Discussion on:

Use color to identify mail messages to and from specific people

This is 2011. To use color to identify mail messages to and from specific people should be a 2 to 4 click process. Your instructions are like we were back in 1990's when to get anything important done on a computer it was necessary to hire a geek to figure the complexity out. Outlook has had bells and whistles galor added over 10 years yet a little thing like this requires a page full of instructions to accomplish. Shame on you Microsoft.

I don't have a Current Settings group. Is this a 2010 version only tip. My agency still uses 2007 (quelle surprise!). Does this work some other way in 2007 or is it only for travellers from the future?

You can apply conditional formatting in Outlook 2007 using the organize pane.

Tool > Organize

Follow the "Wizard" or click on the "Automatic Formatting" button. Hope this helps!

Well, I've got your agency beat.....I am using Outlook 2003.......guess I'm SOL wrt color coding email items..............:(((

I think it's harder than it should be too -- maybe I'm missing something -- if someone has an easier way in 2010, please chime in -- I'm not too proud to learn!

Lotus Notes have been able to do this for years, and it's a lot easier to set up

.... is the ability to color your folders in the folder list within outlook.

If you have hundreds of folders, many nested, being able to color the folder itself would go a long way towards making Outlook easier to use. Even better being able to play with the font would help too!

It is mind boggling to me that with all the bells and whistles Outlook has, all folders are the same color all the time (yes... I know I can fake them to bold if I like)

My problem is that if my emails went to a folder, they would never get read! Most of my mail consists of newsletters from Tech Republic, PC Magazine, Smart Planet, Quality Digest and ZDNet anyway, so why would I color code them? The rest, it seems, are from the various magazines announcing their latest digital edition available for download.
The really important ones, announcing work to do, have multiline titles and are easily spotted.
The only time something like this would be useful to me is when I have been away from the office for a few days. When I am here, there is no real buildup of messages. We are Lotus Notes users, Outlook is not supported. I use Outlook for the tasking function only. It keeps all of the things I use it for, out of my LN mailbox which is limited in its size, therfore it keeps me out of mail jail. Outlook, not being used for mail, has no such limitations. Someday we are to get MSO 2010. It is still being tested by the "knowledgeable users." Even though we were to have it installed already by now. W7 is available by new PC only.

HEY - Users come here from many different places - don't waste our time with bad info. AT LEAST SPECIFY which of 12,243 versions of Outlook you are writing tips for! Geez.

I'm using Groupwise. If I want to colour code my email, I have to apply crayon to monitor.

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook-help/color-code-with-automatic-formatting-RZ001115633.aspx?section=2

I'm surprised by the number of comments saying this is hard. Go to conditional formatting, create a rule, tell it how to format your message, tell it the conditions for when it should format and then click OK. It's hard to see how this could be boiled down much more without taking away flexibility. And this seems to be a feature for people that want a lot of control over their messages, not for the casual user.

I agree that finding the conditional formatting section in the first place is a bit of a pain. Outlook 2010 is not too bad, but this is one of those things Microsoft move around and rename in every version of Outlook they release. I've always found right-clicking a column heading and choosing View Settings is the easiest way to get there, and it seems fairly consistent across Outlook versions.

Though not as extensive, there was an article on doing a similar colour coding on Lifehacker in 2006 (http://lifehacker.com/software/email/outlook-tip-color-code-messages-addressed-only-to-you-157935.php).

You can also do this in Thunderbird and even in the text only client Mutt.

I am surprise at all the morons making rude comments about this Office Tip. So, you know some better way to do this or ???this is nothing new???, well all of you are so special. Someone going to the trouble of writing up a tip about how to do something or make things easier to do should always be thanked. You rude morons need to learn some manners.

Couldn't have said it better, myself. I'm really surprised at how nasty these people are behaving also. For those of us who are not so brilliant (or brilliant in other ways), this was a very helpful article. Thank you, Susan and all the others who posted alternative methods, programs, videos, software, etc.

Microsoft kind of does that to folks -- don't think it has anything to do with me or the information. It does take more steps than it should. I'm hoping someone chimes in with a shortcut!

Thanks for the tip.
Just a smiple variation on the above.
The article mentioned that you have a complete email address name@domain.com either from Contact list or type it in.
Just tried with "@domain.com" it highlighted all emails from the ppl @domain.com

TerryF