Microsoft plans to release Outlook Social Connectors to connect Outlook 2010 with Facebook, MySpace, Windows Live, and more social network support but what about Twitter? Twitter is more like a messaging service yet TwInbox has you covered.

It is an add-in for Outlook developed by the same guys behind the Facebook Add-in. At first glimpse it looks like a basic add-in with limited functionality but is actually a complete twitter client with features to upload images, shorten URLs, and tracking keywords/groups, among many others.

Before you begin, create a new PST file (Outlook Data File) named Twitter. When done, head over to the Add-Ins tab and click New. This will open up a dialog window where you can set up Twitter in just three steps.

In the last screenshot above, hit Select Folder and choose the Twitter Data File you just created. Be sure to uncheck “Follow @TechHit” checkbox before hitting Finish.

In the Compose Update dialog window, enter the tweet and hit Update. If it contains a link, hit Shrink URL to shrink it with Bit.ly before posting the tweet. You will have to register and configure an account with this service(which can be done from Options) before you can use this feature.

Click the small arrow button to open up an advanced box where you can upload the image from highlighted email or from your local drive. At the moment only three image sharing services are supported; TwitPic, Posterous, and Twitgoo.

Once the tweet has been posted you will find it in the public timeline, where you will find updates from all people you are following, one at a time. You can direct message and RT a tweet in a click.

Hit TwInbox to bring up the menu and head over to Options. From the Setup tab you can add and manage multiple twitter accounts, the Preferences tab is where you will find the settings related to the the behavior of the add-in, the User Interface can be tweaked form the UI tab. If you want the URLs to be shortened via Bit.ly, you will have to enter the credentials in the respective tab.

To analyze twitter activity, access Display Stats from the TwInbox menu. The most useful options perhaps, is the Search/Track/Group. Here you can define groups of tweets to be tracked by their own Outlook folders. An example would be to create a group of Apple and enter keywords, such as, iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, etc so that they can be tracked easily.

All-in-all, it is one powerful must-have add-in for Outlook power users.

Download TwInbox

Apart from Outlook 2010, it also works on Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2003.

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We showed you how to create a new data file in Outlook 2010, but there is more to that. Data File has a format PST and is used to store all emails, new emails are downloaded and stored in this file. As more and more emails clutter your inbox, PST file can become rather large, in some cases more than 2GB in size.

In case the Data File becomes corrupt, Outlook comes with a build-in tool to repair it called Outlook Inbox Repair Tool. When you add a new email account in Outlook, a PST file is automatically created for that account the following destination,

C:\Users\Nakodari\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook

but the most easiest way to access it via Outlook 2010 itself, unless ofcourse Outlook is not working.

Head over to Account Settings and navigate to Data Files tab, select the desired data file and hit Open File Location to open the directory where it is residing.

You can set the default data file, edit settings, remove it, or add a new data file from this window. PST files can only be opened from within Outlook, it is advisable to make a backup of this data file every week. If you are using a Home Server, making routine backups daily could help in case the file becomes corrupted beyond repair.

Be warned not to try out any 3rd party tool which can compress the PST file, some of them can actually corrupt the data file instead of compressing it. The best way to fix any problem with PST file is to use the default Outlook Inbox Repair Tool.

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Gone are the days when we needed 3rd party tools to convert Word documents , Excel spreadsheets, and PowerPoint presentations to other formats. The Microsoft Office team has finally added useful formats to which you can convert your documents. Yes, Office 2010 has a build-in converter and is no other than the ‘Save As’ option.

Want to convert your document and spreadsheet to PDF format, simply head over to File Menu(Office Backstage) and hit ‘Save As’ option. Now select the PDF format from the ‘Save as type’ list.

You can also save documents, spreadsheets, and presentations in OpenOffice formats, i.e, OpenDocument Text(.odt), OpenDocument Spreadsheet(.ods), and OpenDocument Presentation(.odp) among many others.

Excel 2010 supports the largest number of formats to convert your spreadsheet into, followed by Word 2010 and PowerPoint 2010.

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Some people are getting the Document cache error while playing with their favorite office application. Those who upgraded from the Office Technical Preview to Office beta are facing this problem and the core reason behind this is that the office cache also needs to be upgraded. If you are for any reason getting this error, the quick steps listed below will instantly repair the problem.

First make sure that MSOSYNC.EXE process is not running, if so, kill it.

Now navigate to the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\14.0\Common\Internet and delete the FileStoreCriticalError key. If the key doesn’t exist then you can skip this step.

Make sure that the OfficeFileCache folder does not exist in the system. Please check the %userprofile% \AppData\Local\Microsoft\Office\14.0\ path and be sure to delete OfficeFileCache if it exists. %userprofile% is usually C:/Users/[UserName]/.

Once done, restart Office 2010 and the error should be gone. Enjoy!

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If you are using Office 2010, you must have come across MSOSYNC.EXE process in the Task Manager. Today we will discuss about this process along with it’s relationship to the document cache.

What Is MSOSYNC.EXE Process?

