- Why use Categorize
Plus?
-
What is the purpose of
the Categorize Plus drop down menus?
- What are menu items and how are
they used?
- What are menu
hierarchies?
- What types of menu hierarchies
can be created?
- How does a Standard Menu
Hierarchy behave?
- How is a Standard Menu
Hierarchy used?
- How does a Group Menu Hierarchy
behave?
- How is a Group Menu Hierarchy
used?
- Can categories and menu
hierarchies be shared between computers?
- Do the Categorize Plus menus
use shortcut keys?
- Why doesn't the Category
Editor use a hierarchy?
1. Why use Categorize Plus?
Outlook items that span multiple
subjects do not fit into a single Outlook folder.
Managing such items is where the power of Outlook
categories comes to life. By categorizing items with
multiple categories, the user is no longer limited to a
single Outlook folder and can more efficiently organize and
store information.
Categorize Plus takes categories a step further.
Categorize Plus allows the user to structure categories
into a convenient drop down menu hierarchy. Once
created, this menu hierarchy can be used to quickly and
easily categorize, filter and search Outlook items allowing
the user to view the information in a variety of
ways. This provides maximum flexibility when
organizing information within Outlook.
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2. What
is the purpose of the Categorize Plus drop down menus?
The objective of Categorize Plus
is to provide a means for categorizing, filtering and
searching Outlook items so that information can be found
quickly with the fewest possible keystrokes. This is
accomplished by employing drop down menus that contain
category, filter and search criteria in the form of a
selectable menu hierarchy.
There are three possible Categorize Plus menus that can be
installed in the Categorize Plus toolbar. These
include the Categorize Menu, the Filter Menu and the Search
Menu. The Categorize and Filter Menus are installed
when using both Outlook 2003 and 2007, while the Search
Menu is installed only when using Outlook 2007. The
Categorize Menu is used to categorize Outlook items, while
the Filter and Search menus are used to filter and search
Outlook items using a wide range of filter and search
criteria.
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3. What
are menu items and how are they used?
Menu items refer to the menu
buttons found in each of the Categorize Plus drop down
menus. Menu items are created using the Categorize
Plus Menu Builder. There are four types of menu items
used in Categorize Plus. These include Category Tag,
Email Address, Custom Filter and Custom Search.
Please refer to the
Menu Items help topic to learn more about each type of
menu item.
Each menu item includes a Caption and a Criteria. The
Caption is the name that is displayed in the drop down
menu, while the Criteria contains the Outlook category that
is used to categorize Outlook items. The Criteria can
also contain other filter or search query strings that can
be used to filter and search for Outlook items.
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4. What
are menu hierarchies?
Menu hierarchies are created
whenever menu items are positioned as a sub-menu of another
parent menu item. Menu hierarchies are created using
the Categorize Plus Menu Builder. Please refer to the
Building Menus help topic to learn more regarding
building menu hierarchies.
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5. What
types of menu hierarchies can be created?
There are two basic ways to
group menu items when designing a menu hierarchy.
Each structure produces different results when selecting
items from the Categorize, Filter and Search menus.
Standard Menu
Hierarchy
The first structure is referred to as a “Standard Menu
Hierarchy” and is used to categorize, filter and search
Outlook items based on combinations of categories and/or
other criteria. A Standard Menu Hierarchy is created
whenever menu items are positioned as children of other
menu items and the parent menu item's criteria field is NOT
blank.
Group Menu
Hierarchy
The second type is referred to as a “Group Menu Hierarchy”
and is used to group multiple categories and/or other
criteria under a single item in the menu hierarchy.
When group menu items are used to categorize, filter and
search Outlook views, then each of the group's children are
included in the operation. A Group Menu Hierarchy is
created whenever menu items are positioned as children of
other parent menu items and the parent menu item's criteria
IS blank.
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6. How
does a Standard Menu Hierarchy behave?
When a child Menu Item is
selected from within a Standard Menu Hierarchy, then both
the child menu item and the parent menu item are
simultaneously added as combo boxes to the Categorize Plus
toolbar. Or, if categorizing items, then both the
child and the parent categories are added to the selected
Outlook items.
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7. How is
a Standard Menu Hierarchy used?
The purpose of a Standard Menu Hierarchy is to organize
information based on combinations of categories. As a
simple example, assume that a company sells a product, and
during the process of selling the product, the company
manages activities related to design, reliability,
packaging and distribution. To organize information
pertaining to each of these activities, it makes sense to
create four categories consisting of Design, Reliability,
Packaging and Distribution.
Now assume that the company receives returns and that these
returns can be categorized into one of the above four
categories. In other words, the four reasons why
products are returned can be described as design flaw,
reliability failure, damaged packaging or errors in
distribution. Therefore, to organize information
regarding returns, rather than creating four additional
categories for each type of return, it is easier to create
a single category called Returns and then
combine this category with one of the other four
previously created categories in order to uniquely
classify each type of return. If this is done,
then Categorize Plus can be used to filter or search
all Outlook items that pertain to returns for package
damage simply by adding both Packaging and
Returns as Filter
Combo Boxes or Search Combo Boxes to the Categorize
Plus toolbar.
In this scenario, one could construct a menu hierarchy
where the Returns Menu Item is a child of each of the four
other Menu Items, Design, Reliability,
Packaging and Distribution.
