Sorting Emails

[WhiskyLima]

Hi All,

I'm working on a database which holds information about clients. This also has a linked table which pulls information from my outlook inbox. Basically what I want is a way to sort the emails into the appropriate contacts page. I have created a sub form which is linked to the contact form and pulls info from the email table. The sub form is linked by the 'from' field in the linked email table to the 'email address' field in the contact form.



This all seems to work exactly as I want when the email address is displayed as the display name of the client however most of the time, the display name in outlook is either the contacts name or their company name.

I suppose my question is this, how can I tell access to pull the email address from outlook instead of the display name? I may be missing something here but this seems like something that should be available as standard doesn't it?

Any help would really be greatly appreciated as I have been banging my head over this for weeks now.

I'm using access and outlook 2010 in case this makes any difference. If anyone has any other way of doing this I would really appreciate the help.

Thanks in advance guys!!

[ItsMe]

This also has a linked table which pulls information from my outlook inbox.

If I recall correctly Outlook stores a separate column for display name and the actual email address. I don't have experience with the new fangled ways of Access linking to Outlook. I would suggest exporting a sample Excel file from you Outlook Contacts. With this you can eyeball the column that holds only the Email addy. Then see what Outlook names this column of fields.

With the name, you can then go to your VBA and try to see how to call this column of fields vs. the "Display Name".

Just a suggestion. As I mentioned. I don't really have any first hand knowledge.

[WhiskyLima]

That sounds great, one step closer at least! Thank ou very much for your assistance, I will try that now!

[WhiskyLima]

So I just exported the emails from my inbox to a .csv file and opened it in excel. It seems the headers are as follows 'From: (name)' and 'From: (Address)'. now the from address is the info I need but how would I reference that in vb?

Many Thanks!

[ItsMe]

That I do not know. Right now my 2010 machine is busy on some processes. I can not look at the Outlook features.

Did you write VBA to link Access to Outlook? Is it all exclusive to a Macro?

[WhiskyLima]

Well, I have a limited knowledge of vb at the moment but im willing to learn. I have used the standard 'external data' function in access and told it to link to the outlook inbox for one of my email accounts. This creates a linked table in which you can view the emails but unfortunately the 'from' field is simply the display name and there is not 'email address' field here. I wonder if there is a way to do this with vb?

[ItsMe]

I can look into it later tonight maybe. Meanwhile, maybe someone here knows the answer already.

[WhiskyLima]

that would be great, your help is very much appreciated!

[ItsMe]

This all seems to work exactly as I want when the email address is displayed as the display name of the client however most of the time, the display name in outlook is either the contacts name or their company name.

I suppose my question is this, how can I tell access to pull the email address from outlook instead of the display name? I may be missing something here but this seems like something that should be available as standard doesn't it?

I went ahead and used the wizard to import a contacts folder from Outlook. As I suspected, it imports just like it would if you were inside Outlook exporting an excel file. So, somewhere in Access you should have a table that has the Display Name and the Email Address.

It seems like Access is showing you the display name and this is how you are selecting the contact to email. It can be confusing if you are just looking at hte display name. Long story short, you don't have to look at the display name only. All of the other fields are there also. So, whatever form you are using to look at the Access table, you can add as many fields as needed to decipher who you are selecting to receive your new email message.

Aside from that. If I remeber correctly, there is a setting in Outlook that will place the Company Name first, if one exists, in the Display name field. THis is a setting within outlook. You can choose the individual name or the company name to appear in the Display Name field. After you play around with it and get it how you want you can import the contacts to your Access table again.

Personaly, I just list out all of the fields when I reference a record/row. I show Email Address, First NAme, Lat NAme, and Company Name.

[WhiskyLima]

Yes I see what you mean. I too have just imported the contacts list to see what would happen and I can see there is an email address field. The problem is when you tell it to link to the inbox folder it does not import the email address. It is the inbox information that I need as I want to be able to sort the emails for each contact so I don't have to keep searching outlook for information from a certain client. Thank you for your help so far, you've been great!

[ItsMe]

The problem is when you tell it to link to the inbox folder it does not import the email address. It is the inbox information that I need as I want to be able to sort the emails for each contact so I don't have to keep searching outlook for information from a certain client.

I did lose sight of your goal to monitor your inbox. My approach to utilizing Access is often times different than others. If I design a feature into my application, I make sure the feature is available to the user via a form or report. What I am now realizing is that you are depending on an interface that is not of your design. Your interaction with Outlook is limited to what is offered to you via the Wizard.

It seems, knowing the Name of a contact is not any help because you have to make your decision solely on the display name. I have had this experience before while utilizing Outlook and I had to change the settings within Outlook. I had to adjust how the "Display Name" was determined. Outlook determines what data is presented in this field. If I recall correctly it is within the "View Contacts" settings or something similar to "Format Contacts View".

The only other option I can imagine is to implement a procedure or function to query your Inbox as needed. There are ways to retrieve this information via VBA. However, you may run into the same issue. The inbox, by itself, may only contain the "Display Name" field. You would need to draw a relation to the Inbox table within your DB to another table that contains the full description and all of the fields for your contacts. This approach is problematic when depending on the Wizard. I don't see any way to draw a relation to your Contacts table to the GUI the Wizard presents. The table that resides in your Access DB does not have the capability to interact with the Wizard.

[WhiskyLima]

Hi and thanks for your help. I have tried and better tried to change any settings I can find to get this working. I did manage to incorporate the email address into the view on outlook but that made no difference unfortunately. I wonder if there is a way to directly tell the SharePoint server to get the information directly from the email account. Could this be done with exchange or something? I don't have much of a clue about this kind of thing but I assume there has to be a way to do this right?

Many thanks for your help once again!

[ItsMe]

You mentioned that your connection to Outlook via Access is "Linked". If this is the case, changes made in Outlook should be reflected within Access in real time. If you are importing information into Access, you will need to re-import data to view current changes.

As for SharePoint and Exchange, I do not have experience here. I do believe there are options with Exchange to place the .PST file on the server vs. local to the client. Perhaps how the client views the Display Name is not literal to the PST. It is not likely. This sounds redundant.

In Outlook 2010, if you go to the individual contact and open to edit, you will see an option to "File As". This changes the Display As for internet settings. This is you controlling how you view your contacts. You can select the Company name here at the individual contact level. The only global setting I can find would switch the "view" to last name first or last name last.

Other columns in your contact's export will include fields that are dictated through POP3 or MAPI settings. this relates to the server. When you send an address you include a Display Field. This is how you announce what your name and reply to email address is. You adjust this setting in the email client one time. You send an email and the recipient sees your Name and your email address.

[WhiskyLima]

Thanks for all your help on this itsMe, but im afraid im going to have to give up on this idea as its taking up too much time to figure out a work around. Instead I have settled on using a text box in each clients page which relates to their email display name. This works just fine but its not an ideal solution as it means adding the display name to each of my 400 something, contacts.

Thank you for your assistance on this though, it was greatly appreciated.