Make Outlook Searches Easier

Has this ever happened to you? You were sent a form via email and the time has come to use it… but you don’t remember where you filed the email. Is it in a folder or lurking in your inbox? Has it been long enough since it was sent to you that it’s been transferred to your archive? You’ve slept since then and it’s just not fresh in your mind.

Friends, fret no more because Microsoft has a free tool to help you in your search – the Windows Live Toolbar. The Windows Live Toolbar has taken several different forms over the past few years from a simple third-party plugin called LookOut to the MSN Desktop Search and is currently part of the Windows Live Toolbar. This handy little utility indexes your email (and the documents on your hard drive, if you so desire) and allows you to search by a variety of keywords – sender, subject, word or phrase in the message text, etc. – then displays the results right inside Outlook or in a separate window if you prefer. It even searches your archives so it doesn’t matter where you put it, if it’s still in your email, it will find it.

I have this toolbar installed on my system and use it all the time within Outlook. I consider it a must-have utility. If you want to use it, visit http://toolbar.live.com for more information and to download and install it on your system.