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MS Office Forum / Outlook / Contacts / July 2005Outlook Contacts Question
I have a large database of Contacts that we have imported from Act!. I would like to seperate this database (by a territory custom field that I created) into several other contact lists. I am using exchange 2003 in conjunction with outlook 2003. My goal is to have a mail contacts that not everyone has permissions to and several others that only the sales rep has access to. And when the sales rep adds or changes a contact in their "filtered" contact list it will also update the main contact database.  SignatureRegards, Phillip Long > I have a large database of Contacts that we have imported from Act!. > I would like to seperate this database (by a territory custom field [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > changes a contact in their "filtered" contact list it will also > update the main contact database. Since you're using Exchange, you can create as many contacts folders as you choose and control access to them with permissions. I'm not familiar enough with public folders to say whether or not they can hold those folders (although I would think so), but certainly the GAL can or a shared mailbox can. SignatureBrian Tillman Thanks! I understand that but will the main contact databse be updated when one of the other (smaller) databases are updated. SignatureRegards, Phillip Long > > I have a large database of Contacts that we have imported from Act!. > > I would like to seperate this database (by a territory custom field [quoted text clipped - 10 lines] > (although I would think so), but certainly the GAL can or a shared mailbox > can. > I understand that but will the main contact databse be updated when > one of the other (smaller) databases are updated. I don't understand your references to "main", "smaller", and "database". SignatureBrian Tillman I have a client who wants his contacts broken down from a large list of several thousand contacts by territory. We have done this and it works well. He doesnt want his sales guys to have access to the total database only to their territory. Again, we have that done. The problem is when the sales guy adds a new contcat to his territory contact list it does not add to the main contact database. Is there a way to have that happen?? SignatureRegards, Phillip Long > > I understand that but will the main contact databse be updated when > > one of the other (smaller) databases are updated. > > I don't understand your references to "main", "smaller", and "database". > I have a client who wants his contacts broken down from a large list > of several thousand contacts by territory. We have done this and it > works well. He doesnt want his sales guys to have access to the total > database Do you mean folder? > only to their territory. Again, we have that done. The > problem is when the sales guy adds a new contcat to his territory > contact list it does not add to the main contact database. Is there a > way to have that happen?? Are these folders nested within the person's default Contacts folder, nested in a different folder, nested with each other, or not nested at all? In any event, if they're separate folders, even if nested, of course changing one won't have any effect on any of the others. SignatureBrian Tillman One thing that should really be remembered is that Exchange is not a database and while you can sync folders between Outlook and Exch - there is no update facility to update <between> folders (i.e. main contact folder, salesrep#1 contact folder, salesrep2 contact folder etc). That being said - it also sounds like you may have some other basic "business rules" you need to decide on that can potentially cause you headaches. Just as a for instance - some questions related to that are: #1 - Will more then one salesrep have access to the same contact within a territory? (or to put it another way - can there be more then one salesperson working the same customer/contacts etc)? #2 - Who actually owns a contact in terms of data priority? What happens if 2 salesreps add the same contact unknowingly? #3 - Are there such types of users like "Sales Managers" managing a group of sales reps who should have access to all the contacts within his/her group but not across groups? #4 - What rules do you want applied if a salesrep deletes in his/her contact folder that may be shared by another rep? Is the contact to be deleted from the main folder - if so at what point? If a contact is deleted in the main folder - should it be deleted in the sub contact folders (for lack of a better term)? #5 - Is this intended to be a one-way update (salesrep to main contact base or bi-directional)? Ergo - if a change is made in the main folder - is the intent to have these changes "pushed down" to the salesreps? #6 - Will any contact notes made by one salesrep be available to another? #7 - Do you have a definition as to what constitutes an "absolutely unique" contact within the main contact base? ....................and the list of questions can go on and on depending on the size and complexity of your organization. Anyhow - just posing this purely as "food for thought" for you and none of this may even apply to your environment (i.e. not looking for/expecting any answers to this). Experience has proven that sometimes the simplest of objectives can become an absolute nightmare once corporate politics/structures/cultures come into play in terms of "data ownership" which is totally outside of what can (or can't) be done "technically". It does sound though, that you may be a prime candidate for one of the many synchronization tools out there once you've settled on what business rules you want to apply in your organization - a good place to start looking is http://www.slipstick.com/addins/groupcontacts.htm Karl __________________________________________ Karl Timmermans - The Claxton Group ContactGenie - Importer 1.3 / DataPorter 2.0 "Power contact importers for MS Outlook '2000/2003" http://www.contactgenie.com > Thanks! > I understand that but will the main contact databse be updated when one of [quoted text clipped - 17 lines] >> mailbox >> can.
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