My company's mail server doesn't allow me to set up an out of office notification and I am trying to find a work around.

On my next trip I plan on leaving my laptop running - but I am not sure what program I can use to do an out of office notification. I use Outlook 2003, but it doesn't appear to allow me to set up a rule to send back a message. I have also played with Thunderbird - no luck.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Outlook's "Out of Office Assistant" is only available when you're using an Exchange server.

For Thunderbird, the options are here. Nothing quick and easy, though.

We don't have an exchange server and I tried to get through the Thunderbird program - but just haven't been able to get it working.

Any other programs?

You can do it in Outlook using the rules wizard.

First, create a new template that will say what you want to say in the reply. Start a new message, type "I will be out of the office...." into the message body, select File, Save As, change the file type to Outlook Template, and give it a name and save. Cancel the message.

From the main Outlook menu do the following

Tools
Rules Wizard
New
Check Messages When They Arrive - Next
Don't check any boxes - Next (you get question about applying to all msgs - click OK)
Check "Reply using a specific template.
Click the underlined "Specific Template" in the lower pane.
Change "Look in" to User Templates and select the one you just created.
Add any exceptions and finish.

This will require Outlook to be running on your computer to work. Also it will reply to every message you receive from someone - the standard out of office assistant only sends it the first time you get a message from someone. Could cause an interesting loop if two people have the same rule set.

Exactly and if your companies server sends it directly to your outlook (not another mid program) you do NOT have to have your computer on for it to work (for most people they are sending an away message because they arent there so their puter wouldnt be on.

You only need the puter on if outlook has to pull from another program.

You can also use rules to forward your email to another email system (I have 4 differnt emails and use rules to send three of them to the 4th one so I can answer all of them via one software).

BTW groupwise also has the same functionality and even some native email software programs like hoarde do this also.

Please do not do this.

People in our office were doing this and eventually one of the messages hits a mzilbos that is full, bad address, whatever. It sends back an error message, and your system sends out your message again. Over and over, thousands of messages until either your box gets full, or you crash your server.

I don't allow automatic replies from our server anymore because of this, it's a nightmare to track down, because restarting the server will only cause it to happen again. When they get to checking the outbound que, if they are smart enough, you will have thousands of messages in there lines up, and they won't be happy.

There are two people in my company. We have our domain hosted by a third party (HostLane). So, I get my mail in Outlook directly from their server or remotely through their site. I can go into our hosting website and set an out of office reply, but I have the same problem with all messages being included. Can I configure this somehow to limit it to the first message, or is this only through Exchange?

I agree that an out of office reply that sends the message repeatedly is useless.

Sam

I contacted the host via chat:

Nikita: Hello. You have successfully connected to your technical services operator. Please wait one moment while I verify and review your information.

Nikita: One moment. I will check it.

Nikita: Yes. You may create an autoresponder which is in the Easy mail setup. The autoresponders tab.

Sam: I know how to set it up, but can I limit it being sent to each person only once, or is that option only available through Microsoft Exchange?

Nikita: It should be sent as a reply to the each e-mail. And you can not limit it as far as I know.

Sam: Thanks.

I don't see a way to modify the rules wizard to only send one reply per person. I don't know how the exchange server tracks it, just that it does. I also like the reminder to turn it off when it sees I am back in the office.

Could you just send a pre-emptive e-mail to important contacts to let them know you will be out?