Infographics – MS Outlook 2013 Apps

Outlook apps help users to speed up the way you access information on the web.  There are many apps available on MS Office Store that divided in to three categories that is featured, free, most downloaded apps.

You can find many exciting apps at the Office Store from here: http://office.microsoft.com/en-001/store/apps-for-outlook-FX102825292.aspx

How to add Apps:

1. In Outlook 2013, click File > Manage Apps.

2. Click on ‘Find more apps for Outlook at the Office Store’.

3. Now click on the app that you want to add, and then click Add.

How to Start app for MS Outlook 2013:

1. First open your email message where app is active.

2. Now click on app name to open it.

Featured Apps for Outlook

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is one of the important app for the users to search a new job or to search a candidate for best fit to the organization. For this users or recruiters have to maintain their LinkedIn profile to build networks and stay in touch with more & more contacts. By adding this app, you can integrate all the information available in your LinkedIn profile within your Outlook. For example you can check your Outlook contact list with information from your contact’s LinkedIn profile.  You can also add new contacts in a single click. You can also check your LinkedIn contacts information about where they work and what they are doing.

Yesware

This app is best for the salespeople and business owners. You can easily find information about your customers including location, social media presence, recent tweets & many more. You can also check that when your customer read your email. There are many features available in Yesware, you can check it by download it on your Outlook.

Insightly

This app helps users to create tasks, opportunities, projects, and events within your Outlook. You can also check Insightly contact information for email senders and recipients within Outlook.

Nimble

This app helps you to merge your email, social signals, activities and you can easily follow-ups all these activities in one place. This App is not fully supported on Firefox.

Sage One

Sage One is award-winning accounting, payroll and CRM software. This app connects directly with Sage One online and shows your customers or suppliers details directly into your Outlook. You can easily check your client information such as financial summary, Payroll summary, your clients’ last payroll run within your Outlook. For this, you only need a Sage One account. Visit uk.sageone.com to find out more and to sign up for your account.

New Apps for Outlook

Package Tracker

Now you can track your FedEx tracking number inside your Outlook mailbox with the help of this app. This app is available for Outlook and Outlook Web App both users.

Yammer Feed

You can integrate the Yammer User Feeds with their Outlook by using this app. You can check contacts from to: and cc: line and get information about their user feeds.

RedCritter Accolades

RedCritter Accolades use to send an accolade from your Outlook inbox. With the help of this app, you can view any email sender's RedCritter profile in your inbox. So first create your own RedCritter profile to share your profiles and rewards with your friends. This app is for Outlook 2013, Office 365 and even with the Microsoft OWA App for iPhone and iPad users.

SPHINXprojects

For using this app, first you need to sign up for a SPHINXprojects account.  After creating your account, you will receive an email with credentials. You can easily login to this app by using these credentials. After login, you can view SPHINXprojects information in the app that is presented in several tiles. These tiles contain contact information, the status, project completion, person responsible and delivery date of the project.

Agito Outlook Meeting Organizer

With the help of this app, you can easily create meeting, prepare meeting material, create task etc. You can create meetings in Outlook calendar simply with drag and drop. This app is available for Outlook 2013 and Office 365 users and can also be used on tablets and mobile phones.

Top Downloaded Apps for Outlook

LinkedIn: All information mentioned above.

Messageware TakeNote

This app helps user to add private, contextual notes to an email and also add its sender. You can easily view and edit your notes directly from your Outlook and also add ideas and comments.  These ideas & comments are easily accessible whenever or wherever you want to. Your data is store confidentially within your mailbox.

Message Header Analyzer

This app uses EWS to retrieve the transport message headers of an e-mail message and also shows message in easy to read format.

Messageware Utility Belt

This app is available for OWA and Outlook users. With the help of this app, you can check various information such as the time in overall world and country and regional dialing codes to help you connect easily with your business and personal contacts. You can also access calculator, interactive calendar, and stop watch timer by using this app.

