As promised, I hereby present to you a utility program to minimize Vista’s Windows Mail to the tray icon. For those who are not familiar with Windows Vista, Vista actually comes with a new mail manager application - Windows Mail. This mail manager does come with a lot of imporvements over Outlook. However, one important feature is missing - minimize to tray.

I did a Google search for help and came up with one WinMailTray by Kristan Kenney. It did a very good job until I realised that it is actually more of a shortcut than a minimized tray icon. Even though the icon is in the tray, Windows Mail will not check for any new mails at every set interval. When Windows Mail is minimized, it is actually not running. And thus the reason why new mails will not automatically be retrieved even though WinMailTray is running.

So the solution, make one myself. Using AutoIt v3.2.12.1 on my Vista x64 rig. And the result is this:

Vista Mail Tray (64-bit) v0.0.0.7
(IMPORTANT! Read the following notes below.)

Vista Mail Tray (32-bit) v0.0.0.7
(IMPORTANT! Read the following notes below.)

How to use Vista Mail Tray:

1. Download the correct version (32 or 64 bit) for your system
2. The file doe NOT contain any virus/malware/whatever. But anyway, you can always scan the file at VirusTotal. Judge for yourself if those are real virus or just false alarms.
3. Extract the file to any folder on your Vista computer. (C:\Program Files\Vista Mail Tray\Vista Mail Tray.exe would be a good choice.)
4. If you want this utility to run every time Windows starts, create a Vista Mail Tray.exe shortcut in your Startup folder.
5. To use, left click on the Windows Mail icon in the system tray to start/show or minimize Windows Mail. Right click to view menu.
6. Have fun!

Notes:

1. This program is provided for free, but all rights are still reserved by me. In other words, I still own rights to this program.
2. You DO NOT have the right to redistribute this program. Your friends need it? Link them here to this page (http://www.chewybyte.net/home-computing/tray-icon-vista-windows-mail.html)
3. Use at your own risks. I will and shall not be held liable to any loss or damages resulting from the use of this program.
4. These zipped files are protected with the phase www.chewybyte.net
   

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- Written on Monday, November 24, 2008 15:22 - 1 Comment -