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How to Tweak Outlook Email To Work for You

Katherine Boehret — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 22:26:03 +0000

If you have a job, chances are you use Microsoft Outlook.

But are you using it to your best advantage?

Despite the popularity of Microsoft Outlook, several of its functions aren’t noticeable unless you dig around in menus or try out keystroke shortcuts. Many of these tricks can be found by reading a user manual, but users would rather be spending their time in Outlook responding to or writing emails.

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In last week’s column I reviewed a program called Postbox, which displays email and its contents in unique ways. In that review I mentioned that Outlook, too, has extra functions, but that these aren’t always as obvious as they should be. Below, I’ve compiled a list of what I consider to be some of Outlook’s lesser-known talents. I focused on Outlook 2007, which many people currently use, and I also included a handful of notes about what Outlook 2010—due out late spring or early summer—will include. With any luck, you’ll find a few tips here that make your time in Outlook better spent.

Search Me

Rather than simply entering a word into the Outlook search box, you can help the search engine narrow its results by giving it specific parameters. For example, if I remember that my friend sent an email with “LSU tickets” in the subject line, I can type “subject: LSU” to pull out all emails about the Louisiana university. Or if I want to find all emails from Molly, I can write, “from: Molly.” This works with several other terms including “to,” “sent,” “cc” and “message size.”

Search Folders, shown in the folder list with a magnifying glass icon beside them, offer a way of saving the searches you perform most often. If, for example, you often search for flight confirmation emails, you could make a Search Folder called “Travel” that would contain a constantly updated list of emails containing the names of airlines.

New folders can be set up by right clicking on the Search Folders icon, selecting New Search Folder and following steps to select a type of folder from one of many pre-set types of folders—such as “mail sent directly to me,” “large mail” or “mail flagged for follow up.” Or you can create a custom Search Folder by telling it to search for certain words that appear within specific message fields.

Color Coding

To make certain emails stand out in a large list—like emails from your boss or messages addressed only to you—you can set up a rule that makes the email show up in a specific color. Or you can set certain emails to appear in bold font, or in a specific font type and size. Just think of all the emails from your mom that will never go unnoticed again thanks to red type, 14-point font and underlined text.

Setting up the way emails are displayed can be done by going to the Tools menu, selecting Organize, Using Colors and then choosing specific colors for emails from specific people. More advanced automatic settings for applying font type and size to emails can be added by selecting Automatic Formatting in the top right corner of the Using Colors screen. Click “Add” to create more rules.

Souped-Up Calendar

The Outlook Calendar can be organized to look the way you want it rather than the way it’s set up by default. For example, if you like looking at your day in hourly intervals rather than Outlook’s default 30-minute blocks, you can right click anywhere you see hours shown and select 60 minutes. Other increments are also available, like five, 10 and 15 minutes.

Outlook can also display other time zones right beside your own time zone by right clicking on the listed meeting hours, selecting Change Time Zone and checking the box labeled Show an Additional Time Zone. This is helpful for people who often work with distant colleagues, saving them from making a mistake and not factoring the right time zone for the other person. A Swap Time Zone button here quickly changes from one set zone to another, which could be a boon for people who regularly travel to different places and want their Outlook settings to reflect that they’re working from there.

Like color-coded emails, calendar events can be automatically sorted into pre-set categories like Personal, Travel and Family by setting formatting to look for certain words like Tennis (Personal), United (Travel) and Mom, Dad or Allison (Family). Added events that use these words automatically get labeled with a designated color to give your calendar a visual way of distinguishing different types of activities.

Another useful calendar tip: You can hold Control while selecting certain dates on the small view of the calendar and you’ll see only the schedules for those dates. So if I want to see Sept. 19, 22 and 24, I hold Control while selecting each date to see the three days’ activities displayed in the right viewing panel.

Visual Contacts

All Contacts in Outlook can be labeled with a photo of the person, which you add by double clicking on the small head icon in someone’s contact card and then choosing a photo from your collection. People who work in the same company and use Outlook can add their own photo to their contact and it will show up with their emails.

The top right corner of each contact card shows what a person’s digital business card would look like; this is an image that can be edited and copied using a right click, and then it can be copied and pasted to any email signature.

Looking Ahead

In Outlook 2010, due out next year, Microsoft (MSFT) says it hopes to streamline work in Outlook, creating smarter rules that do more with less manual work.

One example of this approach is that emails in the next version of Outlook will be, by default, sorted into conversations—a little like Gmail’s current system. An Ignore button will move all future emails related to the same conversation into the Deleted Items folder. That will include those with changed subject lines because Microsoft uses a special identifier to know which emails are associated with one another. A Clean Up button moves all redundant replies to the Deleted Items folder, leaving just the most recent message in the conversation.

