contact autocomplete is poorly designed

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Jim40000 - 30 Jun 2005 15:49 GMT

2003 is nice improvement. Thankyou. But when one enters just one wrong
letter in a contact's name, Outlook can't even make a suggestion from the
contacts database. Any search engine of the web can do better, much less
suggest a correction of the spelling.

I would suggest inserting more capable search logic here.

While we're at it, I would suggest your Tools Options menu in Outlook be
totally revised with two things in mind; less nested nuanced menus (I often
have to go 3 or 4 deep to get where I'm going) and more rationalized. They
are not intuitive. Sorry I'm not making suggestions. If you really want me
to, I will sit down and do so.

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Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook] - 30 Jun 2005 22:26 GMT

This feature already exists. Sounds like you just need to become more
familiar with Outlook and its features. Autocompletion has nothing to do
with your Contacts. If autocompletion does not produce a match, just use
autoresolution (Check Names) to search your Contacts.

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Russ Valentine
[MVP-Outlook]

> 2003 is nice improvement. Thankyou. But when one enters just one wrong
> letter in a contact's name, Outlook can't even make a suggestion from the
[quoted text clipped - 21 lines]
>
> http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx?mid=652e275e-52d4-4
27c-8487-c2cfb6b11a24&dg=microsoft.public.outlook.contacts

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Jim40000 - 30 Jun 2005 22:46 GMT

Thanks for the tip. But I believe your suggestion actually proves my point
better than my wordy entry. In 'Check Names' enter 'Smith' as 'Simth' in a
large database. Let's assume I can't recall the fellow's first name. 'Check
names' is still in effect auto complete since it puts me in the database with
all first names beginning with 'Si' and 'James Smith' is nowhere to be found.
I realize it's a dumb example. But if I don't know how it's spelled, I can
be looking forever, even though I'm technically very, very close. Perhaps I
should be aware of other ways to check, maybe just last names or something,
but check out the Microsoft search engine. It would even suggest the right
spelling.

> This feature already exists. Sounds like you just need to become more
> familiar with Outlook and its features. Autocompletion has nothing to do
[quoted text clipped - 25 lines]
> >
> > http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx?mid=652e275e-52d4-4
27c-8487-c2cfb6b11a24&dg=microsoft.public.outlook.contacts

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Brian Tillman - 30 Jun 2005 23:01 GMT

> In 'Check Names' enter 'Smith' as
> 'Simth' in a large database. Let's assume I can't recall the
[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]
> example. But if I don't know how it's spelled, I can be looking
> forever, even though I'm technically very, very close.

Do you know of ANY mail program that uses a such a lookup for contacts?

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Brian Tillman

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Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook] - 01 Jul 2005 00:04 GMT

So now you are requesting that Outlook return names that you misspell?
That's rather a different request.
Good luck with that.

Signature

Russ Valentine
[MVP-Outlook]

> Thanks for the tip. But I believe your suggestion actually proves my
> point
[quoted text clipped - 52 lines]
>> >
>> > http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx?mid=652e275e-52d4-4
27c-8487-c2cfb6b11a24&dg=microsoft.public.outlook.contacts

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Randy - 06 Jul 2005 13:23 GMT

I presume that you know how to highlight the erroneous autocomplete listing
and hit the delete key. If you need something more robust, first review
this link: http://www.ingressor.com/autocompletetips.htm

Good luck,
Randy

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