URL Information

With the help of this app, you can check Url details without leaving your email client & can also open the Urls in a separate window. This app only works when your email message contains any Urls.

To running Apps for Outlook, you need Outlook 2013 or Outlook Web App connected to a mailbox running on Exchange Server 2013. Try & install some exciting apps and give us your feedback in blog comments!!  

Infographics - MS Outlook vs. Gmail

Every user wants cheaper-faster-better email application to solve communication and tracking needs. Google and Microsoft both offered the world’s top email clients for the users.  Gmail become most popular platform in 2012 when it provided Hotmail configuration. But After the launch of new version of Outlook 2013, Outlook also becomes popular.

Most Famous Email Clients Overall World

Every user gets confused about either to choose a desktop email client or a web-based email client. But I think, it depends on user needs. So let’s take small overviews of desktop email programs & web-based email client. With Desktop email client, you can check multiple email accounts in one place even without the Internet connectivity but this feature is not available in web-based email clients. You can access pre-downloaded emails & also can check multiple email accounts with Desktop email client. You can back up your at any place such as your hard drive but these features are not available in web-based email clients. With web-based email clients, you have no need to install & update any software. You can access your web-based email account from anywhere by simply login. So it depends on your which email program you will choose.  If we want to use email for your personal communications then you can use web based email client. While a desktop email client is perfect for office work.

Survey for Most Used Email Clients

The top email clients list as follows:

MS Outlook

Many people use Outlook because of its various advanced features such as Integration with Windows Desktop Search; transfer everything from your email to your calendar and transfer tasks, contacts. After the latest version of Outlook 2013, it becomes more popular.

Hotmail

It is also the most popular web-based email client around 364 million users worldwide. You can also integrate hotmail with Microsoft products like Windows Live Messenger etc.

Yahoo Mail

Yahoo! Mail is one another famous email client on the web. The most advanced features are SMS texting, social networking and instant messaging etc. But Yahoo Mail does not support IMAP access for desktop email programs.

Gmail

It is one of the popular free web-based email clients. You can also access your desktop email program with Gmail by using POP and IMAP settings.

Apple Mail

This is also known Mail.app & also free with every Mac OS X operating system

Windows Live Mail

It is a free desktop program provided by Microsoft.  It has broad support for CSS but the total market is pretty small.

Thunderbird

This is an open-source email client provided by Mozilla. Two main features of thunderbird are scheduling and task management functionality.

What to Choose: Gmail or MS Outlook

Here are some of my findings about Gmail & Outlook.  

Outlook provides Offline Access

Sometimes many customers demand that they read and sent emails just like they would when they are at their systems connected to the Internet. Also demand to work with email when they are traveling. Outlook does not have these restrictions; you can easily work in Outlook during your journey.  With Gmail, if there's no Internet connection, you can only access past month's email. There is also a restriction to access mails without internet that you can access your emails only on Chrome and Safari browser.

Search Mail

With new version of Outlook 2013, search feature has been faster although significant improvements are made like Search email, attachments, calendar appointments and contacts to find the information. It is also an Instant search-like feature that lets you search by sender, recipient, or subject line. Gmail’s search also provides faster results but not have ability to search the full-text of attachments

Social Media Account connect

Outlook provides social media integration with many social media sites such as Facebook, Twitters, LinkedIn and many more. Gmail does not support with the social integration even you cannot integrated it with your Google + profile also. Other side, Outlook provides social media integration with Windows Live, Yahoo also. It also allows chatting with your friends on Facebook, Windows live, Google talk, Yahoo messenger etc.

Some other features are

Recovery of deleted Mails

When you delete mails from Outlook then these mails are sent to “Deleted” box. If you deleted those mails from “Deleted” box also then in this case you have another option to recover all those mails. But in Gmail when you delete any message, it move into “Trash” box and this trash box automatically delete after 90 days. If you delete message from trash box than it cannot be recover.

