Determining if the Digitally Sign button is depressed

[Mike.N.Roy]

I understand that it is essentially impossible to add buttons, etc to
the msoCommandBar in the Envelope object of an Outlook Inspector when
Word is being used as the editor. What I need to do is simply
determine if one of these buttons is in the "down" state or selected.
It seems that I cannot access the buttons in the Envelope as I would
normally with the FindControlObj() method. I have searched the
Inspector object and the MailItem and I cannot find where this
attribute is stored.

So, the question basically boils down to: Is it possible to determine
if a MailItem has the "Digitally Sign" button checked when using
WordMail.

I have no problem doing this when not using WordMail. I just read the
ButtonState of that particular button in the MailItem.Send event and
determine it is pressed. It is easy because in the non-WordMail
Inspector, the button is located in the Standard toolbar.

I can't seem to find a property of an Inspector or MailItem that
represents if Digitally Sign is selected.

Thanks

 

[Mike.N.Roy]

I failed to specify my development environment. I am writing VSTO
addins for Office 2003/2007 using C# and VB. I have tried OutlookSpy,
Spy++, Procmon, etc, etc, to try and find any trace of where the
Inspector or MailItem store the fact of whether "Digitally Sign" has
been selected when WordMail is being used.

Thanks

 

[Ken Slovak - [MVP - Outlook]]

Since both of your questions relate to the same thing I'm answering here.
Also, please include part of the preceding thread so people know what you're
talking about.

You can see if what you want can be done by iterating the CommandBars
collection of the Word Document object represented by the WordEditor object
of the Inspector and digging down to where that control is located, then
reading the State property of the control.

If that doesn't work then it cannot be done.

 

[Mike.N.Roy]

Ken,

Thanks, I had hoped that wasn't going to be it. I have tried numerous
times to enumerate the built in command bars of the envelope in
WordMail but I have been unable to access them. I only get back the
Mainmenu bar, not the "Standard" bar. I have no problem getting all of
the other toolbars, just not Standard. Do you know of a method to just
read the built-in command bar from the Envelope when WordMail is the
editor? I was hoping that there was a property buried somewhere, like
Importance, that captured the need for the MailItem to be digitally
signed. It would seem that since the email is not signed until after
the MailItem's Send event fires, then there must be some attribute on
the MailItem that tells Outlook to sign it.

Let's look at it from the other point of view: if within Outlook I
wanted to programmatically create an email (MailItem) from scratch and
tell Outlook to Digitally Sign it before it is sent, what would I need
to do? Is there a flag or method built into the MailItem or Inspector
that lets Outlook know to sign the message before it is sent?

I have tried OutlookSpy and code like the following to get the built-
in toolbar, but no luck.

Dim word = CType(Me.Inspector.WordEditor, Word.Document)

For Each i As CommandBar In word.CommandBars
For Each c As CommandBarControl In i.Controls
'check the control name, caption etc.



I have also tried monitoring the PropertyChanged and
CustomPropertyChanged events but they don't pickup when you change the
state of the button.

I appreciate the help.

 

[Ken Slovak - [MVP - Outlook]]

I know of no way to access anything much in the Envelope object. Some MAPI
property being changed or set if the button is depressed might not be true
unless the item is saved. I'd think then the MessageClass would be changed,
but I don't work with signed messages very often.

It's possible that MS has internal ways to get at that information that
aren't exposed to the outside world, just like certain CommandBarControls
can't be used by outside code. If it's not exposed in the controls listed in
OutlookSpy then it's inaccessible.

In a true Outlook item I'd read the button State from the Standard toolbar.
Since the toolbar is provided by Office changes to CommandBar controls don't
set any Outlook properties natively. That would have to be coded using
control events.