Can I develop Add-In for Outlook 2003 with VS 2008?

Can I develop Add-In for Outlook 2003 with VS 2008?

Hi,

Actually I dont mind using VS 2005 or VS 2008 but neither work.
Here is my puzzling story.

I have both VS 2005 and VS 2008 installed.
I have Outlook 2003 with SP1 and I installed the 2003 PIAs.
I want to start developing Add-Ins with VSTO.
I installed the VSTO-OutlookSamples.msi to get started.

Now, when I open the samples with VS 2005 I get an error message that the 
required project type is not installed.
Indeed Project -> New in VS 2005 doesnt offer me any Office 2003 project 
templates.
So, I went and looked for the extension or whatever I need to install the 
templates in 2005.
I found vstor.exe which fails miserably to install.
First it detects a previous installation and offers me "Repair" or "Remove". 
Then, no matter which I choose causes an exception and closes. I did catch 
some message that I should try to remove the installation first from Control 
Panel, but I have no installation whose name reminds me of Visual 2005 Tools 
for Office or whatever.
Could it be that because I installed 2008 with its own VSTO support, 
vstor.exe gets confused?

Well, with that in mind, I thought - OK lets go and do the whole thing in 
2008. There I have the tools and project templates out of the box.

Indeed, I was able to open the projects, but then I got compilation errors. 
For instance.

Inside the ThisApplication class for the ShortcutBar sample, there is a 
declaration:

private Outlook.Explorers _explorers

and in ThisApplication_Startup

_explorers = this.Explorers

There is no Explorers property in ThisApplication, and obviously the 
intention here was not to assign _explorers with itself through the 
Explorers property.

So can anyone tell me what's going on?

Thanks!

David

date: Thu, 7 Aug 2008 20:59:32 +0300 author: David Sackstein

RE: Can I develop Add-In for Outlook 2003 with VS 2008?

Hi David,

When you open an Outlook project in VS 2008 that was created in a previous 
version of VS, you need to do some extra things that the VS conversion wizard 
does not do for you.  

For example, you must change all occurrences of "ThisApplication" to 
"ThisAddIn".  

I recommend taking a look at the "Outlook Projects" section of the topic " 
Upgrading and Migrating Office Solutions" at 
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/k2xkefex.aspx. 

Norm E.

"David Sackstein" wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> Actually I dont mind using VS 2005 or VS 2008 but neither work.
> Here is my puzzling story.
> 
> I have both VS 2005 and VS 2008 installed.
> I have Outlook 2003 with SP1 and I installed the 2003 PIAs.
> I want to start developing Add-Ins with VSTO.
> I installed the VSTO-OutlookSamples.msi to get started.
> 
> Now, when I open the samples with VS 2005 I get an error message that the 
> required project type is not installed.
> Indeed Project -> New in VS 2005 doesnt offer me any Office 2003 project 
> templates.
> So, I went and looked for the extension or whatever I need to install the 
> templates in 2005.
> I found vstor.exe which fails miserably to install.
> First it detects a previous installation and offers me "Repair" or "Remove". 
> Then, no matter which I choose causes an exception and closes. I did catch 
> some message that I should try to remove the installation first from Control 
> Panel, but I have no installation whose name reminds me of Visual 2005 Tools 
> for Office or whatever.
> Could it be that because I installed 2008 with its own VSTO support, 
> vstor.exe gets confused?
> 
> Well, with that in mind, I thought - OK lets go and do the whole thing in 
> 2008. There I have the tools and project templates out of the box.
> 
> Indeed, I was able to open the projects, but then I got compilation errors. 
> For instance.
> 
> Inside the ThisApplication class for the ShortcutBar sample, there is a 
> declaration:
> 
> private Outlook.Explorers _explorers
> 
> and in ThisApplication_Startup
> 
> _explorers = this.Explorers
> 
> There is no Explorers property in ThisApplication, and obviously the 
> intention here was not to assign _explorers with itself through the 
> Explorers property.
> 
> So can anyone tell me what's going on?
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> David
> 
> 
> 
> 
>

date: Thu, 7 Aug 2008 11:36:00 -0700 author: Norm Estabrook

Re: Can I develop Add-In for Outlook 2003 with VS 2008?

222 8942 <#Ml6URN#IHA.5392@TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl>

Hi Norm,
Thanks. Instead of "this.Explorers", I changed to 
"this.Application.Explorers" as instructed by the article.
Thank you very much, it works, now!
David

"Norm Estabrook"  wrote in message 
news:45B19E3A-2DF5-463E-A9F9-612E43FE0DF6@microsoft.com...
> Hi David,
>
> When you open an Outlook project in VS 2008 that was created in a previous
> version of VS, you need to do some extra things that the VS conversion 
> wizard
> does not do for you.
>
> For example, you must change all occurrences of "ThisApplication" to
> "ThisAddIn".
>
> I recommend taking a look at the "Outlook Projects" section of the topic "
> Upgrading and Migrating Office Solutions" at
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/k2xkefex.aspx.
>
> Norm E.
>
> "David Sackstein" wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> Actually I dont mind using VS 2005 or VS 2008 but neither work.
>> Here is my puzzling story.
>>
>> I have both VS 2005 and VS 2008 installed.
>> I have Outlook 2003 with SP1 and I installed the 2003 PIAs.
>> I want to start developing Add-Ins with VSTO.
>> I installed the VSTO-OutlookSamples.msi to get started.
>>
>> Now, when I open the samples with VS 2005 I get an error message that the
>> required project type is not installed.
>> Indeed Project -> New in VS 2005 doesnt offer me any Office 2003 project
>> templates.
>> So, I went and l

date: Fri, 8 Aug 2008 00:26:54 +0300 author: David Sackstein