Sending large file is easier

If you want to send larger files then you can easily send it in Outlook. For this Gmail has limit to upload and send file up to 25MB. If this limit get exceed it cannot be upload & send. For this, you have to upload those files in Google Drive or Google Doc to send such large files. When you upload & send from Outlook & the limit get exceed then, outlook automatically send that file to upload in Skydrive and a link is added to the email attachment.

Choice is Yours

I think both are good at their own places. From above features we can say that Outlook has some new exciting features in its new version that Gmail doesn't have.

How to use Gmail with Outlook 2013

Do you want to secure your Gmail messages? If yes then you can do it by configuring your Gmail in Outlook. If you use outlook with Gmail then it stores all your Gmail messages backup on your computer.  You can setup your Gmail in Outlook either using POP3 or IMAP. Let’s discuss about POP3 & IMAP one by one. 

If you setup your Gmail in Outlook 2013 using POP3 then when you view your mails, first it will be downloaded on your system. If in nay condition you lose access to your Gmail account then you will still have a copy of your mails inside Outlook. Either you read or delete an email in Outlook, it will be marked as unread or undelete on your Gmail account.  

If you setup your Gmail in Outlook 2013 using IMAP, it is just oppose to POP3. If you read any mail then will download anything on your computer. By using IMAP, you can access your e-mails through different devices like iPhone, tablet, laptop, PC & everywhere else. If you read or delete any message anywhere, it shows deleted & marked as read in your Gmail account also. It is also no matter from where you access your Gmail accounts; changes are same as your Outlook. 

Set up Gmail using POP3

To set up Microsoft Outlook, first you need to enable POP on your Gmail Account. First login on your Gmail account & then click on small gear-shaped icon at top right corner of your screen. From here, click on Settings from the drop down menu. 

Then click on ‘Forwarding and POP/IMAP’ option. 

In this section, under POP download, either select the option ‘Enable POP for all mail’ or Enable POP for mail that arrives from now on. So choose option according to your need. From here, you can also set the options with the Gmail messages that are accessed with POP3.  You can select one of the desired options from the list:  

1. Keep copies of messages on your Gmail inbox.
2. Mark mails as read.
3. Automatically move e-mails to the archive.
4. Delete the messages on G-mail.

After selecting all the options, click on save changes. 

Add your Gmail account to Outlook 2013: 

First open Outlook 2013 & then click on “File” tab.

Now click on Account Information & then click on “Add Account” option. 

Select “Manual setup or additional server types” option & then Click on “Next”.

In Choose Service window, click on “POP or IMAP” option and then click on “Next”

In the next window, Enter your name and email address Select POP3 as the account type. Enter the value of incoming mail server as pop.gmail.com and outgoing mail server as smtp.gmail.com. In Login information, enter your Gmail username and password & then click on more settings. 

Click on Outgoing server and click on checkbox enable ‘My Outgoing server requires authentication & then select the first option Use same settings as my incoming mail server. 

Now click on Advanced option tab and enter the incoming mail server port number as 995 and click on checkbox this server requires an encrypted connection. After that enter the outgoing mail server port number 465 and select SSL option from the drop down menu & then click on OK. 

Now Gmail first settings window will be open & then click on Next. 

Now you will get a test message on your Outlook 2013 inbox!!

Set up Gmail using IMAP

Follow step 1 just like POP3 option & then On ‘Forwarding and POP/IMAP’ window, click on Enable IMAP under IMAP Access option. 

Repeat all the steps just like POP3, only you need to select IMAP as the account type.

Now click on More Settings option & then click on Advanced tab. enter the incoming mail server port number as 993. After that enter the outgoing mail server port number 25 and select SSL & TLS option from the drop down menu & then click on OK.

Now it will navigate you to Add Account screen. Click on Next to complete the Gmail account set up. 

Here is the full screen of Gmail account in Outlook 2013.

From here you can easily send and receive messages. 