Then, to filter for Outlook items that pertain to
returns for package damage, one would select the
Returns Menu Item
under Packaging from the
Categorize Plus Filter Menu. This would then
add both a Returns and
Packaging Category
Filter combo box to the Categorize Plus
toolbar. In this manner, Categorize Plus allows
complete flexibility in arranging Menu Items into
hierarchies, and these hierarchies can be replicated
and arranged in a infinite number of
combinations.
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8. How
does a Group Menu Hierarchy behave?
When the Child of a Group
Menu Item is Selected
When the child of a group Menu Item is selected from a
Categorize Plus menu, then the child will be added as a
combo box to the Categorize Plus toolbar, but the parent
group Menu Item will not.
When a Group Menu Item is
Selected
When a group Menu Item is selected directly, then the group
Menu Item will be added as a combo box to the Categorize
Plus toolbar, or if categorizing items, then each of the
group's child Category Tags will be included in the
categorization. Furthermore, for all group menu items
that are added to the toolbar and then used to categorize,
filter or search Outlook items, then each immediate child
of the group menu item, that is of the same item type as
the parent group item, will be included in the
operation. For example, if a Category Tag is
designated as a group menu item, then each child that is a
Category Tag will become a member of the parent group and
will be included in the selected operation.
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9. How is
a Group Menu Hierarchy used?
Managing Multiple
Projects
Lets assume you are managing multiple projects and want to
use Categorize Plus to categorize, filter and search
Outlook items associated with each of these projects.
For this scenario, it makes sense to create a separate
Category Tag menu item for each project. Categorize
Plus can then be used to categorize Outlook items with the
associated project name and then filter and search Outlook
items based on these categorizations.
Managing Active vs.
Completed Projects
Next, over time some projects will be completed while other
new projects will be created. Therefore, at any given
time, the state of some projects will be active and the
state of other projects will be completed. For this
scenario it also makes sense to create two additional
Category Tags labeled Active and Completed and to
categorize all active projects as Active and all
completed projects as Completed.
This way Outlook items can be filtered and searched
by active verses completed projects.
The Problem
Unfortunately, a problem arises when using this
approach. When an active project is finished, then
all of the Outlook items associated with that project will
need to be re-categorized from Active to Completed.
The Problem Solved:
Use a Group Menu Hierarchy
Instead, a better approach is to use a Group Menu Hierarchy
where each project's Category Tag is grouped under a
respective group Category Tag that is labeled either
Active or Completed.
This approach will still allow filtering and
searching for projects by either Active or
Completed. In addition, the advantage of this
approach is that when a project is finished, then no
items need to be re-categorized. Instead, the
Category Tag for the completed project will simply
need to be moved in the menu hierarchy from the
Active group
category to the Completed group
category.
Examples and Additional
Information
For more information, please refer to the
Group Filters and Searches help topic that
provides several examples that demonstrate the power of
using a Group Menu Hierarchy to filter and search Outlook
items.
As a final comment, it is important to note that since
group Menu Items are not added to the Categorize Plus
Toolbar when child Menu Items are selected, group Menu
Items can be added throughout the menu hierarchy without
disturbing the behavior of the Standard Menu Hierarchy.
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10. Can
categories and menu hierarchies be shared between
computers?
Yes. The
Categorize Plus categories and menu hierarchies are
saved in a menu file on each user’s computer.
Therefore, these categories and menu hierarchies can
be shared simply by sharing the menu file. This
is briefly highlighted in the
15-minute Getting
Started Tutorial. As explained below, there are a
couple of options for sharing menu files.
-
The first option is to use the Menu Builder to
save a menu file to any shared file
location. For example, a menu file can be
saved to a shared drive on a server.
Categorize Plus will then load this menu file
each time that Outlook re-starts.
Additionally, multiple shared menu files can be
saved and opened in real-time simply by using
the "File" commands in the Menu Builder.
-
The second option is to save a menu file to a
local file on each computer and then
periodically synchronize this local file with a
file on the server.
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11. Do
the Categorize Plus menus use shortcut keys?
Yes. The
Categorize Plus drop down menus employ the use of
Underlined Keyboard Accelerators the same as those
used in the standard Outlook menus. Therefore,
by adding an ‘&’ in front of a character in the
caption field of a menu item, then that character
becomes a keyboard accelerator. Then, all you
need to do is press the “alt” key and then press the
underlined letter to select the menu item. For
example, to open the Categorize menu you would press
“alt” and then “z”. And you only have to press
the “alt” key once to then navigate through the
entire menu hierarchy using the accelerators.
Categorize Plus is also designed to auto expand the
Categorize menu after each selection so that you can
immediately make the next selection.
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12. Why
doesn't the Category Editor use a hierarchy?
The intended purpose of the
Category Editor is to quickly edit categories that were
previously assigned to Outlook items and it is not intended
to be used for categorization. That is why Categorize
Plus employs the drop down menus. It all comes down
to speed. To categorize an item with multiple
categories, the fastest way is to use the keyboard
accelerators in the drop down menus and not the Category
Editor. Please refer to the pervious FAQ that
explains the use of keyboard accelerators.
Typically I structure all of my menus using accelerators
and then I never use the mouse. My hands become so
fast that I can usually categorize an email with a dozen
categories in under 2 seconds. After awhile you don’t
even think about it and your hands just know what to
press. Kind of like playing an instrument. If
you were to try to accomplish this using the Category
Editor, then you would first need to expand the hierarchy,
then select the categories, then select save. Hence,
the drop down menus are much faster.
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