We use Saleslogix to store non-financial customer information and other things you would find in a CRM application.  Sometimes, the simplest things get the best of us.  Since I had an interesting incident while working with a Saleslogix user, I thought I would share.

SalesLogix can integrate with Microsoft Outlook, allowing users to push email messages relavant to customer accounts/contacts into SalesLogix.  This is a good thing for two primary reasons:

1. It keeps all information about a contact and account in one place
2. It allows the user who received the message to keep their mailboxes cleaned up without losing information.

I am sure there are a load of other reasons to like the integration between Outlook and Saleslogix, but those are the two that stick out for me right now.

When sending an email to Saleslogix, Outlook looks for a record with a matching email address.  If found, the dialog box to allow the message to be inserted appears.  If the address is not found, Outlook gives up.

The issue I saw today was as follows, the email came in from user@company.com.  When put into Saleslogix, nothing happened.  The contact where it should have ended up, was not changed, but did exist.

The email address for the record in Saleslogix was entered as something different from the actual email address, u.ser@company.com.  This causes Outlook to do nothing, because the record in Saleslogix has a different email address than the record in Outlook.  Since these do not match, nothing is done with the message.

The best way to fix this (other than dragging and dropping the message from Outlook to SalesLogix) is to copy the existing value of the contact’s email field into email 2 and then enter the email address used by outlook into the Email field for the contact in Saleslogix.

To retrieve the email address from an Outlook mail message, open the message and right click the name of the sender on the From line.  Then choose Outlook Properties (or properties) and record the email address listed there.  If the sender is within your organization you may need to select the E-mail Addresses tab in Outlook Properties.

Once this is done, you should be able to click the Record history to Saleslogix button (shown on the toolbar in the main application window of Outlook) and have the message recorded to the history for the contact with that email address.

It is likely that most Saleslogix users and administrators are aware of this issue, and that it doesnt happen too often, but I thought it a good idea to share just incase there are some who have not yet seen this.

Here I will walk through the use of the Nlite application to create new media containing a service pack.

Note: In the examples for this post I used Windows Server 2003, but the process will work for other versions of Windows as well.

Open the Nlite console from the Startt -> All Programs menu.  When the application starts up it will present a wizard to walk you through the process of creating new media.

The wizard opens with the screen shown below in figure A.

Figure A

Select the language for this slip stream

Select the language to use in creating the slipstreamed media and click next to continue.  Language selection does not change the language used by the software you are using as the source on the next screen.  The selection there only pertains to the language for the wizard while creating the new media.

On the next screen in the nLite wizard, you will be asked to specify a Windows installation source.  Usually the best way to  achieve an accurate installation source is to make use of the original media.

For example, if you have the media for an original installation of Windows XP, you could use that as the source and download the service packs to incorporate.

Figure B shows the wizard screen for selecting a source, click the browse button to location the installation source nLite should use.  This source will be read and the details displayed on below the browse option.  Once you have confirmed nLite can see your source media, click Next.

Figure B

Choose an installation source

When you click next after specifying the source the wizard will pop up a dialog asking you to choose where you would like to save these files for modification.  The window shown looks like the Figure B above.  Click OK on the dialog box and then select a location (or create a new folder) to hold the files for modification.  Choosing a folder is shown in figure C.

Figure C

Choose a destination folder

Once you have found the folder where the items can be kept for the wizard to use, click OK.  nLite will copy the files from the source media to the folder specified in the previous step.  When the copy process completes, verify the details of the source and click next to continue.

Figure D

Source files are copied to destination

On the screen shown in figure E, you can import settings from previous trips through nLite. For the purposes of this post, I will not be covering the import process.  The screen is shown below for completeness and can save you time the more you use the product.

Figure E

Import previous customizations

To bypass the presets screen simply click next.

The remainder of the nLite wizard focuses on the items you want to add or remove from the new media you are creating.  It not only supports adding drivers, service packs, and other necessary files, but also removing unwanted components.  In a future post, I will look at the components that can be taken away using the nLite application as well as presets for speedier configurations.

On the task selection screen, shown in figure F, you will see there are four sections.

1. Integrate - this section allows you to choose the type of item you wish to add to the source installation.
2. Remove - this option will allow you to remove existing functionality
3. Setup - helps in the creation of unattended media, changing options during setup and applying tweaks to existing options.
4. Create -  the create option is where the new image or media is created.

Figure F

Select the items to customize

In this post I will walk through integrating a service pack with original media.  To perform this task click the Service Pack option and then click the Bootable ISO choice under create, shown selected below in figure G.

