The Fastest Way to Save OE Attachments - Snagging and saving

I am a snagger. I can't help myself. I love the graphics and accessories that come to me through shares groups. PSPers often say that most of their time is spent looking for the right graphic instead of working with it. It's a nightmare if your files aren't organized.

I use Outlook Express in Windowx XP. One of its shortcomings is how OE tries to save files to My Documents and My Pictures. For a snagger, those folders are junk drawers. I used to procrastinate the job of saving and organizing the files I get in OE because it was so much work. After 2 years of snagging, I figured out how to easily save and organize OE's attachments

First things first. Make sure OE is set up with message rules so that your shares groups emails are auto sorted into folders. Ms_Aster has written a beautiful tutorial on how to set up folders to organize the heavy load of email. You can find her tut here. It's easier to read your email it's organized to begin with. I create a folder for each group and individuals I email regularly.

Create a folder on your C:\ drive. Yup, right in the root directory. Name it something you will be able to find easily and keep the name short and sweet. Mine is C:\Shares. Distinguish it from your other work, group activities, etc. Open it and make sub-folders for the types of files you save; tubes, masks, brushes, jpgs, etc. Toss in a misc folder for things that you don't know what else to do with.

Later, you can create more subfolders to organize the file types and move these folders to your PSP directory. For now, the idea is to quickly move and organize your OE attachments.

Open OE and the shares folder you just made. Switch to thumbnail view in your shares folder so you can see your folders and files.

Double click on an email to open it in a new window in one of your group folders. Best to start at the top of the list. Minimize OE and keep the shares folder and the email window open. At the bottom of your screen, right click on the taskbar and choose Tile Windows Vertically.

Adjust the two windows so that the email and your shares folder are lined up together and fill up your screen. Make sure that the Delete X in OE is showing, because that's one handy tool. Below is a screen shot of my setup.

Click and hold the attachment in OE and drag it and drop it on top of the folder you want to save the attachment in. You will recognize the file type by its icon and extension. In the example below, the attachment is a tube.

As soon as you have saved the attachment, delete the email and if you are working with a list of emails, the next email will open in its place. When you reach the end of the list, the window automatically closes.

You can also make a folder to save the entire email. Restore OE and tile it vertically with your folders window (same as above.)

Drag and drop your email onto your saved email folder and delete it from OE.

The emptier you keep your OE folders, the smoother and faster it will run.

Happy housecleaning!

Back to Activities