TABLE OF CONTENTS As you ve seen in the preceding chapters, you can deploy and manage many key Outlook settings with such tools as the Custom Installation Wizard (CIW) and Group Policy Objects (GPOs). Appendixes A, B, and C list many additional policy and registry settings for Outlook 2003. However, there are many options that are not directly (at least, not obviously) addressed by policies, registry entries, .prf files, or settings files. This chapter shows you how to add such enhancements to Outlook, including the following:
COM add-ins
Custom stationery
Custom signatures
A custom Outlook Today page
Custom categories
Custom calendar color labels
In addition, administrators commonly ask for a number of other modifications that are not possible by any obvious means. We ll review why and suggest workarounds.
COM add-ins are a type of application that integrates tightly with Outlook to add new functionality. (Other Office programs also support COM add-ins.) There are both commercial and shareware COM add-ins, and many organizations have their own in-house COM add-ins to enhance business processes that use Outlook.
COM add-ins for Outlook have proliferated in part because good samples are available for programmers to learn from and because they can be built with Visual Basic. Typically, a COM add-in will provide a custom toolbar to invoke its functionality and set its options. It may also monitor specific events in order to respond when certain actions happen in Outlook, such as new mail arriving or...
