Takeaway: If you can’t do something in Outlook, chances are there’s an add-in that can. Susan Harkins lists some handy add-ins that close a few feature gaps.

1: RecoverMyEmail

RecoverMyEmail can repair a broken PST (and DBX) file and recover emails. Figure A shows the add-in at work; the process can take a while. This add-in can also undelete email after you’ve emptied your Deleted Items folder. It’s easy to implement and use. Unfortunately, it won’t recover or undelete anything but email items. You’ll have to look elsewhere for help recovering contacts and calendar items.

Click Open Email File to start the recovery process.

2: E-mail Follow-up

Outlook lets you assign a reminder when you send email and then adds the reminder to your To-do list. If you need more (like me), try E-mail Follow-up. This add-in lets you set a response time when you send an email, as shown in Figure B. If the recipient doesn’t respond within the allotted time, the add-in will remind you that you’re still waiting on a response.

Set a response time and let E-mail Follow-up do the remembering for you.

• Windows 2000, XP, 2003, Vista, and 7
• Outlook 2000, XP, 2003, 2007, and 2010
• $24 (single user) up to $1200 (for 100 users)
• Free trial

3: Lookeen

Despite improvements in Outlook’s search features, many users are still turning to Lookeen. It quickly finds Outlook items, email, contacts, appointments, and so on, that contain your search string. Even attachments are searched. Results are easy to work with and provide an additional management tool for previewing, moving, and deleting.

Type in the search string and Lookeen finds every item that contains that string.

• Windows XP, Vista, and 7
• Outlook 2003, 2007, and 2010
• $39.80 (single user) with volume discount
• Free trial

4: Xobni

It happens to all of us: I know John changed the meeting time after Mary said she couldn’t make it… but you can’t find the message with the new time. And when you finally find it, you realize that John’s assistant, and not John, responded with the new time. Xobni works alongside your mail window to display recent conversations, exchanged files (Figure D), and related emails from people in the copy line. You can also view statistics and graphs that will tell you about your email habits.

View people and attached files related to a specific email.

• Windows XP, Vista, and 7
• Outlook 2003, 2007, and 2010
• $7.99 a month
• Free trial

5: SimplyFile

Despite my best efforts, my Inbox stays crowded. I can drag messages to categorized folders, but I have many folders and I’m good at dropping messages into the wrong folder. SimplyFile does what Outlook does, but a bit more efficiently. After a little training (SimplyFile, not you), a single click to the SimplyFile group, shown in Figure E, will move messages. As you use this add-in, its ability to choose the right folder improves. (This add-in doesn’t support Google Docs and has known issues with Gmail.)

With SimplyFile, filing is a single click away.

• Windows XP, Vista, and 7
• Outlook 2003, 2007, and 2010
• $49.95
• Free trial

6: Email Scheduler

Outlook offers a bare-bones scheduling feature. You specify a day and time, and Outlook won’t send the message before the allotted time. If you’re scheduling messages frequently, you’ll probably want more options. Email Scheduler fully automates scheduling delayed messages and sending messages. You can attach files and even whole folders. Although this is a handy add-in, be sure to check its restrictions before purchasing — it doesn’t work with Outlook Express or Exchange Client.

• Windows 2000, XP, 2003, Vista, and 7
• Outlook 2000, XP, 2003, and 2007
• $24 (single user) up to $1200 (100 users)
• Free trial

7: Sent Item Organizer

Occasionally, I run into an add-in that doesn’t add functionality, it just lets me do what I want to do more efficiently. Sent Item Organizer lets your organize your sent messages by filing them in specific folders. This add-in is more flexible than Outlook’s built-in rules. You can use keywords or email addresses to trigger the move. This add-in is also good for users who need more control but are unfamiliar with Outlook features.

• Windows XP, Vista, and 7
• Outlook 2000, XP, 2003, 2007, and 2010
• $29.95
• Free trial

8: Easy2Add

The coolest stuff comes sometimes comes in the smallest package. Easy2Add displays a small icon in your task tray. When you want to add a new item to Outlook, click the icon and enter the item. That’s all you see, but behind the scenes, it creates a new item in Outlook even if Outlook is closed. Want to add a quick lunch meeting? You don’t have to launch Outlook and wait for all those add-ins to load — just use Easy2Add, enter the details (Figure F), and you’re done. You’ll have to follow a few rules about the text you enter, but they’re simple. (Note: The documentation doesn’t list Outlook 2010, but so far, so good; just keep that in mind if you use it with 2010.)

Enter item details without launching Outlook.

• Windows XP and Vista
• Outlook 2002, 2003, and 2007
• Free

9: PocketKnife Peek

PocketKnife Peek lets you view HTML messages in plain text without the potential danger of executing a malicious script. After installing this add-in, you’ll find a Peek button on the standard toolbar in Outlook 2000 through 2007. In Outlook 2010, it’s on the Add-In tab. Select the email item and click Peek. Figure G shows an issue of the Office For Mere Mortals newsletter in plain text. (No, I wasn’t really worried about the newsletter. OfMM has been around for ages and is clean and informative!

Click the tabs to view an HTML email in plain text.