Figure G

Select output to create

Once the options to modify the media have been chosen, click next to proceed.  In our example to slipstream a service pack you will be prompted to select the update.exe file for the service pack to integrate.  The wizard option to select this is shown in figure H.

Figure H

Select files to slipstream

Notice the links on the bottom of the select screen.  These are links to the latest service packs for each supported operating system.  When clicked they will take you to the Internet to download the files needed.

If you did not choose an option to create an image or other media on the tasks page of the wizard, the nLite application will end when you click next.  This will create a preset configuration for use in the future, but will not create any ISO images or CDs.

If you did select an item to create on the tasks page, the wizard will advance to another page to assist in creating an ISO (or if selected direct burn to CD/DVD).  The create screen is shown below in figure I.

Figure I

Create Output

On the bootable ISO screen, select the mode for creation you wish to use.  The available modes are as follows:

• Direct Burn - write the modified files to CD/DVD
• Burn Image - write a previously created ISO image to CD/DVD
• Create Image - produce an ISO image of the modified files
• Erase RW - erase re-writable media

Most of the time, the best output to select here would be create image.  This way you can create ISO files and save them to a location on your pC or network and store them for later use.  Once the ISO is created, start nLite again, choosing only the Create option on the tasks screen and choose burn image as the mode.

To create an image, you will need to select the ISO engine to use.  Here I have found that the default works quite well.  Then click the Make ISO button to create the image.

When the burn image mode is chosen, you will be promped to browse for the ISO file you created previously then the button next to Click here to start -> will be labeled to facilitate burning an image to disc.

Once the progress bar for your selected task has completed ckick next and then finish to close the nLite wizard.

As you can see the free download makes the creation of slipstreamed media very painless and quite easy to handle.  Hopefully nLite is a tool that will find its way into your computing toolbox.

The benefits here are huge.  If the latest service pack for Windows XP is slipstremed into an image file and burned to a DVD, using this new DVD to install Windows XP will move the new install directly to Service Pack 3 and avoid the large download for each system, either from a network share or from the Internet.

Microsoft has notes about slip streaming a service pack into an operating system, and this method works just fine, however there is a faster method.

A utility developed by Dino Nuhagic called Nlite to the rescue.  Nlite is a free utility that allows you to modify and create your own installation media from the original removing the items that are un-necessary and adding new items, like service packs, that are needed.

As of this writing, the utility does not handle the slip streaming of items into or out of Windows Vista media.  A new tool, called Vlite is in the works to handle Windows VIsta.

Getting Nlite

To get started, visit Nliteos.com to download the latest version (v 1.4.9.1) of Nlite to your computer.  Once the file is downloaded double click the setup file and complete the steps shown below.

Figure A

Select the language for the installation

When the installer launches, it will produce the dialog shown above in figure A.  Select the language for the installation and click OK to proceed.

Once a language has been chosen, the Installer wizard will begin.  Click next to move past the welcome screen.  In figure B below, accept the license agreement for the application and click next.

Figure B

Accept the license agreement

The installer continues by allowing the user to select the installation type and directory.  The default installation directory is usually best and is provided as C:\Program Files\Nlite.  Selecting the Full Installation will provide you with the most choices for creating a slipstream and for output once the image is created.  These items are shown in figures C and D below.

Figure C

Choose the installation directory

Figure D

Select the type of installation to perform

Like with other applications, selecting custom installation will require the user to select the components desired whereas the full installation includes all files available and compact installation includes only the necessary files to operate the Nlite application.

Note: for the purposes of this post, Full installation was selected as it provides the most functionality.  Select the installation that will best meet your needs when configuring your Nlite installation.

When you have selected the installation type and click next you will be asked if the installer should create a desktop shortcut for Nlite.  Select this option according to your needs and click next.  The Nlite installer will begin copying the needed files to the chosen installation location on your computer.  This process is fairly quick and once complete, the successful installation screen is displayed.  Click finish to complete the installation of Nlite.

The Nlite installer does not include the option to launch the application upon completion of the wizard.  You will notice that the Start Menu alerts you to the presence of a new application following the completion of setup.  You can select Nlite from the start menu or its desktop shortcut if you chose to create one.

In a future post I will look at creating a slip stream using Nlite and the options available within this handy application.

Many organizations implement web filtering applications such as websense or other solutions to display a pleasant reminder that the site being visited is blocked, others simply cut the surfer off at the knees by crippling the Internet connectivity of a logon account or a workstation.  These methods are both effective and can work depending on the situation and amount of restriction needed, however most employees today understand that certain things are not work appropriate or (NSFW) and will not violate these policies.

