OPEN OUTLOOK WITH MULTIPLE VIEWS

It's been a while since I literally work a desk job, i.e. sitting at a desk with my own phone extension, a computer monitor, drawers for my own stuff etc.  I started a new job about a month ago and that's exactly what came with the job.  I now also have two monitors to work with, a great thing to have to meet today's work demand.  One monitor for email, the other for the web etc.  With two monitors, I rarely need to print things out, just put the things to compare side by side.

One thing I love to do is have my programs run as soon as I log in.  Outlook, Chrome, Windows Explorer, a DOS box, etc. stuff that I would launch sooner or later.  As I now have two monitors to use, I started the habit of having up to three views of Outlook while using it.  Most people have Outlook show them their email then switch to the Calendar view when needed and switch back afterward.  Instead of just clicking on Calendar, if you right-click on it there's an option to open the Calendar in a new window.  I do that, also for Notes.  Nice to have Mail, Calendar, and Notes up and ready, just a click away, without having to switch back and forth with Mail.

I already have Outlook starts up along with other programs but it only opens the Mail view.  I knew there must be some command line switch I can use but at first there seems to be none.  (FYI, most, if not all, programs that you use in Windows is actually a pretty icon on the front, behind it is some filename that ends in .exe and such that you can type to start the program.)  I did come across this link, https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/command-line-switches-for-microsoft-office-products-079164cd-4ef5-4178-b235-441737deb3a6#ID0EAABAAA=Outlook but it wasn't so obvious.  Ultimately, it was the /select foldername option but the use of the word foldername threw me off.  I think of folders as those things I created in my Inbox to keep things tidy.  I have one for my boss, one for some news subscription, etc, with matching Rules to filter the incoming mail into them.  I am lucky now that I don't have many email message to wade through but if needed I can easily find my boss' email because he has his own folder.  But folder the way Outlook sees it, per the Microsoft link anyway, is what I think of as View.  So what I have now are three separate commands:

c:\program files\microsoft office\office15\outlook.exe" /select outlook:Mail

c:\program files\microsoft office\office15\outlook.exe" /select outlook:Calendar

c:\program files\microsoft office\office15\outlook.exe" /select outlook:Notes

The exact path to Outlook.exe may be different for you, depending on whether you use the same Office version etc.  I already have an Outlook shortcut in my Startup folder, set to the Mail View, so I copied it twice, then edit the path to use outlook:Calendar and outlook:Notes.  Voila!  As soon as I log in, I have the three "Views" opened for me.  

WORD BLITZ - PLAY WITH NON-FRIENDS

My current favorite word game is Word Blitz by Lotum, usually played through Facebook's relatively new game engine.  It's basically a Boggle clone, i.e. you have a grid of letters to work with, connect the letters to form words in the allocated two minutes, in a race against an opponent.  Like most word games, the words you form don't necessarily have useful daily usage, but rather it depends on the letters' assigned points, not unlike Scrabble.

One strange thing with the Facebook version is that you don't get to randomly play against opponents, not easily anyway.  You either drag many of your friends into the fray or earn some Hearts, whether through a timing system or by watching video ads, so that you can play in a tournament.  I suppose that's how they primarily make money, eyeballs supposedly exposed to advertisements.  While the game is popular, many people have a hard time convincing friends to play the game.  Waiting around to have enough Hearts to be able to enter a tournament is a pain.  A popular request in some Facebook groups for players of Word Blitz is that they need friends to play with.  There is no obvious way to play with people who are not already a friend in the Facebook world.  But it is true that you don't need to be a friend of someone to be able to challenge them to a game.

The trick is you first need to make a connection with a player via Facebook Messenger, which is the messaging system in the Facebook ecosystem.  Anyone can send a private message to anyone via Messenger, unless one party doesn't like the other and already blocked them.  When you see someone say, "I need someone to play me!", go to their profile and send them a message, something like "Let us play Word Blitz!"

Next launch Word Blitz and scroll down the Leaderboard, all the way down to the bottom of the list to find the Invite entry.  In the screenshot below, I scrawled over people I am friend with to give them some privacy.  Click on the plus sign next to Invite.

Scroll a bit down to find the list of people who you recently exchanged messages in Messenger.  It can be a friend or in this case, the non-friend that you just verbally challenged to a game.  That challenge of course was nothing more than to establish a link, so that that person would show up in the list after you clicked the plus sign in the screen before.  Click Play.

That's it!  That's how you can play people who are not friends with you on Facebook.  Personally, I do this from time to time.  People would send me friend request for the sole purpose of having an opponent.  It is so unnecessary once you know this way.  Not straightforward, but it works.  I'd rather just play someone this way instead of having to see people's posts in my feed.