How to Sync iCloud in Outlook 2013 Email App

iCloud Service is provided by Apple which is use to sync and store data like contacts, calendars, emails, and photos across multiple systems and devices (iPhone, iPad etc). Here I am explaining the full step by step guide to Sync iCloud in Outlook 2013.

To sync iCloud with your Windows system, you first have to download iCloud in your Windows system.  You can easily download it from here:  

http://www.apple.com/icloud/setup/pc.html

Please follow all mentioned steps in above links:

Click on ‘Download now’ 

It will redirect to this KB page: 

http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1455

Before proceed to the download, close Outlook 2013. 

Then Click on ‘Download’

The file size is 45 MB so it will take some time. 

After completing the Download, Click on ‘Run’

Read the welcome message & click on Next.

Accept the License Agreement & then click on ‘Next’.

Click on Install

Click on ‘Finish’ to complete the download process.

 

Setup iCloud:

Once the install is get complete, the iCloud launch a control panel. Enter your Apple ID & password to continue. After that click on ‘Sign In’

Choose the options from the below window that you want to sync with iCloud. 

Click on Apply button to start sync process.  

Once the sync is completed click on ‘Done’ button to finish the process.

Now you will see that the ‘iCloud Control Panel’ will show in your System Control Panel. 

Now open Outlook, it will ask for enter your password. This dialog will appear only one time after installing iCloud. Now you will see your iCloud email address listed in the side bar. When you click the People link, it will show you an iCloud grouping. Now click on iCloud grouping, it will show you all of your iCloud contacts, pictures and all. 

Note: iCloud Control Panel does not have option to sync iCloud Notes with Outlook. Don’t Worry!! You can manually sync iCloud notes with Outlook via iTunes. But you can use this option with your iPhone not with your PC (via Outlook). To do so enable manual sync option at iTunes so that it will create another Notes account in your iPhone which looks like, You can now use the “From My PC” Notes account on your iPhone. 

When you Sync iCloud in Outlook, you may face some issues like errors or get fail to sync Mail, Contacts, Calendars and Tasks. There are some common issues which most of the users faced. Here is the list:

Known Issues with iCloud:

You faced some known issue while sync Outlook with iCloud account. 

1. After updating your Windows system to windows 8 or 8.1, you may face issues in Outlook.  One known error is “You can’t use iCloud when multiple versions of Outlook are installed. To use iCloud with Outlook, uninstall one version.”  This error occurs when you are using more than one version of Outlook. To fix this issue, uninstall other versions of Outlook.

2. After updating your Windows system to windows 8 or 8.1, you may face issues with Calendars & Contacts in Outlook. It means Calendars & Contacts are no longer syncing with iCloud. To fix this issue, uncheck the option to ‘sync Mail, Contacts, Calendars and Tasks with Outlook’ & then again re-check the option to ‘sync Mail, Contacts, Calendars and Tasks with Outlook’. After completion of process, open Outlook and check that the issue has been resolved. 

“If both of the above issues are not resolved with above mentioned steps then close Outlook and open Programs and Features and uninstall the iCloud Control Panel. Once removed, download it again.”

3. If you face any issue while syncing iCloud in Outlook then in most of the cases there is only single cause of the issue that is deactivation of the Outlook add-ins. Please follow below steps to verify the issue: 

• Click on File tab>>Options, >>Add-ins 

• Now you will find Available Addins: Choose iCloud Outlook addin  

• Select Manage and choose COM add-in as Addin type

• Click on go button and activated the check in the iCloud Outlook Addin

On iCloud-enabled apps when you're connected to the Internet and make any changes to iCloud-enabled apps, those changes will automatically update to your iCloud account and also shared to all your compatible system and devices.

Google Calendar in Outlook 2013

If you want to share your appointments & schedules with your friends or others then you can easily do it by using Google Calendar with the Outlook. For this Google Apps sync use calendar data between Outlook and Gmail along with email, contacts, notes and tasks. In this process, a new Outlook profile created with a PST file which stores all your Google calendar data. This is compatible with Windows XP , Windows Vista & Windows 7. But it is  It is not compatible with Windows 8. 