Another feature is Reply with Meeting, a button in Outlook 2010 that will let users create a meeting out of an email. Selecting Reply with Meeting automatically invites those included in the email to attend a meeting.

The title of the meeting is the same as the subject of the email. If the users are in the same corporate network and they all use Outlook Calendar, this tool also looks for the next available time and date on everyone’s calendar.

Quick Steps, another streamlined feature of Outlook 2010, are one-click shortcuts that simultaneously perform several common actions that people take when handling email. If you select a Quick Step called Reply and Delete, it replies to an email and deletes the original. Users can create their own personalized Quick Steps like one labeled Social that, when selected, marks the email as read, moves it to a special folder and labels it under a certain category.

Edited by Walter S. Mossberg.

Write to
Katherine Boehret at mossbergsolution@wsj.com

Flip Video Mino Takes Aim at the Cool Set

Katherine Boehret — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 00:01:00 +0000

When Pure Digital Technologies Inc. introduced its Flip point-and-shoot camcorder a year ago, it dramatically simplified video recording. The Flip measured the size of a small digital still camera, cost less than $150 and its videos could be emailed in one quick process. Consumers gobbled up the tiny, nonintimidating device.

But to the style-conscious set, the Flip looked like a clunky Fisher-Price toy — especially when compared with a sleek, new iPod or more-sophisticated digital cameras — and was too thick to comfortably slip into a pocket. Last fall, Pure Digital introduced an enhanced version: the Flip Video Ultra, but its biggest aesthetic difference was new orange, pink and green colors.

[ See post to watch video ]

Today, the company will begin sales of its $180 Flip Video Mino (pronounced “minnow”), the hippest offering yet from Pure Digital. This 60-minute Flip includes many firsts for the company: rechargeable batteries; touch-sensitive buttons rather than old-school, push-down buttons; and a thinner build that measures 40% smaller, overall. The Flip Mino is also the first one in the family to enable publishing to MySpace (NWS); prior software limited Web-site sharing to YouTube (GOOG) and AOL (TWX) Video.

I’ve been using a glossy, black Flip Mino (it also comes in white) for the past two weeks and it looks much cooler than older models. Its newly positioned USB adapter pops up from the top of the camera like something from a Swiss Army Knife. The Mino offers features such as the ability to lock the delete button, so no one accidentally deletes your videos, and mute all camera sounds, so as to record silently during quiet moments like wedding ceremonies or speeches.

I brought it along with me almost everywhere I went because of its small size and light weight, even fitting it into a thin clutch purse with a cellphone and BlackBerry (RIMM). I used the Mino in various situations ranging from bright, scenic outdoor settings to indoors while eating dinner in a candle-lit restaurant. Overall, I was pleased with the sound and picture quality of the Mino, and I found its built-in software, which automatically starts when the camera plugs into your Mac (AAPL) or Windows (MSFT) PC, to be a pleasure to use.

Today, Pure Digital Technologies introduced its $180 Flip Video Mino, a thinner, more stylish version of its point-and-shoot camcorder.

It took just a few minutes to trim excess footage from my videos before saving them to my computer or sharing them with friends and family. Another way to share videos from the Flip Mino is via Pure Digital’s server, which sends emails with embedded video links, saving upload and download time on both ends. Though I didn’t publish any of my videos on a public Web site, AOL, MySpace and YouTube were just one step away.

The Flip Mino’s touch buttons, while stylish, were difficult to use at first. I missed the tactile feel of physical buttons as I tried to hold this small video camera and press the zoom buttons using just one hand. The new, touch-sensitive buttons weren’t as satisfying and stable to use, and I pressed them accidentally more than a few times. For instance, the Zoom Out button is directly below Record, making it easy to mistakenly touch it. After about a week of using the Mino, I grew more accustomed to using these new touch buttons, but it shouldn’t take so long to make the adjustment.

Just looking at the Flip Mino’s fresh new exterior makes it hard not to think about the things that this redesigned camcorder is still lacking, like a larger viewing screen (the Mino screen is 1.5 inches, no larger than that of the Flip Ultra), high definition video and wireless sharing capability. These features would likely raise the price and/or tax the battery, and many users of the Flip flock to it for its low price and simplicity. Still, Pure Digital says that it will offer HD video and a larger screen on a product within a year, and is looking into features that might include wireless transferring.

I grew fond of the Mino’s rechargeable battery. Whenever I plugged this gadget into my computer to transfer videos, my Mino charged up via USB without me having to think about it. A full charge lasts four hours and recharging a dead battery takes about three hours.

