How to create custom Outlook forms

Being able to creating custom Outlook/Exchange client forms used to be a pretty big selling point for Exchange. With the proliferation with Web services and easy to use development tools Outlook custom forms have lost that pizzazz that it used to have.

That doesn't mean that there isn't any reasons to use custom forms.

One example that I came across recently (and then had to remember how to create custom forms) is if you have a number of people watching a public folder that customers send email to with questions, however the company would like the public folder's address to appear in the from address so as to not give the customer direct access to the person replying to the email. Creating a custom Outlook form with the "from" address set to the public folder name can reduce the steps that the customer service representative would need to complete. The following steps can be followed using Outlook 2007 and will only fully function if the customer service representative has Send As permissions for the public folder. These steps can be modified to customize other fields on an Outlook form as well.

1. If not already done, enable the developer tab in Office from the Options menu from within Word.

2. Open Outlook and then open a new mail message and type any information such as a signature line or any other information that you want to appear in each email.

3. Click on the Developer tab and then click on Design This form.

4. In the field chooser toolbox select Address fields from the drop down. If the field chooser toolbox is not open, click the field chooser button on the ribbon.

5. Drag and drop the From field to the form to above the To field.

6. Right click on the text field that was created and choose Properties.

7. Click on the Value tab. Check Set the initial value of this field to and then type in the name of the public folder as it appears in the Global Address list and click OK. (Note: The public folder being used to send the email must be listed in the GAL and the user must have send as rights for the send to be successful)

8. On the Developer ribbon click Publish > Publish Form As

9. Select the Public folder or Organizational library in which to publish the form. Be sure to name the form so the end user will be able to identify it.

Using the form

You will now able to choose this form to create a new message.

1. Click on the down arrow next to the New message icon on the toolbar and then select Choose form…

2. In the choose form dialog choose the form library and then select the form and select Open.

3. The form will open.