Microsoft Office 2010 now caches your document for faster viewing. Whether it is a Word document, Excel spreadsheet, or a PowerPoint presentation, Office 2010 will cache the documents. Msosync.exe process stands for Microsoft Office Document Cache and is used to cache the documents. In layman’s term, Msosync.exe process makes caching of Office 2010 documents possible.

What Will Happen If The Process Is Killed?

In short, it is safe to end the process. It takes 2-3MB of system memory and does not effect the overall speed of the OS. It will start again when Office 2010 begins to cache a document.

What Else Is This Process Used For?

Remember Office 2010 Upload Center? The documents when uploaded to SkyDrive are cached in the local drive for faster viewing. You can view all cached files by opening Upload Center and then selecting All Cached Files from the drop-down menu.

Short Tip for Beginners: Open Upload Center by typing Upload Center in Start Search and then hit Enter.

How To Delete Cached Documents?

Office 2010 by default reserves 10% quota for cached documents. In my case it equals to 14.5Gb of space, which is a lot. To delete cache, head over to Upload Center settings and hit the Delete Cached Files button.

When prompted for confirmation, hit Delete Cached Information button.

This will delete all cached files and free up some disk space along the way. Since there is a direct relationship between the MSOSYNC.EXE process and the Document Cache, we have covered both tips in this post.

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Microsoft Office 2010 includes Word 2010, Excel 2010, PowerPoint 2010 and lots of other apps such as OneNote 2010, Visio 2010, Publisher 2010, etc. The contents of these apps are not indexable. This is where Microsoft Office 2010 Filter Packs come in.

Microsoft has released the Office 2010(Beta) Filter Packs, which provides a single point-of-distribution of Office IFilters. According to Microsoft, “IFilters are components that allow search services to index content of specific file types, letting you search for content in those files”.

They are intended to be used with Microsoft Search Services(SharePoint, SQL, Exchange, Windows Search). Please note that MS has released the filter pack for for free to be used with Office 2010 beta only.

The filter pack includes:

Legacy Office Filter (97-2003; .doc, .ppt, .xls)
Metro Office Filter (2007; .docx, .pptx, .xlsx)
Zip Filter
OneNote filter
Visio Filter
Publisher Filter
Open Document Format Filter

Download Microsoft Office 2010(Beta) Filter Packs

Both 32-bit and 64-bit versions are available for download. It works with Windows XP(SP2 and SP3), Windows Vista(SP1), Windows Server 2003(SP2), Windows Server 2008 RC2, and Windows 7.

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When you buy a brand new computer or laptop from any popular manufacturer, it is always filled with pre-installed software. Also you will find trial version of Office 2010 which is valid for only 60 days.

There are complains from users that they are not able to remove Office 2010 from Add/Remove Programs in Control Panel. The reason why Office 2010 cannot be removed is due to missing Setup.xml file.

There are two methods to fix this problem. The first method is guaranteed to work, but if for any reason you are not able to remove Office 2010, follow the 2nd method(for advanced users only).

Method 1 – The Manual solution

Since the Setup.xml file is missing. All you have to do is to copy the setup.xml file from the groove folder from the source and paste it in C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\OFFICE14\Office Setup Controller\Groove.en-us\

Once done, run the uninstaller again and everything will be smooth again. For the sake of convenience I have provided both x86(32-bit) and x64(64-bit) setup.xml files in one simple zip archive. Just grab it and put it in the Groove folder as mentioned above.

Setup.xml (x86 and x64)

Method 2 – The Advanced solution

Warning: Before following this method, create a system restore point just to be on the safe side. We are not responsible if any problem occurs.

This method requires you to download and run the Remove Office 2007 app. The name says Office 2007 but I have tested it to work with Office 2010 as well. Just load it up and hit GO to begin.

Make sure all windows and applications are closed before running the app.

After the uninstallation is complete, it will automatically restart the computer. Once your computer starts again it will again look for traces of Office 2010 installation and remove them if any trace is found. When all is done, it will show you the success dialog

Please note that this app is quite powerful and will remove Office 2010 forcefully. It does however not remove certain parts of Office 2010, which you can remove manually.

There are still some traces left behind. As you can see from the screenshot below Office 2010 is still present in Add/Remove Programs window. As long it is present here, you cannot reinstall Office 2010.

So what will you do now? How will you remove the traces that are left behind. The answer is to use Windows Installer Cleanup Utility. Select Office 2010 from the list and hit Remove.

Once done, Run CCleaner and fix all registry problems. Doing this will remove all Office 2010 registry entries. After you are done with all uninstall procedure, you won’t be able to re-install Office 2010 unless you do not remove each and every file and registry key as mentioned by Microsoft themselves here. The method is for Office 2007(Office12), but works with Office 2010(Office14) as well, just make sure where they ask to locate Office12, look for Office14 instead. Now your uninstallation is complete.

Download Remove Office 2007

Download Windows Installer Cleanup

Download CCleaner

Conclusion

I would highly recommend following the first method, but if it all else fails, then you can follow the 2nd method(only if you are an advanced user).

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If you simply cannot get used to the new Ribbon interface introduced with Microsoft Office 2007 and then added in Office 2010, the free program UBitMenu can help you significantly in the upgrade to Office 2007 or Office 2010. Once installed, you’ll get back the classic menus and toolbar buttons as present up until 2003.

