Setting Up the Application | Programming Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Exchange, Second Edition (DV-MPS Programming)

To install the Account Tracking application, you'll need a machine that has Outlook 98 and at least one application from Microsoft Office 97 installed, preferably Excel 97. You'll also need to have a user account on a Microsoft Exchange Server. Now let's step through setting up the Account Tracking application.

NOTE
Files copied from CDs have their Read-only flags set. When setting up the applications included with this book, be aware that you may need to clear these Read-only flags after copying files from the companion CD.

Copying the Account Tracking Folder

First you will need to copy the Account Tracking folder from the .pst file included on the companion CD to your Public Folders in Exchange. To do this, copy the ExBook.pst file from the CD to your local hard drive. Clear the Read-only flag for this file. In Outlook 98, choose File, point to Open, and then select Personal Folders File (.pst). In the Open Personal Folders dialog box, locate ExBook.pst on your hard drive, select it, and click OK. At this point, the file folder named ExBook should be displayed in your Outlook Folder List. Expand the ExBook file folder to display the Account Tracking folder. While pressing the Ctrl key, drag and drop the Account Tracking folder to the location in the Public Folder tree where you want the folder to appear. Pressing the Ctrl key will make a copy of the Account Tracking folder.

NOTE
If you do not copy the Account Tracking folder from the ExBook.pst file folder to your Public Folders, the Assign Task To functionality will not work.

Copying the Product Sales Database

Included on the companion CD is a sample Access database named Sales.mdb. The application can use this sample product sales database to retrieve product sales and quota information for an account previously entered in the database. The default location for this sales database is in the root of your C: drive, but you can change this location by modifying some of the VBScript code in the Account Tracking form. By default, the application does not use the database, but you can change this setting in the VBScript for the form. To configure the Access database, follow these steps:

From the companion CD, copy the file named Sales.mdb to your local hard drive and clear its Read-only flag.

In the Outlook Public Folders list, select the Account Tracking folder you just copied.

Launch the Account Tracking form by selecting New Account Info from the Actions menu. If a message box is shown that indicates the form can't be displayed because the Expression Service failed to start, you most likely don't have the Expression Service installed. To install the Expression Service, run setup for Outlook 98 and install the Expression Service component.

Select Tools\Forms\Design This Form.

From the Form menu, select View Code.

If you do want to use the sales database, in the Global Declaration section, change the line

 bUseDatabase = 0

 bUseDatabase = 1

If you want to change the location of the database, find the Item_Open subroutine. Change the parameter in the line

 InitializeDatabase "c:\sales.mdb"

to reflect the location of the database. For example, if the database is located on a file share, you would change the line to

 InitializeDatabase "\\fileserver\fileshare\sales.mdb"

NOTE

Although an Access database is being used in this sample application, you could also use Microsoft SQL Server.

Setting Permissions on the Folder

After configuring the database, you need to set permissions on the folder. For example, you might want to give all users the ability to submit new items to the folder but give only the internal sales teams the ability to read and edit items in the folder. You also might want to create multiple folders for the different internal sales teams so that each team accesses only its accounts, contacts, and tasks. To set up permissions for the application, right-click on the Account Tracking folder in the folder list and select Properties. Click on the Permissions tab, and then use the menus to set the permissions for the different users of the application. Consider using distribution lists to simplify setting permissions for teams of individuals.