One of my favourite Windows 7 gadgets is the Outlook Appointments gadget. As gadgets go it’s pretty simple: it shows me upcoming appointments. From Outlook.
But oddly, only when Outlook is open.
Anyhow, when I upgraded Microsoft Office from 2007 to 2010 a couple of weeks ago I discovered that it no longer worked … it just complained that it didn’t have the correct version of Outlook installed.
The hack
But there is a simple hack:
- Make sure that you can view hidden and system files (Control Panel > Folder Options > under View tab select “Show hidden files, folders, or drives”).
- Close the Outlook upcoming appointments gadget.
- In Windows Explorer navigate to C:\Users\YOURNAME\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Sidebar\Gadgets\OutlookAppointmentsGadget.gadget\en-US\js\” where YOURNAME is the name of your user account.
- Open the file “outlook.vbs” with Notepad (or other text editor; personally I wouldn’t use WordPad).
- On lines 22 and 42 change the two occurrences of the number “12” to “14”.
- Save the file.
- Open the Outlook Appointments gadget again.
Outlook Tasks gadget
The same hack also works for the “Outlook Tasks” gadget.
Update
It looks like someone has released pre-hacked versions of Appointments and Tasks called iOutlook which work with Outlook 2010. The iOutlook Appointments one now offers 3, 5 or 10 appointments.
Hi Gareth
Thanks for hack. Only thing now is to get it working without outlook open as I have a mail filter.
Regards
Gary
nice! that did the trick 🙂
shame on microsoft on not updating this themselves! 😉
it is line number 22 and 45 actually……
and it worked thanks……..
@Tushar — it was 22 and 42 on the version I hacked, but glad you got it working.
nice and simply. Great “how to” Thanks!
Pure Awesome!
Thanks for the hack, worked like a charm. 🙂
Sad that they hard code that stuff in there.
Nice Work Gareth. Thanks for sharing!
just a concern. i have followed your algorithm but after i open the “js”, i didn’t see “outlook.vbs”
Thanks
Hey–thanks a bunch for this great and easy fix!
Looks like MS have retired hosting gadgets and I would like to get my hands on this. Can anyone point me in the right direction or send a me mail. Thanks.
Hi Gareth. I know there was a mod for this, but when last I set up my computer, I didn’t write down the details so I had to go poking around.
Thanks for keeping this old post active.
BTW, the latest/greatest MS Office is up to “16” now, so that is what you need to the .vbs file.
Cheers