UBitMenu is free for personal use, and is not exactly expensive for use at work. Having the ability to add the classic menus and toolbars gives you that delicate mixture of knowing exactly where to find all the original features again while being able to enjoy the new functionality as well. If you’re planning on eventually do the transition to the Ribbon interface, this is a nice intermediate solution. No functionality is changed; the only thing it does is add another tab to the Ribbon that has the classic menus and toolbars you’re used to.

As it is no more than an add-in for the Office suite (so not a hack, not even a program), you will not have to sacrifice performance or security. A full list indicating the clean job the authors did, as provided on the official website (link below):

• Based on standard Microsoft® Office-AddIn technology
• Contains no active code elements (no virus scanner hassle)
• No VSTO or .NET-environment or configuration needed
• No dependencies
• Extremely small file size
• No impact on performance
• 23 languages supported

The classic menu and toolbars are installed in Word 2010/2007, Excel 2010/2007, and PowerPoint 2010/2007 only.

Download UBitMenu

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It turns out Microsoft has found yet another way to annoy the users of Office 2010 – Office Upload Center. Yes, the same tool which we mentioned about just yesterday. As it turns out there is no easy way to remove it from the system tray, the most annoying is the part that there is no Exit/Close option in the context menu.

Check it out yourself in the screenshot below:

The Upload Center is started during startup and I cannot disable it from Notification Area Icons window because of “Always show all icons and notifications on the taskbar” checkbox which is enabled. In fact, the Notification Area Icons feature is only able to hide the icon, not disable or remove it.

Microsoft has given the option to remove the icon from the system tray in Upload Center settings. Since it is given in-between other options, sometimes it can be confusing to find it. You just need to uncheck the “Display icon in notification area” checkbox and the icon will be removed.

Additionally if your system starts up pretty slow, you can disable Office 2010 from loading during startup. Type msconfig in Start Search and hit enter. Now go to Startup tab, disable Microsoft Office 2010, and hit OK.

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Upload Center is a small tool that comes with Office 2010. It is in fact, a part of Save To SkyDrive feature we discussed earlier. When you upload multiple documents to your SkyDrive account, they are all added in Upload Center.

Upload Center has two benefits, first and foremost it allows users to quickly monitor the pending documents and second that it can be used to verify that the document has been uploaded successfully.

Further advantage is that it allows users to quickly open the desired document on the web, save the uploaded documents to the desktop, and more. These options can be found under Actions menu.

You can select to upload all documents and pause them using the desired buttons given next to Action menu.

The Upload Center sits in the system tray and notifies the user of any failed uploads, pending uploads, and paused uploads.

You must be wondering how it can save the document to the desktop from Upload Center. This is because it caches all documents that are uploaded.

You can change the maximum cache size by going to Settings. In case you are wondering, the documents are cached by MS SharePoint Workspace.

In conclusion, we can say that Upload Center is one of the best new additions to Office 2010. Now let’s hear what you have got to say on this feature. Do you think MS did a good job or is it just another feature that will soon die after the initial excitement?

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You must have heard by now that Microsoft Office 2010 will have an option to upload Word Documents, Excel Spreadsheets, and PowerPoint Presentations directly to Windows Live Skydrive.

So far nobody knows how it will look like since there has been no solid leads or screenshots. The option will only be available in the final release and is not included in Office 2010 Technical Preview(or at least this is the case with me). This makes sense since Microsoft plans to make Office Web Apps available on the Office 2010 launch date.

Luckily, Microsoft Office team gives a short hint about the functionality along with a screenshot in their official Office Web Apps Document. Point 8, titled Use Office Web Apps With Office 2010 says the following:

Open and save your documents to SkyDrive directly from within select Office 2010 client applications on your computer (via Microsoft Office Backstage view).

The screenshot provided is as follows,

Click the screenshot above to enlarge

This option can be found in the Share tab inside the Microsoft Office Backstage View. The interesting part is that not only can you upload documents to Live Skydrive but also open them directly in Office 2010.

Unless we don’t get our hands on this feature, we can’t comment much about it. But from the screenshot we can say that it organizes both User Personal Folders and Folders that Are Shared With The User. You have an option to create a new folder or refresh them. Just select the folder where you want to save the document and hit Save As, you are done. Enjoy!

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In Office 2010 the location of some of the previously inherited options are different. If you are familiar with Outlook 2007 and have recently migrated to the Office 2010 then you might be wondering about from where you can add signatures to your emails. Here are the steps to add signatures in Outlook 2010.

First of all click the Office button, and the go to Outlook > options. The Outlook Options dialogue box will be displayed.

Now click the Mail option located in the left side menu, and locate the create and modify signatures for message option in the right side main window.

Now click the Signatures button located in front of the create and modify signatures for message option. The Signatures and Stationary dialogue box will be displayed, now in order to add new signatures, click the New button.

Here add your signature’s text under the Edit signature text area and click the OK button.

Now your personal signature will appear at the end of every email you send. Enjoy!

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