Help with customizing a Contact form please

[Saucer Man]

I started working on a new contact form for our company. We plan to import
the ACT! contacts into Outlook and get rid of ACT!

I am using Outlook 2007 and I have several questions.


1) How do I prevent the custom Contact form from being resized?

2) How do I remove the additional pages such as Certificates, Details, All
Fields, etc? I will be putting everything on the General page.

3) I have some controls on a custom form that have become hidden. Some how
they are off the edge or behind other objects. How do I find them and put
them back to the viewable area?

4) How do I set the default value for "File As" to lastname, firstname? I
will make the field disabled so that the user can see that it will be filed
as lastname, firstname but will not be able to change it.

5) When I publish the form to a Contact folder and set it as the default
form to use when posting, how do I make it propagate to all the sub folders?

6) Do I need to change the name of the form every time I modify it so that
the Outlook clients will know that the form has changed instead of just
using an older version in cache?

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

Answers inline below.
--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Microsoft Outlook Programming: Jumpstart
for Administrators, Power Users, and Developers

I started working on a new contact form for our company. We plan to import
the ACT! contacts into Outlook and get rid of ACT!

I am using Outlook 2007 and I have several questions.


1) How do I prevent the custom Contact form from being resized?

That would require an add-in. The code behind a custom form fires no events
related to resizing.

2) How do I remove the additional pages such as Certificates, Details, All
Fields, etc? I will be putting everything on the General page.

You hide them with the Page | Display This Page toggle command

3) I have some controls on a custom form that have become hidden. Some how
they are off the edge or behind other objects. How do I find them and put
them back to the viewable area?

Maximize the window so you can see as much as possible, move controls out of
the way as needed, and/or use the Tab key to move the selection among
controls then use Send to Back, Bring to Front, or display the Advanced
Properties dialog to change the position property values.

4) How do I set the default value for "File As" to lastname, firstname? I
will make the field disabled so that the user can see that it will be filed
as lastname, firstname but will not be able to change it.

Try using a formula on that control's Value tab.

5) When I publish the form to a Contact folder and set it as the default
form to use when posting, how do I make it propagate to all the sub folders?

You'd need to make the same change on each folder manually or write code
iterating the Folder.Folders collection and using the PropertyAccessor object
to change the value of these two MAPI properties:

message class name - http://schemas.microsoft.com/mapi/proptag/0x36E5001E
form display name - http://schemas.microsoft.com/mapi/proptag/0x36E6001E

6) Do I need to change the name of the form every time I modify it so that
the Outlook clients will know that the form has changed instead of just
using an older version in cache?

No, you don't need to do that, but you should update the version number
before republishing. And don't forget to save an .oft copy as a backup.

 

[Saucer Man]

Thank you Sue. In reference to question 4, I don't know what formula to use
in the Value box. can you help me here?

Thanks.

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

The easiest way to build a formula -- especially when you're just getting
started with formulas -- is to use the input options available in the Edit
Formula window. You'll have a list of available fields and functions. Use
standard operators like +, -, &, etc. to join expressions. Thus, you might
try:

[LastName] & ", " & [FirstName]
--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Microsoft Outlook Programming: Jumpstart
for Administrators, Power Users, and Developers

 

[Saucer Man]

Thanks again Sue. I wasn't putting the operators in so an error was
generated. A couple more questions please...

1) Can I remove the options like Picture, Categorize, and Private?

2) How do I add the "Business Card" view to the general page?

Thanks.

The easiest way to build a formula -- especially when you're just getting
started with formulas -- is to use the input options available in the Edit
Formula window. You'll have a list of available fields and functions. Use
standard operators like +, -, &, etc. to join expressions. Thus, you might
try:

[LastName] & ", " & [FirstName]
--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Microsoft Outlook Programming: Jumpstart
for Administrators, Power Users, and Developers

Thank you Sue. In reference to question 4, I don't know what formula to
use
in the Value box. can you help me here?