Contact Groups in Windows Mail

**Brink** · 06-10-2007

How to Create and Use a Contact Group in Vista

...

Click here to read the entire tutorial

**Brink** · 04-27-2008

Emilio,

You should be able to backup your contacts and contact groups from your C:\Users\(user name)\Contacts folder. You can manually copy them to something like a DVD or USB flash drive to do this.

Hope this helps,
Shawn

**Brink** · 04-27-2008

	Quote:	adisonsmum
	okay .. have tried all the options available but still seem to be having the same prob on FIL's peice of junk vista laptop! (sorry vista fans!). Have set WM as a default, BUT when I try and create a new contact in the mai list (or modify and existing one). It goes to bring up the screen BUT the screen doesnt come up - it goes to come up and then dissappears! any other ideas ? I am at FIL's place for another 48 hrs and then wont see them or this stupid lappy for 2 months or more so would like it fixed before then. .. and dont think I havent thought about reformatting the whole damn machine!! or swapping him over to OE

Hi AdisonsMum,

Double check to make sure that Windows Contacts has all of it's default associations set to it to see if that will help.

Default Programs

Shawn

Emilio2000 · 04-28-2008

Thanks, Brink for your suggestion to COPY all Contacts, instead of Exporting them (as I used to do with the Windows Address Book). So, it seems that when I want to synchronize the Contact lists on 2 computers, there is no way to merge the COPIED contacts from one computer with the existing Contacts on the other computer.

Instead, the only way I can figure it is to designate one computer to be the main one for Contacts, and then periodically simply COPY all the Contacts onto the other computer, replacing all the existing Contacts on that other computer. It's not perfect, but this should work for me.

By the way, I still terribly miss the ability to see which Groups a person belongs to. When someone emails me, saying: "Please remove me from your mailing list", I have no idea which of the many mailing lists he/she is talking about. He/she may be in more than one Group. I have to check them all to make sure the person is removed from each of the Groups I may have set him/her up on.

I can't understand how Microsoft can claim that Windows Mail retains all the features of Outlook Express, when it obviously doesn't.

Another Outlook Express feature I miss is the ability to copy someone's email address directly from the Summary tab (when someone asks me for an email address). The ability to copy that email address has been disabled. I can only look at it, but I cannot highlight it or copy it. Even right-clicking on the email address in the Summary tab doesn't do anything! Instead, I have to go to the "Name and Email" tag, and click on EDIT, pretending I am about to edit the email address, and only then can I highlight it and copy it. It may seem like only a minor annoyance having to do a few extra clicks, but it can be a big annoyance if you have to do it a lot (which I do).

I hope Microsoft is paying attention to this Forum, and may fix things in the next version of Windows. Bring back all the Outlook Express features that were left out of Windows Mail. Why did they have to mess with a good thing to begin with?

**Brink** · 04-28-2008

Your welcome Emilio,

It would be nice to have a easier way to search through the contact groups.

Shawn

3.0Liter · 4 Weeks Ago

Help! Is it possible to send emails to multiple contacts (but not ALL contacts) in a Vista Windows Mail Contract Group?

I just spent about an hour beating my head in trying to setup Vista Mail on a friends new desktop machine and they couldn't believe that there 7 year old desktop with OE supports "Email Groups" where they could pick a Group from a LOV and then select multiple contacts from the Group to send an email to.

As far as I can tell Contact Groups in WM are simply renamed Distribution Lists since from the frustrating hour I spent fighting with it you can ONLY send an email to the ENTIRE Contact Group (unless you select a single contact as shown in the first post).

I even downloaded the free trial version of Outlook 2007 and it was same thing!!! I'm absolutely baffled how musty old OE has more features than Vista's WM?!?!

The closest hacked up workaround I could provide my friend was to create a regular folder in Contacts Manager and then copy all of the email addresses they wanted to group together. That way he could Click on Contacts, select the folder, select specific email addresses in the folder, right click and select "Send Email". The only problem with that is it doesn't directly support forwarding emails. In that case he has to then drag and drop the email he wants to forward into the body of the email which sends the forwarded email as an attachment. <sigh>

Its days like to today that make me thankful I still use Windows XP/MCE on my work and home PC's!

**Brink** · 4 Weeks Ago

Hello 3.0Liter, and welcome to Vista Forums.

I couldn't agree with you more. You might give the free Windows Live Mail a try instead. It's contact manager is a lot easier to work with and should allow you to easily do what you are wanting.