How to configure Google Apps settings to permit calendar synchronization with Outlook

How to install Google App Sync:

Have you received this error message while staring installation of Google App:

"Unable to set up a Google Apps Sync account while Microsoft Outlook is runnings”

This message occurs when you are trying to install Google App when the Outlook is running so first Close Outlook & then proceed to the next step.

Now download Google App from this link: 

https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gappssync/

When you open this link, you will see below picture. Click on Download button to download Google App.

Next screen will come like this:

If the download process is not get completed then click on “click here” link as shown in above picture. 

After the successful installation of program, you will see this window:

After that Click on Close, and move to next step.

In next step, you will see below window which will prompt a sign in window of Google Apps account. Enter your maid id & password & then click to continue to move on next step.

After clicking on Continue button, Setup Google Apps window will open. In this step, create a Google Apps profile in Outlook which has an option to import data from an existing profile. You can import your existing Outlook calendar from your profile to new created Outlook profile. So click on “Import data from an existing profile” check box including “Calendars” check box & then click on create profile button. 

Here is status screen on your migration process:

After completing successful migration process, you will receive this message window:

After clicking on OK button, you will see this window:

Click on Done & you will see that migration has successfully completed!! Now click on "Start Microsoft Outlook". 

Now next window will open to choose the profile that you want to use. Click on Ok button. 

Now open Outlook & you can view the calendar same as in an Exchange account. 

New Look of Outlook: Outlook 2013

Microsoft added many new advanced features in MS Outlook 2013. You can install this new version of MS Outlook on your Windows 7 and Windows 8 systems. If you are a XP and Vista user then you have to upgrade your OS to install this latest version. Let’s have a look of its new interface.    

Outlook 2013 Interface: Here is the first look of Outlook 2013 Interface: 

File tab/Backstage: After clicking the File tab, you can open the backstage view where all your Account Information will display. You can easily print & manage your accounts & also set preferences with the help of this option. 

Quick Access Toolbar: Just like older versions, Send/Receive All Folders and Undo command are available in this option.

Message List: You can see list of all messages in this section. You can set it according to your requirements.

Instant Search Box: You can easily search a particular item in this section. 

Help Icon: All information about Outlook 2013 is available in this section. 

To-Do Bar: It displays the combination of Tasks, People and Calendar.  

You can check all other interface changes in the above picture. 

New Advanced Features of Outlook 2013: 

Exchange ActiveSync (EAS): 

 

With this feature, you can connect Outlook 2013 to services such as Hotmail, Outlook.com to access your emails, calendar, contacts and tasks.  You can add a new Hotmail or Outlook.com account by simply clicking on ‘add a new account’ option. After that in ‘Add Account dialog’ option, specify your name, Hotmail or Outlook.com email address and password.

SharePoint Integration:


 



Outlook 2013 has better SharePoint integration to connect your SharePoint content with Outlook. You can view all your SharePoint document files such as calendar, library, and contact lists etc within the Outlook.


People Card:

 

This feature is one of my favorite feature in MS Outlook 2013. In this section, you can find all information about your contacts. This feature collects all details about your contacts like their phone number, email address, company information, and social media updates. From their card, you can easily send instant messages, schedule meetings & also perform many other tasks.

Weather Bar:





Weather Bar provides the information about your local weather condition so you can plan for any meeting and appointments accordingly. In this section, by default it provides a three day forecast by default.  You can also check the weather report of multiple cities at one place by adding multiple locations. You can add as many cities as you want to by clicking ‘Add new locations’. 

Social Connector:

 

You can easily connect your social media accounts with Outlook 2013. So you can check all your contacts social media activities in your Outlook mail application.

