Email Address "Display As" Headache

[JVroom]

Hi,

I have a Contacts subfolder call "accountants"

I'm using the "Phone List" view

I've added the field "E-mail Display As" field as well as the "E-mail" field
to the Phone List view.

(FYI: Contacts were initially imported from a CSV file)

When I open a contact...the contact records "E-mail Dispay As" field
correctly shows properly formatted "E-mail Display As" value" - [Contact Name
(email address)]

How can I get the "E-mail Display As" field to show the proper "E-mail
Display As" text in the phone list view?

I noticed that if I open a Contact...cut the email address ...clear the
email and email display as field then past the email address back into the
email field and press tab a couple of times, the Email Display As" field is
recreated, but after I save the record the "Email Display As" value does show
properly in the Phone List view.

However, I have hundreds/thousands of records/contacts and I can't go
through that process on an individual basis.

Any ideas how I can get outlook to show the Email Display As data in the
Phone List View (Yes the E-mail Display As data field has been added to the
view...it just isn't displaying the data in the field...all contacts/record
have an empty/blank value)

Wierd?

 

[Russ Valentine]

Karl may have a fix for this, but I'm guessing you're out of luck. One of
the many problems with importing Contact data is that the derived fields,
such as "Email Display As" or "File As" behave unpredictably. There may be
some code you can run to repair those fields, but I don't know of any for
the "Email Display As" field. As you've pointed out quite correctly,
recreating the Contact will allow the field to be derived correctly, but
that's hardly a solution.
Just curious. Since you can display all the information you need in the
Phone List view, why does it matter whether the "Email Display As" field is
correct?

 

[Karl Timmermans]

Would offer a solution to the core problem as to why the data isn't
displaying correctly but my EDA's in phone view (which is my own personal
default view for contacts) works the way it should so have no explanation.

Just to get the simple stuff out of the way, one of the functions of
ContactGenie Toolkit is Email DisplayAs standardization
http://www.contactgenie.com/cgtoolkit.htm) which includes a number of
pre-defined formats for EDA outside of the standard format - however, if
someone changes the email address for a contact - Outlook is going to change
the value of the EDA - there is no way to stop that short of having an addin
monitoring specific fields.

A few things to keep in mind....

#1 - How the EDA field gets populated (and/or changed) also depends on what
is doing the changing - what are "derived" fields under the Outlook object
model - are not necessarily "derived" if various fields are populated
independently of Outlook but suspect most people reading this newsgroup are
only going to be concerned with Outlook itself

#2 - The Outlook UI and the Outlook import process are 2 different animals
and not all the same rules applied within the UI are followed via the
Outlook import process (FileAs being one example).

#3 - In the Outlook UI - if the email address changes - the EDA changes. If
only the name changes - EDA doesn't change. You can type anything you want
into the EDA and it will remain - until the email address gets changed at
which point whatever is present in the EDA field gets replaced.

#4 - If there are no addins that impact any of the core Outlook fields -
Outlook will never change anything on its own "out of the blue" - there will
always be some action that has been taken by the user to cause the change -
no exceptions. The reason may not be readily apparent but guaranteed that at
the end of the day - there will be a reason.

Having said all of the above - can't speak to the issue of "views" and
things getting corrupted etc - not something I focus on - just know that my
own stuff works the way it's suppose to. Other's more versed with views and
what can and cannot occur may have some insight as to other potential
possibilities for the appearance of things changing "adhoc"

Karl
____________________________________________________________
Karl Timmermans - The Claxton Group
ContactGenie - Importer/DataPorter/Exporter/Toolkit/Duplicate Contact Mgr
"Contact import/export/data management tools for Outlook '2000/2007"
http://www.contactgenie.com

Karl may have a fix for this, but I'm guessing you're out of luck. One of
the many problems with importing Contact data is that the derived fields,
such as "Email Display As" or "File As" behave unpredictably. There may be
some code you can run to repair those fields, but I don't know of any for
the "Email Display As" field. As you've pointed out quite correctly,
recreating the Contact will allow the field to be derived correctly, but
that's hardly a solution.
Just curious. Since you can display all the information you need in the
Phone List view, why does it matter whether the "Email Display As" field
is correct?
--
Russ Valentine

Hi,

I have a Contacts subfolder call "accountants"

I'm using the "Phone List" view

I've added the field "E-mail Display As" field as well as the "E-mail"
field
to the Phone List view.

(FYI: Contacts were initially imported from a CSV file)

When I open a contact...the contact records "E-mail Dispay As" field
correctly shows properly formatted "E-mail Display As" value" - [Contact
Name
(email address)]

How can I get the "E-mail Display As" field to show the proper "E-mail
Display As" text in the phone list view?

I noticed that if I open a Contact...cut the email address ...clear the
email and email display as field then past the email address back into
the
email field and press tab a couple of times, the Email Display As" field
is
recreated, but after I save the record the "Email Display As" value does
show
properly in the Phone List view.

However, I have hundreds/thousands of records/contacts and I can't go
through that process on an individual basis.

Any ideas how I can get outlook to show the Email Display As data in the
Phone List View (Yes the E-mail Display As data field has been added to
the
view...it just isn't displaying the data in the field...all
contacts/record
have an empty/blank value)

Wierd?