I need to be able to find programs I already own that meet a need. I nearly bought a second copy of software that didn’t meet my needs on the first purchase.
I’d love to use tagging. Here are the problems:
Google Desktop doesn’t search metadata
Microsoft Desktop Search does search metadata, but it doesn’t search Thunderbird email.
Copernic searches metadata and email, but …
Microsoft PHLAT does keywords but it doesn’t search Thunderbird, and it stores its tags in metadata that is not visible from Windows file property dialogs. <hr />Windows Search (Microsoft’s indexed desktop search for Windows XP) - I don’t use it for the following reasons:
- When you un-install it, it wants you to un-install all programs installed after it, before you un-install it.
- It holds Outlook in memory, so you can't back-up Outlook mail files using standard backup applications.
- It removes the basic Windows search command. I want desktop search PLUS the basic windows scan-files-for-content, because not every file type gets indexed, and I need to be able to search for non-indexed files.
Update: You can retain the basic Windows search (via winkey-F or Start/Search):
In RegEdit, go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows Desktop Search\DS and set ShowStartSearchBand to 0
Lookout and Outlook 2007
Installing Lookout on Outlook 2007
1) First, you’ll have to find a copy of Lookout. Microsoft doesn’t distribute it anymore, but issuing this search on Google seems to find it pretty handily.
2) Next, install Lookout. You’ll need admin privileges (no difference from XP), and the install will go without a hitch.
3) When you next restart Outlook, you’ll probably get a "Lookout failed to start" error dialog:
4) The problem is that Outlook 2007 ships the Outlook 2007 Office PIAs by default. Open a command shell (as administrator), and issue the following commands:
- cd %SYSTEMROOT%\assembly\GAC
- rename Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook.OLD
5) Restart Outlook and you are good to go.
Reversal
If this doesn’t work for you, or it breaks some other plugin, you’ll want to restore the interop library. Just undo the command above thusly:
- rename Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook.OLD Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook
Why does this dialog exist?
At the time Lookout was written, Microsoft’s strategy for shipping PIAs hadn’t fully been sorted out. Prior to Outlook 10, there were no official PIAs. Outlook 10 introduced official PIAs, which you could redistribute. Outlook 11 had official PIAs as well (different ones), but Microsoft didn’t permit redistribution of them, and they weren’t backward compatible. Further, with VS2003, it was pretty easy to create your own PIAs, which were almost identical to the official ones, but not signed. There were lots of plugins out there, and some of them handled PIAs badly.
At some point, Lookout ended up requiring that it be able to find the official Outlook 10 PIA installed, or it would assume it would fail. It wasn’t smart enough to recognize that new versions of the PIA might be legit, and probably should have handled it better. Who would have guessed that Outlook 12 would introduce yet a 3rd PIA distribution strategy? OL2007 elects to install the PIAs into the GAC by default; so plugins no longer needed to redistribute them at all. I do believe this is the best strategy.
What this simple fix does is temporarily uninstall the Office 12 version of the PIA. As long as no other .NET Outlook addins are running (C++ based addins don’t use PIAs), this has absolutely zero negative impact on your system. If other .NET addins exist on your system, and those addins are Outlook 11 or 12 specific (I don’t know of any OL12 specific plugins yet?), then you might have a problem with this fix. These conflicts should be rare, but not zero.
Pasted from <http://www.belshe.com/2007/12/06/how-to-install-lookout-on-outlook-2007/>