Pure Digital says that the sound quality and lighting are improved in this model. Like previous models, this Flip records in 640×480 pixels at 30 frames per second.

The Mino didn’t have a problem with lighting in most situations; indeed it did a nice job of capturing images of my family sitting around a table in a restaurant with little more than candlelight to brighten the picture. It doesn’t use a flash or a built-in light, but instead uses automatic sensors to adjust to various levels of light.

This svelte camcorder seemed to handle noise more evenly than I remembered in prior Flip models. It didn’t make my voice sound unbearably louder than everyone else’s, even though I was closest to the camera’s microphone, yet it managed to detect voices across the room. I did have some trouble on a windy day: While recording a quick video of a golf course in San Diego, wind audibly muffled my voice during a few moments in the video.

Along with the delete-lock and sounds-off settings, this Mino has a few other tricks up its sleeve. Each of the touch-sensitive buttons is designed to glow only when usable, so as to better help people who might not know which buttons to press while using this camcorder. For example, only the zoom buttons glow while recording since the other buttons (volume, play/pause and delete) can’t function in this setting.

Shortcuts built into each button provide more functions: Holding the play/pause button down will set the playback mode to play all videos on the Mino; holding the seek ahead or seek back buttons while watching a video will fast-forward by seconds within that video; pressing the record button as the camera starts up opens up the settings menu.

In conjunction with the Flip Mino’s introduction Wednesday, prices of the former Flip Ultra model will drop to $150 for the 60-minute model. The Flip Ultra 30-minute model will be phased out, as will the Flip Classic, which will cost $130 for a 60-minute unit.

Though the Flip Mino’s touch-sensitive buttons look great, they aren’t as functional as they needed to be. But if you really want a sleek, hip-looking gadget, you’ll learn to adjust to these new buttons. No matter which Flip you choose, Pure Digital’s software changes the way people capture and share videos, and that’s a great thing.

Edited by Walter S. Mossberg

Email mossbergsolution@wsj.com

Digital Cameras That Do Thinking for You

Katherine Boehret — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 00:01:00 +0000

Most digital cameras have more settings than the average person knows what to do with — from common adjustments for nighttime and face shots to obscure settings for sports, fireworks and snow scenes.

When the moment comes to take the perfect picture of a snowy mountaintop, Fourth of July fireworks or soccer goal in midkick, most people forget about these features or don’t know how to use them. And while many digital cameras can now detect faces and make sure they are in focus, they can’t tell whether that face is smiling or not. The results aren’t bad, but they could be much better.

Sony’s Cyber-shot DSC-W170 uses Smile Shutter Mode to snap pictures when a subject smiles.

This week, I tested three new digital cameras that claim to do the thinking for you. Some digitally analyze the scene you’re about to capture, automatically choosing the setting that would take the best picture. Others can detect when a subject is smiling so as to automatically know when to snap the photo. One camera even attempts to digitally alter frowning faces into smiles, with amusing results.

I tried out Sony’s $300 Cyber-shot DSC-W170, Kodak’s $250 EasyShare Z1085 IS and Olympus’s $200 FE-340. Only the Sony (SNE) includes all three of the aforementioned features; the Kodak (EK) has scene detection, and the Olympus (OCPNF.PK) camera has built-in smile detection. I found the automatic scene detection offered in the Sony and Kodak cameras to be the most useful feature for everyday photos. It improved my photos and didn’t require any extra adjustments. I handed the cameras to other people to take pictures, without having to change any settings.

The automatic smile detection offered in the Sony and Olympus cameras was fun to use and could be especially helpful for families whose young kids never seem to smile at the right moment. But it didn’t work consistently and had trouble detecting my bearded boss’s smile and even that of a beard-free colleague.

I found Sony’s frown-fixing tool, which is called Happy Face Retouch, to be rather unusual. It took already captured images of my friends’ faces and turned their frowns or ambivalent looks into smiles, but didn’t adjust the subjects’ eyes. Though this was good for laughs, the eerie-looking grins pasted on faces reminded me of painted-on clowns’ mouths. And some attempts to retouch a face couldn’t detect the face to alter it. But a handful of the Happy Face Retouches looked somewhat natural.

Similar Specs

These cameras boast many similar specifications. All three use 5x optical zoom lenses, and the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W170 and Kodak EasyShare Z1085 IS each have 10.1 and 10 megapixel image sensors while the least expensive Olympus FE-340 has 8 megapixels. The Sony and Olympus both have generous 2.7-inch viewing screens and almost identically sleek builds, though the Sony is the only one of these three cameras to have an optical viewfinder.

