Relational db and Microsoft Outlook application

[Steve Naidich]

I need to develop a custom database application. The application involves
contacts and companies - data that you would normally store in Microsoft
Outlook / Exchange. The application also has many other functions, data and
reports that are industry specific. These features would not be handled
well by Outlook. The application / database will be multi-user.

It does not make sense to re-invent the wheel. Outlook can already store
all the contact info, keep journals, calendars etc... Outlook can synch
with handheld devices. Outlook can NOT handle the industry specific
features.

I need to be able to print uptodate client/contact reports so I do not want
to maintain two copies of contact data, nor do I want to require double data
entry.

Any ideas how to integrate access and the non-relational Outlook? I have
played around with linking Access 2003 to Microsoft Exchange public contact
folders and have had little to no success. Contacts in outlook do not seem
to have unique id's. Also, there is no relation between Companies and
contacts in Outlook. If I update a company address in one record, I must
update the address record for every other contact who works at that company.
If I have two separate datastores, one in access and one in Outlook, I need
to keep them in-synch.

Thoughts, suggestions, advice?

Thanks,

Steve

 

[Ken Slovak - [MVP - Outlook]]

Outlook can only store data in a PST file or Exchange mailbox, it cannot use
data in a database. So synching is the only option.

The linking with Access is flawed and only provides a subset of the fields
in any Outlook item. If I recall correctly for a contact item it only links
44 of the contact fields and never any custom fields. So writing you own
code to synch or finding an application that does that is about the only
practical way.

The unique GUID fields for any Outlook item are EntryID and StoreID. Given
those you can locate any individual item in Outlook. Of course when using an
Exchange mailbox the EntryID will change if the item is moved to a different
folder in the same InfoStore.

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

TabTag can expose a database in Outlook, so that might also be an option.

--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of
Microsoft Outlook Programming - Jumpstart for
Administrators, Power Users, and Developers