Jul/100
Developing a provider for the Outlook Social Connector version 1.1
This post is syndicated from Microsoft Outlook 2010.
Following the release of the Outlook Social Connector (OSC) version 1.1 and the availability of new and updated providers, we have released a set of updated and expanded content for developers. The Outlook Social Connector 1.1 Provider Reference incorporates content from OSC 1.0 with new additions for OSC 1.1.
If you’re developing a provider for the OSC, here is a quick guide to the new provider reference on MSDN:
- Getting Started with Developing an Outlook Social Connector Provider helps you understand why and how to develop a provider. For developers who are just getting acquainted with OSC provider development, I especially recommend the topic entitled Quick Steps for Learning to Develop a Provider.
- Updated content on provider deployment and packaging. See the topic entitled Installation Checklist for guidelines about building a provider installation package. Although OSC 1.1 is not redistributable, you can link to the appropriate OSC 1.1 installer using a GLINK.
- Completely new content on testing a provider. See the section entitled Getting Ready to Release an OSC Provider. This section contains the complete guide for your Quality Assurance team to fully test provider installation, authentication, and core OSC features such as contact and activity sync.
- Updated code samples for OSC 1.1. The code samples include a working sample provider and provider templates for Visual Basic, Visual C#, and C++. The code samples require Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 or Microsoft Visual Studio 2010.
If you are a developer interested in building a provider for the Outlook Social Connector, review this new reference content on MSDN. If you have questions or issues with the documentation, contact us at oscprex@microsoft.com. Happy coding!
Randy Byrne
Microsoft Outlook Program Manager
Jul/100
Use the Outlook Social Connector with Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace and Windows Live!
This post is syndicated from Microsoft Outlook 2010.
Outlook is the premier communications tool to stay connected with colleagues, friends, and family. Your email messages, even from multiple accounts, are in one place. Connections and communication also happen on websites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace and Windows Live. Through these sites, you find new contacts and reconnect with old ones. You can share who you are, what you think, what you are doing, and what you like or don’t like. So, it makes sense that you can now add your friends and colleagues to these sites and get their activities from within Outlook.
Today, we are announcing that you can use the Outlook Social Connector with Facebook and Windows Live. Our partners LinkedIn and MySpace are also releasing updates for their providers. All of the latest providers appear on the provider page.
We are also releasing the Outlook Social Connector for Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 and Office Outlook 2003 in the following languages:
Arabic, Brazilian, Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Danish, Dutch, English, French, German, Hebrew, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, and Thai, with more languages in the upcoming months.
You can the download Outlook Social Connector for your language at the Microsoft Download Center.
Lastly, we are also releasing an update to the Outlook Social Connector for Outlook 2010. This update is distributed through Microsoft Update.
To learn more about the Outlook Social Connector, see this introductory article.
With today’s updates:
You can add friends and colleagues to Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace and Windows Live, directly from the Outlook People Pane.
When viewing a message from someone, you see real-time updates from his or her activities on Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, and Windows Live. You see information that your friends and co-workers have made public on those sites, as long as the email address they are using to communicate with you has been added to their account settings on the social network.
We believe that the information you share through social networks is a matter of personal choice. You should decide whether to share very little, or reveal a lot about yourself. You might decide to share information only with your friends, or share details with everyone. You might decide to have a strong division between personal networks and professional ones, or between social networking and email. The Outlook Social Connector respects what you decide to share through social networks. Other people using the Outlook Social Connector can only see information about you based on what you have made public to them on social networks and the email address in your profile on the social network.
You can review our privacy policy here. You can also review those of our partners by visiting their sites to understand each option and help make your personal choices to protect your privacy.
View Video
Format: wmv
Duration: 6:37
How is social networking and Outlook working for you? We look forward to your comments.
Randy Byrne, Program Manager, Microsoft Outlook
Alessio Roic, Program Manager, Microsoft Outlook
Paco Contreras Herrera, Group Product Manager, Microsoft Office
Dec/090
Crabby’s shorty shortcut tips for working smarter (Part I)
This post is syndicated from Inside Office Online blog.
I love finding ways to get my work done quicker so that I can push myself away from my desk, take a deep stretch, and ponder the many avenues I have taken on my way to Crabbydom. What about you? What would YOU be doing if you weren't chained to your desk...(read more)Nov/090
Best Practices for Outlook 2007
This post is syndicated from Microsoft Office Outlook Team Blog.
On the Outlook team, we are frequently asked: “what is the ‘right way’ to use Outlook?” Sure enough, there is no “right way” to work in Outlook—but, as the product team, we did design it with certain best practices in mind. Specifically, there are some best practices that make you more efficient at getting your job done while using Outlook, including:
- how to set up Outlook (layout, rules, folders, etc.),
- how to best process e-mail messages to “tame your Inbox”
- the importance of doing a daily review of your calendar and tasks
- how best to get work done in Outlook
- doing effective searches
- the do’s and don’ts of writing great messages
- how to best manage your calendar and set up meetings
The end result is a new article on Microsoft Office Online tailored towards end users for how to best use Outlook. (There is one long article that contains the full set of best practices and also a series of shorter articles focused on specific areas.) The last section of the article includes an FAQ to help explain some of the rationale behind the suggestions, along with help on how to migrate to this system from other ways of working.
The starting point of the entire document is based on some basic principles of good time management. Here is an excerpt (which can also be found in this article):
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Basic principles of good time management Outlook 2007 is a tool to help you manage your e-mail, calendar, contacts, and tasks. As such, it is at the center of not only your communications but also your time-management. To get the most out of Outlook 2007, we suggest a few basic principles:
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Even if you don't subscribe to all of the best practices described here, following just a few will improve your experience with Outlook 2007.
Note for IT admins: the article includes Word and PDF versions of the online content which can be adapted to the needs of your customers. For example, if you don’t use SharePoint in your organization, you can remove all references to SharePoint in the Word copy of the document. You can then deploy the customized version.
Hopefully, you will find these best practices useful, and as always, we appreciate your feedback.
Enjoy!
Melissa MacBeth
Outlook Program Manager
Nov/090
Office Intervention: Break me out of Mail Jail!
This post is syndicated from Inside Office Online blog.
I think Outlook is the Office product offering the most great features that people don’t use (including me). Like the brain, we use far less than the total capacity of what Outlook can do. But here’s where we can help. Meet Laurie Johnson, who spends...(read more)Aug/090
Never miss a deadline again.
This post is syndicated from Inside Office Online blog.
My teammates Joannie Stangeland and Michael Oldenburg produce the video series "A Writer's Guide to Office." This recent episode about pairing OneNote with Outlook to track submission deadlines and records has already helped me revamp my own poetry submission...(read more)