Some other users might think since the company  isn’t watching them every step of the way that they are free to do whatever they choose.

IT Administrators can employ many a monitoring applications to track every click, or just log websites.  One such utility is IEHistory View.  TechRepublic’s Bill Detweiller outlines this tool and its usage in a video post for IT Dojo.  Click here to watch

In this post I am going to look at sorting a mess of data in Microsoft Excel which is a very useful trick.  Suppose you are creating a sheet that will store information about wedding anniversaries for family members.

You might use fields that denote his first name, his last name, her first name, her maiden name, his birthday, her birthday, wedding date, relation to you, and a few other things, this way you could use one spreadsheet to keep track of anniversaries and birthdays and other important events.

With the sheet created you will need to select the content that you wish to sort.  Since I am going to sort the entire sheet clicking on the item in the very top left corner above the row numbers and to the left of the column numbers.

This will select all of the data on the sheet.  Then you can sort the selected info by any cell’s data.

With data selected select Data

Note: In Excel 2003 choose the data menu in the menu bar, if you are using Excel 2007 click the data tab on the Office Ribbon

From there select Sort.  This will open the sort dialog box allowing you to sort by a column in the sheet.

Office 2003 Sort

You will then select the column you wish to sort by, if more than one column is needed you can choose columns in additional dropdown menus on the dialog.  After selecting the column to sort on, choose Ascending or Descending for sort and click OK.

Office 2007 Sort

In Office 2007 the dialog looks a bit different.  The rules are the same, choose the cells to sort by in the first dropdown and them choose to sort of values, which will sort on the data in the cell, then select how to sort, (oldest to newest, A-Z, etc) and click OK.

Note: To add additional sort criteria in Excel 2007, click the Add Level button at the top of the dialog

Once you click OK on the sort dialog, the selected cells will be sorted according to the rules you have specified.

After you have sorted a few spreadsheets, this will be old hat, but it never hurts to have a quick reference for sorting a spreadsheet’s data.

Visit this link: http://support.microsoft.com/common/international.aspx?rdpath=1&prid=11274&gprid=500921

for more details on how to get free support for Windows Vista SP1.

When the technology to create CDs was first introduced, the computer needed to have CD writing software from Nero or Adaptec or some other vendor coupled with a CD Rom drive that was capable of writing data to CD media.

With the popularity of CD burning PC manufacturers have been including CD Rom drives that can write CDs in the majority of computers sold and Microsoft licensed CD burning technology from Adaptec to include in Windows.

The remainder of this post is going to walk through the process of creating a CD Rom directly with Windows XP using no other applications.

To create a CD Rom using Windows, complete the following steps:

1. Create a new folder on your desktop called Write to CD

Note: I am using a new folder here to create an easy location to place the files you will write to a CD. However, any folder location will work.

2. Copy the files you wish to write to CD into the new folder

3. Open the CD Rom folder for the CD Writeable drive in your computer (usually drive D or E) by clicking on Start and then My Computer and then double clicking the letter of the CD writeable drive.

4. Drag the contents of the Write to CD folder into the open Window for the writeable CD drive.

5. In the left portion of the CD rom window you should see a section for CD Writing Tasks, if there are no options showing, click the double down arrow to expand it.

6. Click the link labeled Write these files to CD

7. The CD writing wizard will appear, click Next past the welcome screen

8. Enter a label for the CD Rom, this will default to the current date.

Note: You can only enter 11 characters into the label field

9. Click Next to begin writing the CD

10. After the first disc has completed, the final window of the wizard will appear displaying a check box to create another copy of the same CD, if you wish to do this check the box and click Finish, if you are done creating CD Roms, click Finish to close the Wizard.

There you have it… the simple, but useful process of creating CD Roms.

One final note, if your computer has Nero installed on it, you may have difficulty using the Windows XP CD writing utility and should use Nero instead.

Assigning delegate access to your mailbox or parts of your mailbox can be a great way to make sure your email is watched or meetings managed while you are out of the office.  It can also be useful to those with assistants and very busy schedules allowing the assistant to manage incoming mail and meeting requests.

It is important to note that while delegation within Outlook is useful in many situations, the access should not be taken lightly.  Sending email on behalf of another user can be a very powerful thing, use it very carefully and be sure that you are considering both your own and the other user’s best interests.

How do I delegate access?

