Email Guides and Essays
by Kaitlin Duck Sherwood,
including

Overcome Email Overload with Microsoft Outlook 2000 and Outlook 2002

Visual Basic Macros

If you have my book, Overcome Email Overload with Microsoft Outlook 2000 and Outlook 2002, these steps are probably a little easier to follow on paper. See page 246 for instructions and click here to get the macros when you are ready.

If you routinely work with Visual Basic, you probably don't need to read further -- just get the macros at the link above and run with it. Note: If you try to run one of these macros immediately after installing it, you might get a warning that macros are disabled. If so, quitting and restarting Outlook should fix it.

Otherwise, you follow the instructions below to

create a digital signature for yourself,
download the macros,
install the macros, and
sign them.

Each individual step is easy, but there are quite a few steps.

Create Digital Signature

To use the macros safely, you need to create a digital signature for yourself and sign the macros. To do this, you need to have SelfCert.exe installed. If it is installed, it is probably at
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office
If SelfCert.exe isn't already loaded, here is how to install it:

Go to the Start menu and select Control Panel.
Click on the Add/Remove Programs icon.
Make sure that the Change or Remove Programs icon in the upper left is selected.
Select Microsoft Office 2000 and click on the Change button.
Expand Office Tools by clicking on the plus sign (+).
Select Digital Signature for VBA Projects and set it to Run from My Computer.
Click on the Update Now button. (At this point, the installation program will probably ask you for your Microsoft Office 2000 CD-ROM installation disk.)

To create your certificate, start SelfCert.exe and enter your name. This will create a digital certificate for your personal use.

Download the Macros

In a moment, I'll ask you to click on a link. Select all the text in the file that appears and copy it to the clipboard, then return to this page. (Control-A, Control-C should copy it all.) Okay, now click here to show the macros, select all, copy, and return to this page.

Install the Macros

(Welcome back!)

To install the macros, do the following steps:

Go back to Outlook.
Open the Visual Basic editor from inside Outlook by pressing Alt-F11 or selecting Tools->Macro->Visual Basic Editor.
Select Insert->Module.
Click in the module window and paste (Control-V) the contents of the clipboard (i.e. the text of the macro file) after Option Explicit.
Save the macro by selecting File->Save.

Sign the Macros

Finally, you need to actually sign the macro with this new certificate.

Inside the Visual Basic window, select Tools->Digital Signature.
Click on the Choose button.
Select the certificate that you just created.
Click on the OK button.
Select File->Save.

That's it! You should be in business now.

Kaitlin Duck Sherwood
Updated 18 December 2001.