Other Methods of Creating Contact Items

There are several methods of creating contact items other than those described on the previous pages. You can import contact items from Microsoft Word Mail Merge data files, import from Excel, Microsoft Access, vCards, comma-delimited or tab-delimited text files, and personal folders files.

For more information about importing and exporting information, see "Exchanging Outlook Data with Other Applications," p. 550.

Most of the methods to import and export contact items will be covered in detail in Chapter 23, "Importing, Exporting, and Backing Up Outlook Information." In this chapter, you'll get a brief overview of two of the most common methods of importing contact items: creating a contact from a vCard and creating contacts from a Mail Merge data file.

Importing Contacts from a Mail Merge Data File

A mail merge is a common way to create envelopes and labels to send out form letters, emails, and promotional mailings. You can create your data source directly in Microsoft Word by using a table. After you've created that data source, you can import that data directly into your Outlook Contacts folder. To import a Word table of address information into your Contacts folder, use the following steps:

1. Open your data source file in Word.

2. Click in the table that contains your contact information and select Table, Convert, Table to Text to display the Convert Table To Text dialog box seen in Figure 9.27.

   Figure 9.27. Choose the text separator you need.

   

3. Choose Commas as your text separator and click OK.

4. You should now see your table displayed as lines of text with the individual fields separated by commas.

5. Select File, Save As and choose Plain Text from the Save As Type drop-down box.

6. Enter a name for your file and click Save to display the File Conversion dialog box shown in Figure 9.28.

   Figure 9.28. You usually want to accept the defaults in this dialog box.

   

7. Click OK to accept the default values in this dialog box.

8. Close Word and open Outlook.

9. Select File, Import and Export to start the Import and Export Wizard as seen in Figure 9.29.

   Figure 9.29. You can choose from a variety of options for importing or exporting.

   

   NOTE

   If you've installed Business Contact Manager, the menu combination you'll need is File, Import and Export, Outlook.

10. Choose to import from another program or file and click Next.

11. Select Comma Separated Values (Windows) and click Next (see Figure 9.30).

    Figure 9.30. You can choose from a variety of different file types for your import.

    

12. Select the proper comma-separated values (CSV) file that you saved in step 6 and click Next.

13. Choose the desired Contacts folder and click Next.

14. Choose Map Custom Fields to display Figure 9.31 to ensure that the fields in your table are properly matched to the fields in your contact item.

    Figure 9.31. The Map Custom Fields dialog box enables you to control which source fields populate which contact fields.

    

15. If all field names in your table are standard, you probably won't have to do much with this window. To map a source field to a destination field, drag the field from the left text box to the right text box. This will create the field map. When you're done mapping fields, click OK.

16. Click Finish to complete the import.

Outlook will take a few seconds to perform the import and create all the new contacts. When the import is complete, you can edit each contact to assign a category or make any other changes to the contacts, if necessary.

Importing Contacts from vCards

You can also import contacts directly from vCards. A vCard is a widely recognized format for transmitting contact information over the Internet by Outlook and a variety of other personal information management applications.

NOTE

For detailed information about vCards, see the white paper located at http://www.inmc.org/pdi/vcardwhite.html.

Each vCard is a separate file with an extension of .vcf. You can email vCards to other users to share contact information. To save a contact item as a vCard, select File, Save As, and select vCard from the Save As Type drop-down list. You can then email the vCard to another person. You can also accomplish this task by clicking File, Save As directly from the Contacts folder as long as at least one contact item is selected.

To import information from a vCard into Outlook, use the following steps:

1. Select File, Import and Export to display the Import and Export Wizard.

2. Select Import a vCard File (.vcf) and click Next.

3. Select the vCard from its location and click Open.

Outlook creates a new contact record from the vCard. You can also import a vCard received as an attachment to an email message: Just double-click the vCard attachment and Outlook opens the vCard in a contact form. Click Save and Close to save that contact in your default Contacts folder.

Importing Contact Information from External Applications

You can import contact information from other applications such as Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Access, dBASE files, and Lotus Organizer. Detailed information about importing and exporting from and to these types of programs can be found in Chapter 23.