Detecting Outlook 2002/2003?!

[Emil Frank]

Hi,

Via a web based intranet client side application I need to detect whether
the end user has installed Outlook 2002/2003.

It can be assumed that the user is running either IE 5.5 or IE 6.0 (I was
thinking that JScript might offer the best capabilities here).

It also would be good to be able to detect wether Outlook 2002/2003 is
running or not. If not it should be started (upon button click by the end
user).

How can I do this?

In case you could point me to some code examplea I would highly apprechiate
it.

Thanks,

Emil

 

[Ken Slovak - [MVP - Outlook]]

VB-type example:

Dim oOL As Outlook.Application
Dim sVersion As String

Set oOL = GetObject(, "Outlook.Application")
If oOL Is Nothing Then
'not running
Set oOL = CreateObject("Outlook.Application")
End If
sVersion = oOL.Version
If Left(sVersion,2) = "10" Then
'OL = 2002
ElseIf Left(sVersion,2) = "11" Then
'OL = 2003
ElseIf Left(sVersion,1) = "9" Then
'OL = 2000
End If

Of course from Web code you would need to set the safe to instantiate and
create settings or you will get permission dialogs popping up when you try
to use GetObject and CreateObject. That can be done using some Win32 API
code.

For a more complex solution you could find the place in the registry that
tells you where the Outlook.exe program is stored and from that derive the
Outlook version and then check for what Windows processes and windows are
open to see which are there if Outlook is not running, is running with a UI
or running without a UI. Those would be all Win32 API calls and so wouldn't
cause any security popups.

The information for that is partly in the MSDN library and the rest has to
be reverse engineered using Spy++ or some tool like that to monitor Windows
processes and windows.

 

[Emil Frank]

Ken,

Thanks a lot, the sample script was very helpfull!!

In case a user would have installed some version of Outlook Express the
"Left(sVersion,2)" function in your sample script would not return 9, 10 or
11 but another value, right?

Thanks,

Emil

 

[Ken Slovak - [MVP - Outlook]]

No, it wouldn't work at all. Outlook Express has nothing in common with
Outlook other than some misguided marketing person's selection of a name.