I Like Outlook Because….

By / / 13 Comments / Email, Microsoft Outlook, Outlook 2007, Outlook 2010

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I currently have four email clients installed, why? Well, each has its own merits.

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  • Thunderbird – because I love to customize and Tbird has lots of add-ons, extensions and themes
  • Postbox – because its slim and eager to go and I got the license for free
  • SeaMonkey – because, well because a friend was having a few problems with SeaMonkey and I installed the Browser with integrated email to try to replicate the problem and just haven’t had the time to uninstall it yet!… and
  • Outlook – the daddy of them all! Not cheap! Not Cheerful! Not very customizable but it has POWER!

Now what I am about to divulge is just one of many features that I like and as far as I know it works with most versions of Outlook. If fact why don’t you tell us about your favorite Outlook features in the comments below? If we get a good thing going then maybe we can extend it to other email clients in the future.

Back to the feature, When you are composing an email and adding the recipient’s address by typing the first letter or two of the name then clicking on the Name in the address book. This, by and large, works fine unless you have typed something a little sensitive and in your haste clicked on the WRONG recipient’s address!

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Let me give you an example! I had or rather thought I had, sent an email to my wife on Valentine’s day telling her that I love her. But in my haste to send the mail, clicked on the WRONG Tina (my wife’s name), in fact the mail was sent to a work colleague! OOOPS!!!! That was a little embarrassing, especially when trying to convince my work colleague that no, I wasn’t drunk and yes, it was a genuine mistake!

Now, if you type the first couple of letters in the address field then press the CTRL key + K it will  open your address book with the names associated with the letters you typed so you can check the name and email address of the recipient.

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You may think this is a bit of an overkill but the one second longer it takes to send the mail is worth it in my opinion so I can be certain the right person is going to receive the mail.

13 thoughts on “I Like Outlook Because….”

  1. NewKreation

    That’s funny. I did the same thing several months ago. Only I sent the love letter to a guy in maintenance. You talk about embarrassing. Especially when using cushy nicknames.

    What do I like about Outlook? I like the fact that signatures are stored in local *.html files. I can back them up and run a script to insert a random quote.

  2. Alan Wade

    Thanks for the reply NewKreation, I’m so glad its not just me that sends out mail wrong, thanks for the input!

  3. Ken Power

    If you like MS Outlook have a good look at eM Client. It is still evolving a bit, but it is so close to Outlook as to feel familiar – and it is free.

  4. Richard Grieves

    Can you please tell me how much Outlook costs? I really liked outlook express and I just do not know why it was done away with. Thank you

        1. Tony

          Thanks for the correction Alan.

          Is there any way this site can be set to notify me of responses to my posts or new posts to the same thread? I’m only now seeing this 23 days later, just by chance.

  5. Alan Wade

    Which country are you in Richard?
    Amazon.com has Outlook 2010 for about $155.
    Outlook Express and Outlook are two very very different applications, they are not even remotely the same.
    O.E. was replaced by Windows Mail in Vista.

  6. RandiO

    I have been using Outlook for far too long to remember, both for personal and professional needs.
    One of the little tricks I learned, many a moon ago, was to delay the sending of all email I construct (or reply to) by 10minutes!
    It saves a lot of embarrassments and allows for corrections/additions if needed!
    But one must remember that when you press the send button, your email will just hang in the “Outbox” for the amount of time it has been set to be delayed by.
    If you need to send it immediately, a simple F9 command will take of that urgent need!
    Unfortunately, to initially set this simple trick up is not so simple! It can be found under the Rules&Alerts command.
    The following link describes how to set this Outlook trick up >> http://www.groovypost.com/howto/microsoft/delay-defer-schedule-delivery-outlook-2010-email/

  7. JoninOz

    Hi Alan,
    I like Postbox, as I liked Outlook Express many moons ago. This is because of the simplicity of both, and I want to send and receive email only,
    nothing else. With Postbox I can the type the first letter of a name in BCC, and I choose the recipient.from those with the named letter. When I open ‘Reply’ or ‘Forward’, my list of contacts is in the right-hand column if I wish to choose several recipients.
    I can open Outlook.com, Gmail and Hotmail within Postbox, which were imported simply and quickly by Postbox, without the usual fiddle-faddling around with Pop or Imap, nor worrying about security certificates, verification, SSL/TLS or ports.

    On another note, I like my mobile/cell phone which I use for receiving or making ‘phone calls, nothing else required.

    Kind Regards from Oz.

  8. Alan Wade

    That’s a good tip RandiO! Sometime’s its wise to have that ‘breathing’ buffer, I know, I have sent out a few emails in anger and wished I hadn’t.

    @JoninOz, one of the things that puts me off Postbox is the fact I cannot customize it. I know, you can say that of Outlook too but at least I can change the UI colour.

  9. Alan Wade

    @Richard Grieves
    To tell you the price of Outlook is very difficult as it varies from country to country. An example of that is a mate of mine bought an English version Office 2010 here in Sweden because he said it was much cheaper. The answer to your question must be that you need to check online at ebay, Microsoft etc. in your country.

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