Using custom mailform for handling incoming mail

[Peter Karlström]

We are developing a solution where we want to save information about
incoming and
outgoing mail. For outgoing mail there is no problem, but with incoming
mails there are a lot!

We use Outlook 97 (and some 98) on Windows NT (and som Win2000). Mail is
handled on a Exchange 5.5 server with SP 4.

Creating the form (IPM.Mail.Message) is no problem. On it we have a button
which
runs the following code:
Sub cmdStore_Click()
Set olApp = CreateObject("Outlook.Application")
Set olItem = OlApp.ActiveInspector.CurrentItem

fSendDate = olItem.CreationTime
fReceiveDate = olItem.ReceivedTime
fSubject = olItem.Subject
fBody = olItem.Body
fSender = olItem.SenderName
fMessageID = olItem.EntryID
fAttachList = ""
For each olAttach in olItem.Attachments
fAttachList = fAttachList & olAttach.filename & ";"
Next
set Msave = CreateObject("MailSave.Class1")
MSave.StartDialog fSendDate, fReceiveDate, fSender, fSubject, fBody,
fMessageID, fAttachList

olItem.Close
Set olItem = Nothing
Set olApp = Nothing
Set MSave = Nothing

End Sub

The ActiveX DLL shows a form to the user in which he/she search for a
specific entry
in our customer Oracle-database. The user then saves the E-mail information
to the database with connections to the customer entry.

The biggest problem is to make this custom mailform show up when the user
opens a mail
item from the Inbox.

I have seen solutions which works fine for Outlook 2000 but these don't work
for older
versions. (FormsAdmin)

How should we solve this problem?
Does anyone have any ideas?

Thanks in Advance

Peter Karlström
Midrange AB, Sweden

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP]]

One solution would be an Exchange server script on every mailbox to convert the incoming message to the custom message class. There should other possibilities, such as the equivalent of a rule, if you're willing to go to Extended MAPI and develop an Exchange client extension.
--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Outlook and Exchange solutions at http://www.slipstick.com
Author of
Microsoft Outlook Programming: Jumpstart
for Administrators, Power Users, and Developers