[NOTE: I am reposting this as a result of data-loss from a disk failure at my hosting provider]
As many people know, I’ve used ClearContext to help me manage my Inbox for a long time now, since version 2 in fact (it is now at version 5). If you haven’t taken a look at the features that are on offer, head to http://www.clearcontext.com/ and download the trial version.
With the release of Microsoft’s Office 2010 and support for Outlook 2010 built into ClearContext 5, I was obviously very excited. However, due to a very annoying “feature” of Microsoft Office’s Ribbon, I actually ended up being incredibly frustrated instead.
I am a keyboard person. I’ll avoid using the mouse wherever I can. As such, I rely a lot on shortcut keys to navigate my applications. ClearContext was no exception – alt-m to file a message, alt-p to set the topic on a mail, alt-t to file a whole thread etc. However, when implementing the Ribbon, Microsoft removed the ability for add-in developers to assign specific shortcut keys to their features.
Sure, shortcut keys still exist, but they are assigned by Outlook, and are often long and convoluted. For example, in the following screenshot, I had pressed the ALT button and you can see the shortcut key presses that are now available.
If I want to then use a feature on the current tab (Home), I have to press “H” to activate it. This then gives me the following view.
Now I can use either 1 or 2 character key presses to access a feature. For example, I can file the current message by pressing “Y” then “3”. So, the key press combination to file a message is “ALT-H-Y-3”. Clearly that is unacceptable.
To make matters worse, in order to get to the ClearContext tab to perform the less common functions, I now have to use key presses to first change the Ribbon tab. For example, say I want to assign a project to the current mail in my inbox. In this case I have to press “ALT”, then “Y-1” to select the ClearContext tab, and finally “Y-E” to activate the assign project feature. That’s “ALT-Y-1-Y-E”. Clearly that mouse is going to be quicker!
Solution 1: Quick Access Toolbar
One option that is useful for really common tasks is to add functions to the Quick Access Toolbar at the top – see the items labelled “1”, “2” and “3” in the first picture above. Once you’ve added items here, they are accessible in a single jump by pressing ALT-number.
Solution 2: AutoHotKey
I found a utility called AutoHotKey that will automate Windows by sending keystrokes and mouse clicks. You can target specific applications which allows me to limit my keyboard shortcuts to within Outlook. They even provide a “spy” application that will help you find the details about your applications that you will need in your script.
Once AutoHotKey is running, you can right-click the tray icon and select “Edit This Script”. This will open the current script in your default text editor. The window spy told me that Outlook’s windows have a class of “rctrl_renwnd32”. The first thing to do is create a section of the script that is specific to this class to ensure your key presses are only going to affect Outlook.
#IfWinActive ahk_class rctrl_renwnd32 #IfWinActive
Now, we can create multiple shortcut sections. They follow the form “keypress:: script to run return”. So, to attach the file message functionality to ALT-m, I have the following 3 lines of script placed in between the #IfWinActive lines shown above:
!m:: Send !HY3 return
The !m catches ALT-m (where the “!” is the script notation for ALT). This then “sends” the keypresses “ALT-H-Y-3” to Outlook. The “return” tells the script to stop at that point.
You can use more complex options, including pressing the arrow keys and the enter key. To select a project for the current message, I need to select a drop down item from the ribbon, move through the options with the arrow keys and then press enter to select an item. The following script achieves this:
!p::
Send !HYD{Up}{Up}{Up}{Enter}
return
This catches ALT-p as a shortcut. It then selects the “More” drop down from the ClearContext features (“!HYD”), moves up through three of the options in the list (“{Up}{Up}{Up}”) and then selects the option (“{Enter}”). Once again, the “return” stops execution.
I’ve mapped about 5 or 6 shortcut keys that I use all the time to file threads, jump to projects etc. Now I can get back to using just my keyboard, and I can reach Zero Email Bounce in no time.