The Kodak’s viewing screen is slightly smaller than the other two digital cameras, measuring 2.5 inches, but its build isn’t nearly as compact as the others. It reminded me more of small, high-end SLR camera, with its comfortably large hand grip, a settings knob on the top edge of the camera, and a protruding zoom lens.

Sony’s Happy Face Retouch feature digitally changes facial expressions into smiles, but all it did was make me look unnatural and awkward.

Kodak’s EasyShare Z1085 IS takes Secure Digital (SD) memory cards, which are more common than the Memory Stick and xD cards that work in the Sony and Olympus cameras, respectively.

The Kodak and Sony digital cameras have different names for their automatic scene-detection features. By default, the Kodak camera works in Smart Capture Mode, which includes intelligent scene detection, capture control and image processing. I focused on the camera’s scene detection, which automatically determines whether the photo should be taken in Macro, Text (for shots of text in a book, for example), Face, Landscape or Night settings.

Icon on the Screen

I snapped pictures around Washington, D.C., noting a tiny icon on the camera’s screen that indicated which of the five scene modes was being used to capture the photo. A flower icon indicating Macro appeared on my screen when I stooped to get a close-up shot of a tulip, and an icon of a dark sky and stars showed on the screen when I took photos at night. The camera’s flash, focus and exposure changed according to the type of photo.

The Sony camera uses what it calls Intelligent Scene Recognition to decide which settings should go along with certain photos. Like the Kodak, icons on the Sony’s screen indicated the scene settings that were automatically deemed appropriate, including Backlight, Backlight Portrait, Twilight, Twilight Portrait and Twilight Using a Tripod.

The Sony’s Intelligent Scene Recognition isn’t on by default like Kodak’s feature. Instead, it must be turned on from within a menu, but once on, it stays on until you turn it off. ISR can be used in either Auto or Advanced mode; Auto takes a single photo with automatically determined settings, while Advanced takes two shots — one with manual settings you can choose and another shot immediately following the first with automatic settings according to what the camera thinks is best.

I experienced surprising results with the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W170 and Olympus FE-340 while testing their automatic smile-detecting functions. My friends thought I was joking when I told them the camera would take their picture only if they were smiling. When the flash went off multiple times as they kept smiling, they were intrigued by this feature.

Sony’s version, which it calls Smile Shutter Mode, is easy to switch into by turning a dial on the camera to a smiley face. Once this setting is chosen and the camera’s shutter button is pressed, the Cyber-shot will search for smiles in its subjects, and will take photos whenever it detects a smile. Settings within this mode can be set to specifically detect an adult’s smile or a child’s smile, and the degree of smile can be set to low, medium or high; I kept things simple by leaving the smile detector on default settings.

Capturing Smiles

Olympus calls this feature Smile Shot, capturing three rapid shots in a row to make sure everyone’s smiling. The idea of taking three shots would be extra helpful with an indecisive baby, but most of my friends were able to hold their smiles, which produced three almost exactly identical shots each time someone smiled. Smile Shot is harder to get to in a pinch compared with the Sony: it’s buried in a list of 13 settings on the Olympus when the camera is set in Scene mode.

The Olympus seemed to be a bit slower than the Sony when it came to detecting smiles, but both had trouble with bearded men and even some folks without beards. And people felt silly standing around with a smile on their faces waiting for the camera to finally work. Closed-mouth, no-teeth smiles were harder for these cameras to detect, but not impossible. In group situations, the Olympus camera will focus on whoever’s face appears largest, which could mean the person closest to the camera, while the Sony takes a picture whenever anyone in the group smiles.

Putting a Happy Face On

If someone isn’t smiling, Sony’s Happy Face Retouch tool can come in handy, but don’t count on liking the results. In a group shot of five friends, two people who weren’t smiling put a bit of a damper on the whole shot. I used Happy Face Retouch, but it picked up on only one of the nonsmiling faces, turning a confused look into a smile that looked passable. But other results weren’t usable. A serious-looking shot of me deliberately not smiling looked freakishly unnatural after the touch-up, mostly because the rest of my face didn’t join the smile. I looked more like someone who had received too many Botox treatments.

Sony says that, in group shots, it can detect and change up to eight faces, but in my tests it usually changed only one. This retouching tool is also difficult to find: It took me 16 button presses to change each image into a smile — or what Sony calls a smile. A few times, Happy Face Retouch couldn’t identify a face in the photo, even when just one person stood in the frame.

These digital cameras took good photos, overall, and are fun to use because they take pressure off the photographer. I found the automatic scene-detection tools of the Kodak and Sony to be the most realistic and useful offerings, and I’m sure it won’t be long before automatic scene detection becomes as commonplace as an automatic flash.

The chart below compares features of the three cameras described. Click on it to make it larger.

Email mossbergsolution@wsj.com