to modify, and then select a color coded category that you wish! For Microsoft Office 2003 you will need to right-click in the Category are of the e-mail that you wish to modify, select “Categories…” and then choose which category you want for that e-mail.
You can add your own Categories as well.
For Office 2007, right-click on any e-mails Category section, and select “All Categories…”.
In the next window you will want to click on “New…”
and then you can name the category, select a color to go along with that category and even choose a short-cut key if you wish. Click on “OK” when you are done.
You should now see your new category. It is selected by default so you just need to click on “OK”
Your new category is now assigned to the e-mail that you selected!
Now you are able to use your own custom category that you can assign to any of your e-mails!
For Office 2003, right-click on any e-mails Category section, and select “Categories…”.
In the next window click on “Master Category List…”
and then enter a name for your new category in the blank area and click on “Add”. It is now added as a category that you can apply to your e-mails!
2. E-mail Flags
E-mail flags are very similar to categories in that they can specify a specific type of information toward an e-mail in your mailbox. For example you can use these flags to denote a time frame for responding or following up on an e-mail. To make sure that you have Flags enabled on your mailbox, follow the same steps for enabling Categories, but add “Flag Status” instead.
To set a flag on an e-mail, all you need to do is right-click on the flag field for an e-mail, and select the flag that you wish to assign to it. You can also create your own custom flags by right-clicking on the flag field for an e-mail and then select “Custom” (for Outlook 2007) or “Add Reminder…” (for Outlook 2003).
There you can set the type of flag, the color of the flag and a few other options.
3. Built-in Reminders
One of the easiest ways to create your own built in reminders is to use the flags above associated with an e-mail. Just create a custom flag and set it to the time that you want it to remind you (in Outlook 2007 be sure to check the “Reminder” box)!
Creating your own reminders
For Outlook 2003: Click on the “File” menu and click on “New” and then “Appointment.
In the subject area enter the title of the reminder that you wish to have. You can choose a Location and a label if you wish, but the important areas you will want to fill out will be the start and end time for the event (If it’s just for a specific day, just check the box “All Day Event”). Under that you can set the reminder time to just a few minutes or up to two weeks! You can put a more detailed description in the box below if needed. Just click on “File” then “Save” to set the reminder!
For Outlook 2007: You can follow the instructions for Outlook 2003 to set a reminder for yourself, OR you can use the handy new feature of Office 2007 – The To-Do Bar. By Default in Outlook 2007 the To-Do-Bar should appear on the right side of your screen. In case it does not, all you need to do is click on “View”, then “To-Do Bar” and set it’s view to “Normal”.
The To-Do Bar will show all your current appointments and makes it handy to create more. All you need to do is right-click anywhere in the bar and select “New Task”.
The window that comes up is very similar to setting an appointment, but has a few different options. You can of course name the task, but you can also set the date that a task starts, when it should be completed and even its priority and status! Below those options you have a “Reminder” check box. Check that if you wish to set reminders up for yourself. You can set that reminder to happen on any date and any time…and can even play a sound that accompanies that reminder!
4. Other Useful Tools
One of the easiest other tools within Outlook 2003/2007 is being able to view the size of your mailbox. To do this all you need to do is right-click on your mailbox, and select “Properties for Mailbox…”.
In the next window click on “Folder Size.”
The next window may take a while to open depending on how many folders and e-mails you have. There you can view the total size of your mailbox (handy to find out how close you are to being over your size limit) and the size of individual folders. Keep in mind that if you have folders within other folders it could be confusing to understand (I.E., you have several folders within your Inbox that contains the majority of your e-mail. The Inbox folder will show the entire size of that folder and ALL folders within it. Below that folder you may see each individual folder within your Inbox and their individual sizes.
Keep this in mind if you like to add up all your folders together yourself to make sure you’re coming up with the correct size – some of the information may very well be redundant and make it appear that you have significantly more e-mail than you actually do!).
Last revised on 07/08/09