Using filters and the People pane

- [Narrator] Outlook has a few neat options to quickly find an email that's different than directly searching for it. The first way, is by using filters. From the home ribbon tab I can select filter email on the top right hand side of the screen. This is a very quick way to filter my inbox based on certain criteria. For example, I can only read unread messages, or I can only view messages that have attachments. I can also filter the view by date. If I hover my mouse over the arrow, I can see that I could choose to view only today's mail, mail that came in yesterday, this week, this month, or so on.

I can view any messages that have been categorized, and we'll learn how to use those later, messages that are flagged high priority, and I can also click more filters to get a more extensive list of fields that I can filter by. I'm going to hover my mouse over this week, and I'll choose today's mail. This is a great filter to use at the end of the day to make sure you haven't missed any important messages. When you're done with your filter you can click the X in the search bar at the top of the message list to return back to your full inbox. Another method of searching for important messages is by using the find related tool with an email selected in the view.

I can right click with my mouse, hover over find related, and then choose either find related messages in this conversation or messages from sender. I'll select messages from sender and it opens up a search box with that name already populated. I didn't have to do any typing and I could quickly find all the messages from Leslie. I'll click the X again, out of the search box and the last method also involves finding related messages. It uses something called the people pane, and to turn that on change to the view ribbon tab, select people pane all the way to the right, and choose normal.

It's going to open up a new pane in the bottom right hand side, giving important details about the person that you are conversing with. I have a tabbed interface on the left hand side, clicking all will show you all items related to that person. I can change to the mail tab, just to see email messages, I can click attachments to see any attachments that person has sent me, and any meetings that I may have with that person that are on my calendar. Leslie sends me a lot of attachments, so if I need to find an attachment from Leslie quickly, this would definitely be the quickest way that I could find that attachment.

If I kept this pane open, I can also see any emails that she sent me and I can click on the emails themselves to get right to it. I'll close out of this email. If the people pane is taking up too much room on your screen you can hover your mouse over the horizontal line and click and drag to make it larger or smaller. I can also minimize it by clicking the triangle on the top right hand side of the people pane. This is useful because it doesn't take up any additional room, but whenever you need to bring it up you can click directly inside and it will pop right up and you can find what you're looking for.

Between the people pane, right clicking to find related items, and using filters from the home ribbon tab you'll always be able to find the email that you're looking for, and you'll never have to worry about missing any particular emails.