What is unicode?

[George]

I just re-installed WinXP-pro on my PC, along with OutlookXP(2003)Pro with
Business Contact Manager. This time around, I noticed in setting up the
contacts database, it said I could choose (old) Outlook database (think 2002
and below), or (new) Outlook with unicode. I was wondering...

1) In layman's terms, what's unicode and what's the big deal, big selling
points as to why someone would want it.

2) I already set up my (old) Outlook...it has hundreds of contacts.
(Setting up the whole Personal Folders thing was a bear, by the way). Is
there a way to (easily) transfer my contacts from Outlook-old to
Outlook-new-with-unicode?

Thanks,
George

 

[Brian Tillman]

I just re-installed WinXP-pro on my PC, along with OutlookXP(2003)Pro
with Business Contact Manager.

Office XP contains Outlook 2002. There is no such thing as Outlook XP
(2003). I suspect you really mean Outlook 2003.

This time around, I noticed in
setting up the contacts database, it said I could choose (old)
Outlook database (think 2002 and below), or (new) Outlook with
unicode. I was wondering...
1) In layman's terms, what's unicode and what's the big deal, big
selling points as to why someone would want it.

The biggest selling point is that a Unicode PST does not have the 2 GB limit
that the earlier ANSI-format PSTs have. Out of the box, a Unicode PST can
be up to 20 GB and by adjusting registry settings it can be much large. The
theoretical limit is, I believe over 30 TB. Another selling point is that
it can contain Unicode fonts: character sets that use more than one byte for
a character, like Chinese.

2) I already set up my (old) Outlook...it has hundreds of contacts.
(Setting up the whole Personal Folders thing was a bear, by the way).

I'm not sure why, but without you describing the process you used, no one
can make any recommendations for an easier approach.

Is there a way to (easily) transfer my contacts from Outlook-old to
Outlook-new-with-unicode?

I think it's easy, though it can be tedious. Create a new PST with
FIle>New>Outlook Data File. Select "Microsoft Outlook Personal Folders File
(.pst) and click OK. Select a folder where you want the PST stored (or
accept the default), name the file (or accept the default) and click OK.
Give the PST a display name (or accept the default) and click OK.

Now, make the new PST your delivery location with the "Delivery new messages
to the following location" drop-down at the bottom left of Tools>E-mail
Accounts>Next. Stop and restart Outlook.

Now, for each NON-default folder, simply right-click and drag that folder to
the new PST root, release the mouse button and choose Copy. For each
default folder, open the folder in the old PST, select all the items with
CTRL-A, and either right-click and drag the selection to the corresponding
new default folder, choosing Copy when you release the button, or click
Edit>Copy to Folder. For the Calendar folder, you'll need to switch to a
list view before CTRL-A will select all entries.

When the copying is complete, right-click the root of the old PST and choose
Close.