This is possibly one of those life changing articles.
How? I’d always used Contact sub-folders, for no other reason than that’s the way I’d always done things. Yea, I knew the “solution” to Contact sub-folders not being synchronized on PPC’s was to use categories instead, but that would mean I’d have to change how I did things, so I didn’t change….until today.
Your Article Ed was so well written with so many compelling points, I couldn’t ignore the functionality of contact categories anymore. I just got done assigning meaningful and powerful categories to my 200+ contacts, and can’t believe the difference! You’ve converted me as well (not from Palm to PPC mind you :wink:, but from Contact sub-folders to categories). Already gone are the days of “damn, the contact I needed on my PPC is sitting in a sub-folder on one of the two computers I synchronize with.”
For what its worth, instead of sorting by “Categories” then “company name” (as in your instructions), I’m sorting by “Categories” then “File As”….works just as well, even better considering personal (friends, family) contacts that don’t have anything in their Company Name field.
Thank you for the great article, and hopefully other people will see the difference contact categories make.
I too have subfolders for now. Sometimes I need to send e-mail to everyone in a subfolder, and having to manually type the names of 50 or so contacts is out of the question - even partial names.
It might be possible to still use categories in this case if you assign all the members of a particular category also to a group. Then you could e-mail the group...
Too bad Microsoft didn't implement "Mail to category" somewhere.
Ahhh... but that is what Distribution Lists in Outlook are for.
Of course, Dist lists don't sync to the Pocket PC, but then neither do your sub-folders. At least with the category/dist list combo, your contacts are on the Pocket PC and you have powerful category filtering on the desktop and Pocket PC.
And once they are on your PPC you can select a category, bring up the keyboard, tap 'ctrl' then 'a', which selects all the contacts for that category, then just tap and hold on anyone of the selected contacts and then select "Send E-mail to Contact..." from the menu and voila, a new e-mail with all the contacts already filled in.
One disadvantage to this view is that you cannot use your keyboard to quickly jump to a letter in the alphabet. I have about 400 contacts, and the list grows constantly- while I have been using categories for a while, I continue to view my entire list using view:address cards. From there, you can either use the letter shortcuts at the right, or just type the first letter of the last name using the keyboard.
In my opinion, it would be best to have a drop down box in the address card view for categories.
Other than that, good article.
One disadvantage to this view is that you cannot use your keyboard to quickly jump to a letter in the alphabet. I have about 400 contacts, and the list grows constantly- while I have been using categories for a while, I continue to view my entire list using view:address cards. From there, you can either use the letter shortcuts at the right, or just type the first letter of the last name using the keyboard.
In my opinion, it would be best to have a drop down box in the address card view for categories.
Other than that, good article.
I just type their name in the quickfind in Outlook 2002 from wherever. No need to look up an indidual from the Contacts folder. I think Outlook 2000 and 98 could do this from the Outlook Today page.
I just type their name in the quickfind in Outlook 2002 from wherever. No need to look up an indidual from the Contacts folder. I think Outlook 2000 and 98 could do this from the Outlook Today page.
Wow, another good tip! Ed, you've not only convinced me to start using multiple categories (up until now, I've only assigned one per contact), but you've also shown me a great shortcut!
Thanks.
Ok, so my contacts have been categorized since the beginning--including multiple categories per contact. Now, what I want to see is the Contacts application actually let me USE the categories to my advantage. For instance, right now the only way to use Categories on PocketPC is to view ALL contacts or a list of Categories OR'd together. I want to be able to specify OR, AND, or NOT operations. For instance if I have "Friends", "Business", "Entertainment", and "Christmas Cards" categories, I want to be able to get a list of:
"Friends" and NOT "Business"
"Friends" OR "Business"
"Friends" AND "Business"
("Friends" AND "Entertainment") OR ("Christmas Cards" AND "Business")
I'm not sure how this would be implemented in the UI without forcing me to use a SQL select statement, but I think it could be done.
Don't use the To: button. Just type in some of their last or first name. If I were in your contacts, you could type "hans" and then tab down to the message and start. Outlook will fill it out for you or ask if you wanted Hansberry or Hanson.
You can do multiple too. If you type in hans;smi;jone;willi it would espand to Hansberry, Ed; Smith, Jeff; Jones, Mark; Williamson, Alice.
I never ever use the To: button unless I am not sure who I am sending it to and want to browse my names - and then having them in one folder makes that easier.
That works for me somtimes; however, some contacts don't work that way for me. When I click the To: button in these sutuations, the default view is Personal Address Book.
It worked correctly for me a couple of weeks ago when I was using Win98SE and Outlook 2000 SP1, but I since blew away the harddrive and installed Windows 2000 SP1, upgraded to SP3, installed Office XP and upgraded to SP1 then SP2.
That works for me somtimes; however, some contacts don't work that way for me. When I click the To: button in these sutuations, the default view is Personal Address Book.
It worked correctly for me a couple of weeks ago when I was using Win98SE and Outlook 2000 SP1, but I since blew away the harddrive and installed Windows 2000 SP1, upgraded to SP3, installed Office XP and upgraded to SP1 then SP2.
Right-click on the Contacts folder and select Properties. On the Outlook Address Book, check the "Show this folder..." box.
I'd then remove PAB from the listing.
Tools|Email Accounts|View/Change existing directory. The only thing that *needs* to be there as long as everything is in Contacts or an Exchange Server GAL is the Outlook Address Book. The Personal Address Book is redundant and, IMHO, worthless for Outlook users.
I read all posts, but I think that folders are better.
And I sincronize with my e740 with Outlook PCS http://office.microsoft.com/downloads/2002/opcs.aspx with no problems: folders become Categories in the e740.
making use of categories
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