To delegate access to your mailbox to other users complete the following steps:

1.   In Outlook select Options from the Tools menu

2.   In the Options Dialog box click the Delegates tab (shown below)

Figure A

Adding delegates

3.   Click the Add button to select the users who will receive access to your mailbox

4.   Enter the name(s) or select users from the list

a.   Ctrl+Click will select multiple users

5.   Click the Add ->button to include the selected users

Once all of the accounts have been added, click the OK button on the add users dialog box

This will display the Delegate Permissions dialog for your mailbox.  On this dialog you can specify access for the user or group of users you selected previously.

Note: When selecting multiple users to provide delegate access, all of the users you select at once will receive the same access rights to your mailbox.  To assign different access to users you will need to complete the steps presented here for each user or group of users.

6.    On the Delegate Permissions dialog (shown in figure B below) you can specify the degree of access the selected user(s) will have for each section of your mailbox.  The access types are available:

• Editor - users with this permission can read, create, and modify items in the selected mailbox folder
• Reviewer - users with this permission can read items in the selected mailbox folder
• Author - users with this permission can read and create items in the selected mailbox folder

Each folder listed on the delegate permissions dialog can have different permission and these are configured separately by choosing a permission level for each in the dialog box for the folder.

Figure B

Configure delegate permissions by choosing the access level for each folder listed

For the calendar folder, you can also check a box to send meeting requests to your delegate as well as to yourself.  This will speed up the response process by delegates because a copy of the item will arrive in their mailbox as well.

For the delegate user or group as a whole, you can select one or both of the following checkboxes at the bottom of the permissions dialog:

• Automatically send a message to delegate summarizing these permissions - emails the delegates you selected to let them know that they have been assigned access to your mailbox. The email will summarize the level of access the user(s) have as well.
• Delegate can see my private items - this allows delegates to view calendar and other items marked as private

7.   Click OK on the Delegate Permissions dialog box to save the permissions

8.   Click OK on the Options dialog box to alert the chosen delegates of their access rights

Note: Some folders may not appear as soon as access is assigned for the delegates, there may be a need for them to logon again to see these items.  Also it may be a requirement to have the delegates open calendar items as a shared resource if they do not appear.  This should not affect their delegate access.

Assigning delegates is a great way for managers and supervisors or departments with multiple staff members to get help managing their email and meetings.  It can also help keep things flowing during periods of extended time away from the office.

Managing outlook delegation effectively can make everyone’s day a bit easier and remove some of the burden from your organizations IT staff when others need access to your resources.

Version 3 has many enhancements in speed and ease of use over the current version and will integrate the functionality of many popular plug-ins directly into the browser.

Some of the features include:

• One click bookmarking
• Improved Security
• Lightning fast performance
• Built in Spell Check
• Zoom
• Phishing and Malware protection
• 5,000 Add ons and counting

That is not all however, Mozilla is aiming to set a Guinness World Record for most downloads in a 24 hour period.  On the 17th of June, you can participate in Download Day by simply downloading the latest full release (no upgrades will be counted).  To see more about the world record attempt click here.

When a task is added to Remember the Milk, the user is able to specify a location, a due date, repetition, and tags associated with the task. Sometimes a task may need some more information. This is where notes come into play.

Each task entered into Remember the Milk can have its own notes. The number of notes is unlimited, however I recommend keeping this to a manageable level, three notes is the most I have found useful. An example of a task where notes could be very useful is a task such as get groceries. If a task is added for get groceries, a note (or multiple notes) can be added to provide a list of the items that are needed… milk, cereal, and other things.

Rather than adding a single task for each item that is needed at the store a note showing these items might work a little better and keep the task list clear for the items that fit best there.

Let’s get started on going through the notes process with Remember the Milk.  To add notes to a task in RTM, you must first create a (or select an existing) task to which you can add notes. Task Creation is covered in this post. To select an existing task, simply check the box next to that task in the list of avaialble tasks in RTM.

Once you have your noteworthy tasks checked and are all ready to go, look up the page at the top right of the screen, where the task details are listed.

Figure 2

With the task selected, click the Notes tab also shown above. You can add as many notes as you need to a particular task. Simply click the add notes link on the notes tab to add a new note.

Once you click the Add note link, another box will appear for you to enter the text of your note and click OK to save the note you entered. The note count is then incremented to keep track of all of the notes you have added.

To edit a note that you have entered already, click the edit link listed next to the note title on the notes tab. The Note add and Note edit dialogs look similar, below is the edit view for an existing note.

The image above shows the note text box and the edit link. The note editing text box will be the same for adding and editing notes.

Once you have finished entering the information for a particular note, click save to append the note to a task.

That is all there is to the creation of task notes in Remember the Milk. The process is very simple and could help creates fewer, more useful tasks.