Check out these Outlook 2010 efficiency tips:
- Drag a message to the calendar in your To Do Bar (if not displayed, click View > To Do Bar > Normal) to quickly create a calendar entry.
- From a message sent to several people, click Meeting from the Home tab to create an invitation to the recipients. In addition, you can click on Schedule Assistant to see availability of all invitees.
- Check others’ availability from Calendar view by clicking from the Home tab Open Calendar > From Address Book, and select names you wish to invite from the Global address list, and click OK. If invitees haven’t changed their default permissions, you should be able to see their availability (but not their entries).
- To grant others access to view entries or edit your calendar, click Calendar Permissions (or right click on your calendar in the navigation pane in Calendar view and select Properties > Permissions tab) and then click Add to select a name from the Global Address list. Then select the appropriate permissions and click OK.
- Combine two or more calendars into one by using the left arrow on the calendar tab. Separate calendars by clicking the right arrow.
- Add colored categories to your calendar entries by selecting the Categorize button from within an entry. For existing entries, right click and select Categorize. You can rename the categories with more appropriate keywords by clicking on All Categories. You can have up to 25 colored categories.
- Add tasks at the bottom of your calendar day in week or day view.
- Create recurring meetings by clicking on the Recurrence button and select the recurrence pattern. Recurring meetings can be deleted or modified by occurrence or by series. You will not be able to create “custom” recurring entries for random days.
- You can select and show random days together by going to Day view and click on a day in the calendar in the navigation pane. Hold the Ctrl key while selecting additional days. Those days will then appear in the main calendar view.
- After selecting random “custom” days from instructions in the previous tip, you can create an entry, select it and hold the Ctrl key while dragging to the other days to copy an entry onto several “custom” days. This does not create a recurring series, so if you delete or change the meetings, you would have modify from each date manually.
Learn more about Outlook calendar features at the Outlook 2007/2010 Calendar class on Wednesday from 1 to 3 p.m. in room 8011 Wittson Hall. Register online.