OL97: How to Programmatically Update Company Names

• Microsoft Outlook 97

SUMMARY

This article explains how you can use Microsoft Outlook Visual Basic Scripting Edition (VBScript) to change the company name for many contacts without having to manually open each contact. This solution is useful if a company changes its name and you have many contacts for that particular company.

MORE INFORMATION

Microsoft provides programming examples for illustration only, without warranty either expressed or implied, including, but not limited to, the implied warranties of merchantability and/or fitness for a particular purpose. This article assumes that you are familiar with the programming language being demonstrated and the tools used to create and debug procedures. Microsoft support professionals can help explain the functionality of a particular procedure, but they will not modify these examples to provide added functionality or construct procedures to meet your specific needs. If you have limited programming experience, you may want to contact a Microsoft Certified Solution Provider or the Microsoft fee-based consulting line at (800) 936-5200. For more information about Microsoft Certified Solution Providers, please see the following page on the World Wide Web:

http://www.microsoft.com/mcsp/

http://www.microsoft.com/support/supportnet/overview/overview.asp

1. Open a new Contact item.



2. On the Tools menu, click Design Outlook Form.



3. On the Form menu, click Display This Page to hide the default General page.



4. Click the (P.2) page of the form.



5. On the Form menu, click Control Toolbox. On the Control Toolbox, click and drag a CommandButton onto the P.2 page of the form.



6. Right-click the command button, and click Properties. Change the Caption to Change Company Names, and then click OK.



7. Resize the command button so that the entire caption appears on the form.



8. On the Form menu, click View Code.



9. In the Script Editor, type the following VBScript code, and then close the Script Editor:




Sub CommandButton1_Click()

   Dim objContactsFolder
   Dim objContacts
   Dim strOldCo
   Dim strNewCo
   Dim objContact
   Dim I, iNumItems, iCount

   ' Specify which contact folder to work with
   Set objContactsFolder = Application.ActiveExplorer.CurrentFolder
   Set objContacts = objContactsFolder.Items

   ' Prompt for old and new company names
   strOldCo = InputBox("Enter the old company name.")
   strNewCo = InputBox("Enter the new company name.")

   iCount = 0
   iNumItems = objContacts.Count

   ' Process the changes
   For I = 1 to iNumItems
      Set objContact = objContacts(I)
      If Left(objContact.MessageClass, 11) = "IPM.Contact" Then
         If objContact.CompanyName = strOldCo Then
            objContact.CompanyName = strNewCo
            objContact.Save
            iCount = iCount + 1
         End If
      End If
   Next
   
   MsgBox "Number of contacts updated: " & CStr(iCount)

   ' Clean up
   Set objContact = Nothing
   Set objContacts = Nothing
   Set objContactsFolder = Nothing

End Sub 

10. On the File menu, click Publish Form As. In the Form name box, type Change Company Name Form. Click Publish In. In the Set Library To box, click Folder Forms Library. In the folder list, click to select your Contacts folder, and then click OK. Click Publish.



11. Close and do not save changes to the form.

1. On the Contacts menu, click New Change Company Name Form.



2. Click the Change Company Names button.



3. When prompted, type the old and new names for the company.



4. Wait until a window appears telling you how many contacts have been updated.

• It may take a while to process the items in the folder. While this happens, the mouse pointer does not change to an hourglass indicating Outlook is running the macro. The Outlook object model does not support changing the mouse pointer in this manner.



• The code above works with the current folder you have selected. Therefore, you can publish the form to any contacts folder. Be sure that you don't switch folders after you open the form.

REFERENCES

For additional information about creating solutions with Microsoft Outlook 97, click the article numbers below to view the articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q166368 OL97: How to Get Help Programming with Outlook

Q170783 OL97: Q and A: Questions about Customizing or Programming Outlook

Additional query words: OutSol OutSol97 vbscript

Keywords : OffVBS
Version : WINDOWS:97
Platform : WINDOWS
Issue type : kbhowto