Windows Live Suite Downloads

Hope this helps,
Shawn

tiger777 · 15 Hours Ago

	Quote:	Emilio2000
	I have over 20 different Groups set up in my Address Book. In the good old Outlook Express Address Book, I could open a Contact and in the "Other" tab, I could see a list of all the Groups that the person belongs to. In Windows Mail Contacts. I successfully imported all my Contacts and Groups. But. is there a way to find out which Groups a person belongs to? It's too time consuming to manually search through each of my 20 groups. The Help section claims that Windows Mail has all the features of Outlook Express. but the list of Groups a person belongs to is obviously missing. It looks like Microsoft is selling us a degraded product ("Address Book Minus" instead of "Address Book Plus") and is calling that an improvement!!!! HA! Please prove me wrong. Show me that I can display a list of Groups for each person. I rely heavily on Groups. Just for example, if I have multiple entries for the same person (with different email addresses), I can tell which one is the most current by looking at which email address is part of a recently set up Group. If Microsoft Mail is unable to show me a list of Groups for any one individual Contact, is there a way I can continue using Outlook Express under Windows Vista Ultimate x64? Emilio

Wonder if you have found some solution for your problem...
I have the same misfortune: many groups, but the membership is no longer listed in the individual contact file, as it was in WindowsXP...

the other thing is: is it possible to export contact groups,
from Vista Mail to Outlook...?
It seems the contact groups do not remain intact....
there must be a way...
who can help?

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06-10-2007
Brink Administrator	Contact Groups in Windows Mail How to Create and Use a Contact Group in Vista ... Click here to read the entire tutorial

04-27-2008
Brink Administrator	Re: Contact Groups in Windows Mail Emilio, You should be able to backup your contacts and contact groups from your C:\Users\(user name)\Contacts folder. You can manually copy them to something like a DVD or USB flash drive to do this. Hope this helps, Shawn

04-28-2008
Emilio2000 Newbie	Re: Contact Groups in Windows Mail Thanks, Brink for your suggestion to COPY all Contacts, instead of Exporting them (as I used to do with the Windows Address Book). So, it seems that when I want to synchronize the Contact lists on 2 computers, there is no way to merge the COPIED contacts from one computer with the existing Contacts on the other computer. Instead, the only way I can figure it is to designate one computer to be the main one for Contacts, and then periodically simply COPY all the Contacts onto the other computer, replacing all the existing Contacts on that other computer. It's not perfect, but this should work for me. By the way, I still terribly miss the ability to see which Groups a person belongs to. When someone emails me, saying: "Please remove me from your mailing list", I have no idea which of the many mailing lists he/she is talking about. He/she may be in more than one Group. I have to check them all to make sure the person is removed from each of the Groups I may have set him/her up on. I can't understand how Microsoft can claim that Windows Mail retains all the features of Outlook Express, when it obviously doesn't. Another Outlook Express feature I miss is the ability to copy someone's email address directly from the Summary tab (when someone asks me for an email address). The ability to copy that email address has been disabled. I can only look at it, but I cannot highlight it or copy it. Even right-clicking on the email address in the Summary tab doesn't do anything! Instead, I have to go to the "Name and Email" tag, and click on EDIT, pretending I am about to edit the email address, and only then can I highlight it and copy it. It may seem like only a minor annoyance having to do a few extra clicks, but it can be a big annoyance if you have to do it a lot (which I do). I hope Microsoft is paying attention to this Forum, and may fix things in the next version of Windows. Bring back all the Outlook Express features that were left out of Windows Mail. Why did they have to mess with a good thing to begin with?

4 Weeks Ago
3.0Liter Newbie	Re: Contact Groups in Windows Mail Help! Is it possible to send emails to multiple contacts (but not ALL contacts) in a Vista Windows Mail Contract Group? I just spent about an hour beating my head in trying to setup Vista Mail on a friends new desktop machine and they couldn't believe that there 7 year old desktop with OE supports "Email Groups" where they could pick a Group from a LOV and then select multiple contacts from the Group to send an email to. As far as I can tell Contact Groups in WM are simply renamed Distribution Lists since from the frustrating hour I spent fighting with it you can ONLY send an email to the ENTIRE Contact Group (unless you select a single contact as shown in the first post). I even downloaded the free trial version of Outlook 2007 and it was same thing!!! I'm absolutely baffled how musty old OE has more features than Vista's WM?!?! The closest hacked up workaround I could provide my friend was to create a regular folder in Contacts Manager and then copy all of the email addresses they wanted to group together. That way he could Click on Contacts, select the folder, select specific email addresses in the folder, right click and select "Send Email". The only problem with that is it doesn't directly support forwarding emails. In that case he has to then drag and drop the email he wants to forward into the body of the email which sends the forwarded email as an attachment. <sigh> Its days like to today that make me thankful I still use Windows XP/MCE on my work and home PC's!