Sams Teach Yourself Microsoft Office 2003 in 24 Hours

By Greg Perry

• Table of Contents
  • Copyright
  • About the Author
  • Acknowledgments
  • We Want to Hear from You!
  • Introduction
  • Who Should Read This Book?
  • What This Book Does for You
  • Can This Book Really Teach Office 2003 in 24 Hours?
  • Conventions Used in This Book
  • Part I. Working with Office 2003
  • Hour 1. Getting Acquainted with Office 2003
  • Part II. Processing with Word 2003
  • Hour 2. Welcome to Word 2003
  • Hour 3. Formatting with Word 2003
  • Hour 4. Managing Documents and Customizing Word 2003
  • Hour 5. Advanced Word 2003
  • Part III. Computing with Excel 2003
  • Hour 6. Understanding Excel 2003 Workbooks
  • Hour 7. Restructuring and Editing Excel 2003 Worksheets
  • Hour 8. Using Excel 2003
  • Hour 9. Formatting Worksheets to Look Great
  • Hour 10. Charting with Excel 2003
  • Part IV. Presenting with Flair
  • Hour 11. PowerPoint 2003 Presentations
  • Hour 12. Editing and Arranging Your Presentations
  • Hour 13. PowerPoint 2003 Advanced Features
  • Hour 14. Animating Your Presentations
  • Part V. Organizing with Outlook 2003
  • Hour 15. Communicating with Outlook 2003
    • An Outlook Overview
    • Outlook Is Not Outlook Express
    • Understanding the Outlook Screen
    • Outlook's Folders
    • Viewing Non-Outlook Data
    • Mastering Outlook Mail
    • Keeping Contacts
    • Summary
    • Q&A
  • Hour 16. Planning and Scheduling with Outlook 2003
  • Part VI. Tracking with Access 2003
  • Hour 17. Access 2003 Basics
  • Hour 18. Entering and Displaying Access 2003 Data
  • Hour 19. Retrieving Your Data
  • Hour 20. Reporting with Access 2003
  • Part VII. Combining Office 2003 and the Internet
  • Hour 21. Office 2003 and the Internet
  • Hour 22. Creating Web Content with Word, Excel, Access, and PowerPoint
  • Part VIII. Publishing Eye-Catching Documents
  • Hour 23. Publishing with Flair Using Publisher 2003
  • Hour 24. Adding Art to Your Publications
  • Part IX. Appendixes
  • Appendix B. Business Contact Manager and Office Extras
  • Part X. Bonus Hours
  • Hour 25. Using FrontPage 2003 for Web Page Design and Creation
  • Hour 26. Managing Your Web with FrontPage

Understanding the Outlook Screen

The opening screen of Outlook can vary considerably depending on how your version is currently set up. The default screen that shows right after installing Outlook is the Outlook Today screen, shown in Figure 15.1. This Outlook Today view is defined by a folder inside Outlook called the Outlook Today folder, and it shows an overview of messages, to-do tasks, and appointments for the current time period. If today's a holiday, Outlook will also tell you that; most major as well as minor holidays appear, and you can adjust, add, and remove other days you want to be reminded of such as birthdays and anniversaries.

Figure 15.1 Outlook's Outlook Today opening screen summarizes your current activities and messages.

If your Outlook does not open to the Outlook Today screen, but you want it to, select Tools, Options; click the Other tab; and click the Advanced Options button. The drop-down box at the top of the Advanced Options window contains a list of items from which you can select to determine what first appears when you start Outlook. So if you want the Outlook Today screen to appear when you first start Outlook, select Outlook Today from the list. If you want to see your email's Inbox (the place where all your mail comes into), select Inbox. You can select from several other opening screens as well. After closing the windows, the next time you start Outlook, the feature you selected will appear.

Figure 15.2 shows the Outlook Calendar folders that you see when you click the Calendar option in the lower-left corner of the screen. You can adjust virtually all screens in Outlook to display data in a format that best suits your preference.

Figure 15.2 The Calendar folder's view shows appointments you've set up.

The different Outlook features, most which are available from the buttons in the lower-left corner of the screen, produce screens that are quite different from each other, more so than the different views of the other Office programs. Here are Outlook screens you'll see:

• Outlook Today— The at-a-glance overview of your current activities that you saw in Figure 15.1. You can view your Outlook Today screen by clicking the shortcut button (shown in Figure 15.1) and then clicking the Outlook Today shortcut that appears in the list at the left of the screen.
• Inbox— A collection of your email messages, organized in topic folders that you set up or contained in the default Inbox folder.
• Calendar— The scheduling screen where you can track appointments, as Figure 15.2 shows.
• Contacts— A card catalog of contact name and address information.
• Tasks— Items you have to prioritize and complete.
• Journal— A log of activities you perform on the computer.
• Notes— Notes on any topic that you want to organize.

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