Rules Wizard Questions

  • Thread starter Thread starter MWE
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M

MWE

I am running Outlook2000 under WinXP. I have 3 questions
about the use of the Rules Wizard (in Tools)

1. I have noticed that rules constructed using the Rules
Wizard do not always run. They seem to work for a week or
two and then stop running. I can normally get them going
again by envoking the "run against current inbox" a few
times. This has occured with 3 or 4 different
installations of Outlook2000.

2. I wish to identify and move to a specific folder any
incoming email with a specific word or words in the FROM
field. I can not simply identify the list of words as,
for example, is done with words in the SUBJECT field.
Rather Outlook tries to force me to select names from my
Personal Address Book or Contacts List. What am I doing
wrong?

3. How does one set up a rule such that messages
containing a word or group of wording >anywhere< in the
SUBJECT field are, e.g., moved to a specific folder. It
seems that if the word is at the beginning of the SUBJECT
field text, the rule works; but if the word is elsewhere
in the SUBJECT text, the rule fails.

Thanks
 
I am currently trying to find an answer to your second question. Do you have
a solution yet?

Andy
 
Andy: thanks for replying

I do not have a solution yet. I still do what to
understand how to make a rule that does what I originally
was trying to do, but I do have a workaround.

I wrote a VBA procedure that processes all messages in
the "current" folder for virtually any criteria (From, To,
Body, Subject, ...) based on info pulled from an external
file (an Excel spreadsheet). I actually like it better
than the OutLook Rules approach because I can control
precisely what it is doing and it generates a history or
log file. It is probably not as efficient (my VBA code
tends to be brute force). Interestingly, I did encounter
another issue with the "From" attribute
(called "SenderName" in VBA) of a "MailItem". Attempting
to access the SenderName (just read it) triggers a funny
window from Outlook telling me that a procedure is
attempting to fetch sender names and that if I did not
envoke the procedure, this may be a virus. I can
manuallyoverrule the defense, but only for a user-
specified number of minutes. Since the procedure runs in
a 8 to 10 seconds even on a folder with 1000 messages,
overriding the defense for a minute is fine. I suspect
that a programmatical override is not possible (would
defeat the virus defense purpose).

Thanks again and please let me know if you find a solution.

MWE
 
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