• Windows XP, Vista, and 7
• Outlook 2000, XP, 2003, 2007, and 2010
• Free

10: SMS

Microsoft’s SMS add-in lets you send SMS text messages through most mobile phones. In addition, you can save a draft, send to groups, print the SMS, and forward a message as SMS or email. You can lookup contacts and use Spellcheck. Connect your mobile phone via Infrared, Bluetooth, or even a USB cable and you’re ready to go.

• Windows Server 2003, XP, Vista
• Outlook 2003 and 2007
• Free

During remarks at a developers conference in Japan on May 23, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer referred to the next version of Windows as “Windows 8.” He also said the next generation of Windows systems will be out next year.

To those not following Microsoft’s Windows saga closely, this may seem like a “so what” moment. But Microsoft execs have been studiously avoiding any references to the timing or naming of the next version of Windows to try to keep the specifics of the product as quiet as possible. Microsoft’s top brass has been avoiding calling the next version of Windows “Windows 8″ publicly, preferring instead to call it “Windows Next.” (Internally, a number of  Microsoft job postings and leaked slides have referenced “Windows 8,” however.”

Here’s what Ballmer said today in Tokyo about Windows 8, according to Microsoft’s own transcript:

“We’re obviously hard at work on the next version of Windows. Windows 7 PCs will sell over 350 million units this year. We’ve done a lot in Windows 7 to improve customer satisfaction. We have a brand new user interface. We’ve added touch, and ink, and speech. And yet, as we look forward to the next generation of Windows systems, which will come out next year, there’s a whole lot more coming. As we progress through the year, you ought to expect to hear a lot about Windows 8. Windows 8 slates, tablets, PCs, a variety of different form factors.”

Parsing Ballmer’s words further, it’s interesting he called out Windows 8 slates and tablets as two separate form factors. Last year, Microsoft was pushing Windows Embedded Compact as its slate operating system, designed for devices that were more about consumption than creation….

It’s also interesting that Ballmer did not say specifically that “the next generation of Windows systems” due out next year were Windows 8 systems. (There’s been some speculation that Microsoft might deliver ARM-based tablets separately from Windows 8 laptops, PCs and notebooks — with some company watchers predicting that Win8 tablets would ship before the other SKUs, and others predicting they’d ship afterwards. I’ve heard from my contacts that Microsoft is planning to deliver all Windows 8 SKUs simultaneously, however.)

The head of Windows, President Steven Sinofsky, is slated to speak next week at the AllThingsD conference, where many are expecting him to show off an internal build of Windows 8 (whether or not he actually refers to it using the Windows 8 codename).

Microsoft is expected to provide testers with a first tech preview or beta of Windows 8 in mid-September during the company’s developer conference in Anaheim, Calif. The rumored release-to-manufacturing date of Windows 8 is mid-2012, with holiday 2012 retail availability targeted.

Update: OK, believe it or not, the “official” response is Ballmer’s statement isn’t what it seems to be… Sent from a Microsoft spokesman earlier tonight:

““It appears there was a misstatement. We are eagerly awaiting the next generation of Windows 7 hardware that will be available in the coming fiscal year.  To date, we have yet to formally announce any timing or naming for the next version of Windows.”

And, as usual, there are many ways to interpret these remarks. Is the next-generation Windows release nothing but Windows 7 with new paint? Windows 8 not the final name for the next version of Windows? (The final name possibly being something other than Windows 8 is something that I’ve heard from my tipsters…) You be the judge….

By Adrian Kingsley-Hughes | April 2, 2009, 4:45am PDT

It’s time for Microsoft’s policy of tying the availability of Windows Updates to Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) validation to end.

Brian Livingston writing for Windows Secrets had the following to say:

“It’s ridiculous to say that Microsoft provides all security updates to Windows users, whether or not they pass Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) validation. No, Microsoft doesn’t.

“First of all, a system that fails WGA is restricted in using Microsoft’s update and download sites.

“WGA has a reputation for rating some PCs as unlicensed when in fact they’re completely legitimate. For this reason, many people exit Windows Update at this point and turn off Automatic Updates (if it was enabled) rather than risk disabling their expensive computers.”

Windows Update and WGA are interlinked . If you have a PC that doesn’t validate as running a genuine copy of Windows (or you are uneasy about putting it through the validation process for whatever reason), then you are limited to receiving only those updates that are labeled as “Critical”. While this still gives users access to the most important updates, it means that users miss out on updates classified as “Important” or “Moderate”.

To make matters worse, back in 2006 someone at Microsoft decided to push an update for the WGA mechanism (KB905474) through the Windows Update mechanism and marked it as a “Critical” update. This mixing of genuine security updates and marketing propaganda was an enormous abuse of trust on Microsoft’s part (Apple later pulled a similar stunt when it pushed Safari to Windows users though its software update mechanism) and shouldn’t have been allowed to happen.

It’s now time for Microsoft to disconnect WGA from all Windows related updates. Same goes from Office Genuine Advantage and updates for Microsoft Office. The current situation doesn’t make good sense. I don’t have a problem with Microsoft demanding that users wanting additional content (games, new apps, templates viagra and alcohol and so on) have to go through a validation process, but ALL updates should be available to ALL users, irrespective of whether users are running a genuine copy of Windows or not. Users who have unwittingly been sold a counterfeit copy of Windows shouldn’t be penalized and have their security compromised. In fact, when it comes to security updates, even those who know they are running a pirated copy of Windows should get access to all updates. It’s in everyone’s best interests that as many machines as possible are patched.