Create pdf Documents from Office 2007 with a Free add-in Direct from Microsoft.

Did you know that Microsoft provides a free add-in for your Office 2007 products that allow you to create, quite simply, pdf documents? Furthermore you can now generate pdf’s from Word, Publisher and even Excel among others.

Although this feature is not new, many Office users don’t know about it, and for those of you who have struggled about how to get your Word document turned into an Adobe pdf document, this is pure gold. (.pdf documents require the free adobe reader to read but they are EXTREMELY versatile and easy way for everyone to see a document regardless of the origin).

Here is the Microsoft website pdf creation link.

Renaming Fields in Outlook

In an earlier blog entry, I explained how to create Outlook fields. But one of the inherent problems with creating fields is that you CANNOT sort or even group by them.

So how can you overcome that issue?

Ah! let me introduce you to the Rename Field feature of Outlook.

Outlook has about 250 fields, and although they can’t offically be renamed, you CAN assign an alias name to them in any View.

Here’s what to do. Let’s say I was an independent marketer in a multi-level marketing organization. If I knew everyone’s level within the organization, I could create 20 different categories and manage them for each level members are in, but what a nightmare of management that would be–also bloating my categories list needlessly. Instead, I’m going to “pirate” one of those 250 fields, in this case the Government ID number and create one view for all members grouping by the level they are in. Just hang in there with me and we’ll walk through this step-by-step.

I’m going to assume that you’ve already created a category and that category has been applied to everyone in your downline (by the way, I show how to do this for many people at once on CD-2 of my course www.outlookfortheentrepreneur.com).

Let’s start by creating a new view. We’ll copy an existing view and call it MLM Levels.

1. Select the Contacts module. From the menu select Views, Current View, Define Views. Click on New.

2. In the Create New View dialog box, Name it MLM Levels, Highlight Tables Type of View, click the Can be used on: All Contact folders. Click OK.

3. Click on Fields Icon. Remove whatever fields you won’t be using. Add those from the left side that you wish to add (drag/drop, double-click or Add->).

4. In the Select available fields from click the drop-down and select the set called Miscellaneous fields. Double-click on Government ID Number and it will move to the bottom of the Show these fields list on the right. Left-click drag that field to the top of the list.

5. Click OK to return to the Customize View: MLM Levels wizard.

6. Click the Group by… icon. Select the Miscellaneous Fields box in the lower-left corner drop-down. In the first Group items by, drop-down and select Government ID Number. Click OK.

7. Click on the Sort… icon. Again select the Miscellaneous Fields box in the lower-left corner drop-down. In the first Sort items by, drop-down and select Government ID Number. Click OK.

8. Click on the Filter… icon and then the More Choices tab. Click on Categories and select the category that you have assigned to everyone in your downline. This will eliminate anyone not in that category in your new view. Click OK.

9. Finally, click Format Columns. Here you can change the Label of Government ID Number to Member Level. Click OK.

10. Click OK to close the Custom View window. Then click Apply View. You will now see that the Member Level is grouped and sorted. Click in the Member Level text box on any row and fill it out. Use “sortable” field names like 1-Diamond and 2-Director.

That’s it. You now have a new report view that will tell you in an instant who’s where in the organization and also is easily modified.

Opinion: Your Virus Protection (VP)

I’ve been using TrendMicro for about 2 years now and although I’ve had many “threats”, Trend Micro has caught all of them and generally leaves me alone. I can’t say the same about Norton and McAfee. And I’m talking about VIRUSES, not Trojans–the two are quite different but both just as deadly as the other.

My first statement about all virus checkers is, however, you get what you pay for. For those that become distraught for having their system destroyed because they were unwilling to pay the piper up front to keep themselves protected properly–I’m not sympathetic. One can’t complain because something is free–that’s just bad karma.

Second, many people aren’t active on the web so they don’t visit many places, so they don’t bump into a virus-by-visitation. So, their assumption is that their virus protection is good. NOT TRUE.

Third, here’s what to consider when purchasing your virus protection software (and if you don’t have it at all times, God bless you as you are going to need divine intervention).

1. The cost for VP is about $30-$50 per year so invest your hard-earned money gleefully. It takes only one virus to rip the guts out of your computer and hours and hours between support phone calls and or struggling to chase down on the internet how to clean it up. Viruses can also attack your operating system files and unless you know how to intelligently fix THEM (yes I do) without restoring the operating system (or reformatting your hard-drive) you’ll spend more hours then you imagined.

2. Typically you’ll spend between 2-20 hours trying to fix an infection. Hmmm, let me see, my time is worth $15/hr at best case, or $1.50 per hour worst case if I don’t use VP. This should be a no-brainer.

