[Info-vax] Writer advice requested

[AEF]

On Nov 12, 3:48 am, John Wallace <johnwalla... at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
> On Nov 11, 7:50 pm, AEF <spamsink2... at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > On Nov 11, 1:16 pm, koeh... at eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob
> > Koehler) wrote:
> > > In article <ZdednauJXM05uEHRnZ2dnUVZ_o2dn... at giganews.com>, "Richard B. Gilbert" <rgilber... at comcast.net> writes:
>
> > > > Save Outhouse for customers who require it.
>
> > >    Why else would I be using it?
>
> > It does some nice things Mac Mail doesn't do. You can flag an open
> > email (message) with a keyboard shortcut and it shows up on the email.
> > You don't have to go to the list of email messages (viewer window) and
> > find it in the big list or open the right menu to see if it took, or
> > if it was already flagged! You can have multiple colored flags, and
> > change the color without the mouse! The follow-up flags can easily be
> > set to a future time to come up as a pop-up reminder, using just the
> > keyboard. Different follow-up types (aside from colors) are
> > available.
>
> > Outlook tells you right at the top of the email if you've ever
> > forwarded or replied to it. I like that.
>
> > Page Up and Page Down move the highlight bar in the email list and the
> > cursor in actual emails. Not so in Mac Mail and almost all other Mac
> > stuff (Dictionary is an exception).
>
> > Outlook (like at least some other Office apps [I haven't tried them
> > all] and Windows itself) has keyboard shortcuts for more than 99% of
> > what you can do with the mouse. I find that to be a big help.
>
> > There are probably others highlights. But don't get me wrong, there's
> > plenty of things I hate about Outlook! Instability and fixed-size
> > rules and alerts dialog box are at the top of my Outlook pet-peeve
> > list.
>
> > AEF
>
> "Outlook tells you right at the top of the email if you've ever
> forwarded or replied to it. I like that."
>
> Does it? Really? Have you checked in detail?

Yes, yes, and yes:

http://web.me.com/alanfeldman/Site/Outlook_examples.html

> Outlook versions I'm familiar with have for years had a silliness (aka
> bug) where all the flag actually tells you is whether Outlook ever
> saved a draft of a forward or a reply. The flag doesn't reflect
> whether you actually sent the message; Outlook lies. This applies to

I have no idea what flag you're talking about. I don't know, and have
never known, any flag that tells you whether the message was sent. I
never said any such thing. If the message was sent it will appear in
the Sent Items folder. If you move it out of that folder you can still
tell it was sent because it has the From and To fields. If it's from
someone else (in the From field), you didn't send it. If it's a draft,
these fields will be white rectangular boxes you can type in. If it's
not a draft, it will be black on gray with no borders around it. I
don't see what a flag has to do with this.

> Outlook 2002 at home under Windows XP with simple POP/SMTP support and
> a very different corporate Outlook at work with the more usual
> Exchange support; same lies on both.

I have no idea what lies you're talking about.

BTW, there's yet another thing it does that Mac Mail/iCal can't do:
You can snooze reminders for any amount of time. When an iCal reminder
pops up, it says "remind me in" and then offers fixed choices, like 1
hour, 2 hours, 1 day. What if I want to be reminded in 8 hours? Can't
do it. In Outlook I can tell it 8 hours, 7 hours, 20 minutes -- I type
in the numbers and units of my chioce; or I can give it a fixed time,
like 22:00, or even a date and time: next Monday 14:00. I'm not sure,
but I don't think you can do that with a pop-up reminder in iCal.
Also, iCal is much more difficult to use with the keyboard (like a lot
of other Mac stuff - Time Machine comes to mind).

Repeat: There's plenty I don't like about Outlook, but it does stuff I
like that Mac Mail doesn't.

AEF