Creating a Public Journal for Microsoft Outlook

A major shortcoming in Microsoft Outlook + Microsoft Exchange Server is the lack of an obvious method for creating publicly accessible journal entries for contact records kept in a public folder. Below you'll find an explanation of the problem and some possible approaches developed by the Exchange/Outlook community.

Outlook/Exchange presents three obstacles to creating a public journal:

1. Automatic journaling takes place only for contacts in your mailbox Contacts folder.
2. When you manually create a journal entry for a public folder contact, the journal item goes into the Journal folder in your mailbox, not into a public Journal folder.
3. When you view the Journal tab on a Contact record, it shows only items in the Journal folder in your mailbox. In Outlook 97 and Outlook 98, you cannot view Journal entries in a public folder through a Contact, only by directly opening that folder. You can, of course, group or filter the items by Contact to make it a useful view.

Keep these issues in mind as you review the possible solutions