3. Anti-Virus software when running can take up a lot of your time to manage or little. For example, Avast continuously gives a virus warning that is not even configurable to stop it (McAfee is configured by default to display advisories, but at least is configurable to stop them).

4. Norton and McAfee are both resource hogs, and they are always slowing email input and output and constantly updating themselves.

5. Finally Norton is simply bloated, weak, and nearly impossible to remove without a download of addtional software to clean up after itself. I’ve never seen Norton behave well, and it is NOT user-friendly. Maybe they’ve improved their support in the last 3 years. Let me know dear readers.

All VP software interfaces with Outlook. I turn off the outbound email checker but leave ON the inbound virus checking. That’s probably a double-check because many email hosting providers are checking your inbound email for viruses long before they get to you.

I encourage you to add any comments you might have hereto my blog www.softwaremagician.com/blog

What are the Outlook Display-As and File-As fields?

Do you know the difference between the File As and the Display As?

Both appear on the Contact form. The File As field is used to display which combination and order of the Contact Name and Company in the Business Card, Address and Address Detail Views.

Open up a contact that has both a Name and a Company. Click the Drop-down box under the File As and you will see which fields and in which order you wish the contact to appear. Be careful though because changing this order implies that the item will appear in “other than the place it was” in the 3 above views based on the “new” name.

The Display As field works like the File As, but for the Email Field.

By the way, you CAN override the name of the File As without affecting the Contact Name. For example, you can change William to Bill and look for your contact name by Bill.

Fake Microsoft Outlook update contains virus for ID theft

Spam email purporting to be a “critical update” for Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express contains a link to download a malicious program that can steal personal information from a user’s computer, including login credentials and credit card information, Trend Micro reported June 22.

The spammers use legitimate links to Microsoft sites in the email body to make the email appear genuine, but a link appearing to direct users to a Microsoft site for the “update” actually downloads a Trojan horse called ZBot.

Using Custom Fields in Outlook

There’s over 250 fields already defined in Outlook from simple ones like First Name to more system-oriented fields like Message Class (for custom forms).  There are even antiquated fields from the Stone Age, like the Pager field.

But what if you want your own fields or even rename existing fields?

Creating a new Outlook Field

Suppose that you want to keep SSN or Keycodes or Frequent Flyer Miles for members of your company? Or what if you want a new Calendar field?

In this article I’m going to show you how to create and manage your own new Outlook fields.

First though, let’s create a new field in Contacts.  There’s 2 ways to create fields, depending on which view you are in.

1. Card View (Address or Detailed Address)
   1. You can hover over the dividing line between columns of contacts to get the double-headed arrow and press right-click.  Choose Show Fields.
   2. On the Show Fields screen between the 2 data columns click on New Field near the bottom
2. Table View (Phone List)
   1. Choose Field Chooser in the Advanced toolbar OR right-click on any of the heading columns. That will bring up the Field Chooser.
   2. Click New in the lower-left corner.
3. Here is where you can create a new Data Item.  Let’s make it simple:
   1. Name: SSN
   2. Type: Text
   3. Format: Text
4. Click OK.

Now, how do we use it?

1. Open up any contact
2. Click on All Fields tab
3. In the Select From drop-down box slide to the bottom and choose User-defined fields in folder (don’t confuse this with the pre-selected User-defined fields in this item.)  You’ll now see the SSN and you may change the data there.
4. After you add the entry here, you can see it and modify it.
   1. Important note: Check to see if you are allowed to edit the field.
      1. In Card View,
         1. Again hover over the separating line.  When you see the double-headed arrow right-click and choose Other Settings.
         2. Make sure the Allow in-cell editing field is checked.  For any card that has a SSN value that is filled in you will see it in that view.
      2. In the Table View,
         1. Right-click on any of the heading columns and select Customize Current View.
         2. Choose Other Settings.
         3. Make sure the Allow in-cell editing field is checked.
   2. You should also note that the Allow in-cell editing feature is configured for each view.
5. If you are in the Table View, you can see the new field, SSN, by inserting it as a column wherever you wish:
   1. Right-click on any of the heading fields at the top. Select Field Chooser.
   2. In the drop-down at the top of the Field Chooser box, scroll down and select the set of fields near the bottom called User-defined fields in folder. You will see SSN
   3. Left-click-drag SSN out of the Field Chooser and drop it anywhere onto the Table column Headers.  (How cool is THAT!?)

Now that I’ve shown you how to create new usable fields, there’s a small gotcha:

YOU CAN’T GROUP BY USER-DEFINED FIELDS.

Yup.  That’s a bummer.  And it hasn’t changed in Outlook 2007 either.

But the solution to that little problem is rather cute: And I’ll give it to you in the next blog.