To link a social media account first select File > Info > Account Settings >Social Network Accounts as clearly shown in the above image. After that connect your social media account such as LinkedIn, Facebook or any other desired service by typing your account details, and giving Outlook permission to access your account. 

New Improved IMAP: 

Microsoft improved IMAP support in MS Outlook 2013. It started to support many new features such as:

• In earlier version when Syncing is in process, you cannot use MS Outlook but in new version you can use both function side by side. 
• Supports New mail notifications 
• Choose as many mail as you want to sync 

Two features that are still not supported in Outlook 2013 for IMAP are:


• Does not support Download Headers Only mode  
• Categories is not supported  


Discontinued Features in Outlook 2013: 

Meeting Workspace Feature:

The Meeting workspace feature is discontinued in Outlook 2013. In this feature, workspace stores the information, such as attendees, date, time, and location. So if you need any information for meetings, you can add it to the Quick Access Toolbar but in this version, it is not possible.

Outlook Mobile Service (OMS):

In this feature, you can communicate mobile devices with Outlook. This feature is also discontinued in Outlook 2013.  

Calendar publishing:

In Outlook 2013, you can publish calendars to Office.com.  

Journal and Notes:

The Journal section is not available in Outlook 2013. Notes Section is still available, but all options are gone for both the sections.

Suggested contacts:

Suggested Contacts feature is not available in your Contacts list.
  
Import/Export from applications:

Import & Export options are discontinued in Outlook 2013.

Conclusion:

Overall, we are impressed by new polished version of MS Outlook. Features like People Card, Social Connectors are awesome but in my opinion some of the discontinued features are need to be added in this version. 

How to Migrate from Microsoft Outlook to Google Apps

Google provides a free migration tool to migrate your data from Microsoft Outlook to Google Apps. You can migrate your mails, contacts, calendar events from PST files to Google Apps in few simple steps. This migration tool is compatible with Microsoft Outlook 2003, 2007, 2010 etc.  

With the help of this process, you can secure your outlook data by saving it on Google’s secure servers; if any problem occurs in your PC then in this case your data is safe. Even you or your friends can access your data anytime from anywhere. 

To start migration, install Google Apps Migration for Microsoft Outlook from the following link:

https://tools.google.com/dlpage/outlookmigration

Note: You should install this tool on your system where you are running MS Outlook & also make sure that Outlook should not be running.

After clicking on above link, you will see this window:

Click on ‘Download Migration Tool’ button. Now you can see in the bottom picture that migration process is get started. If you want to pause the migration, you can do it by clicking ‘Pause Migration’ button. 

 After that click on download exe & then click on run.

 

Now it will show the downloading process of migration tool.

 

After starting Google Apps, it will prompt a sign in window of Google Apps account. Enter you maid id & password & then click to continue to process next step.

Now it will prompt to select user profile. From here select Outlook profile option which I marked with red color in below picture. In this option, if your existing profile is already listed, it will show the profile name option to choose profile. When you will select your profile then Migration tool will take the profile snapshot and import that data. Or if you want to choose PST File(s) then you can easily browse to the file on your computer.

After that select the data that you want to migrate. It means if you want to migrate all Outlook data (mail, contacts, and calendar events) then select ‘Migrate all data’ option otherwise go for ‘Migrate only new data’ then click on next button. 

 

Now you will see below window. From here, you need to set migration setting. Select the data that you want to migrate & also set the date whether you want to import your mails before or after a particular date. 

Google Migration tool does not support migration of Notes, journal entries, and tasks. After select all required option, click on “Migrate” button to start migration process. 

 

Once you start the migration, you will see below picture. It will show you the migration status.  You can see in below picture that. Contacts are imported first, after that calendar data, and then email.  You can easily monitor your migration process from the below picture. You can also check Migration log file to see the status of your migration. If any error occurs then you can check it easily by clicking log file link.

 

When the migration gets finished, it will show you the message of “Migration Completed” which you can clearly check in below picture.

 

You can also use this migration tool for Exchange server & lotus notes.