Customize Outlook’s Map Link

For Outlook 2000/2002, Outlook 2007, and Outlook 2010. This does not work with Outlook 2003.

One useful but often forgotten feature of Outlook’s Contacts is the ability to map the contact’s address using MapPoint on CD or through a web site if MapPoint is not installed.

When you need a map of a contact’s address, open a contact and press the Display Map button to connect to a web-based mapping service. If MapPoint is installed, the yellow icon is replaced with a map icon and it uses MapPoint to map the contact’s location. (Or use Actions, Display Map of Address menu.)

When MapPoint is installed, you can create web-based maps by disabling the MapPoint Com addin by opening Tools, Options, Other, Advanced Options, Com Addins and remove the check from the MapPoint Addin.

Outlook originally used maps on the Expedia website and Microsoft recently redirected the URL to mappoint.com. However, Outlook 2000 does not redirect properly and users are unable to use the external mapping service. If you use Outlook 2000 and don’t have MapPoint installed, you can edit the registry to enable another web-based mapping service.

Edit Outlook 2000’s registry by opening the Start menu, Run command and typing regedit then press Ok. Navigate to the registry key
HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftOffice9.0OutlookOptionsGeneral

Right click in the right pane and choose New, String Value. Enter MapScriptURL for the string value name. Double click on the MapScriptURL key to open it and enter the URL you want to use for the data value. You have at least three choices to use for the data value.

To paste the urls below into the registry, click in the text field and press Ctrl+A to select all, Ctrl+C to copy, then paste in the Value Data field in the registry editor.

Outlook 2002 uses MapPoint by default, but if you want to use another map with Outlook 2002, you can use this registry key as well. Don’t forget that Outlook 2002’s version is 10.0 when navigating to the proper key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftOffice10.0OutlookOptionsGeneral.

This registry key doesn’t appear to work with Outlook 2003.

Outlook 2010 uses Bing by default, but if you want to use another map with it, you can use this registry key as well.
HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftOffice14.0OutlookOptionsGeneral.

To use Bing Maps

http://www.bing.com/maps/?where1=<0s>, <1s>, <2s>, <3s>, <4s>

Google Maps

http://maps.google.com/?q=<0s>, <1s>, <2s>, <3s>, <4s>


For MapQuest, use this URL as the data value:

http://www.mapquest.com/maps/map.adp?address=<0s>&city=<1s>&state=<2s>&zip=<3s>

Expedia

Requires the country code. For US, it needs to be USA. Outlook defaults to United States of America, but you can enter USA and Outlook uses it. If you are only mapping US addresses, replace <4s> with USA. Or replace it with the correct code for your country.

http://www.expedia.com/City-Map?action=findAMap@results&findAMap_addressPlace_country=<4s>&findAMap_addressPlace_street=<0s>&findAMap_addressPlace_city=<1s>&findAMap_addressPlace_state=<2s>&findAMap_addressPlace_zip=<3s>

Yahoo Maps

http://maps.yahoo.com/maps?newFL=&addr=<0s>&csz=<1s>+<2s>+<3s>&srchtype=a&getmap=Get+Map

This URL also works for Yahoo:

http://maps.yahoo.com/map?q1=<0s> <1s> <2s> <3s> <4s>

Now when you select the map button, Outlook brings up the internet map of your choice.

To use other web-based mapping services, you’ll need to know the URL that is sent back to the server. Once you have that, replace the address fields with the codes Outlook uses:

If you don’t want to edit the registry yourself, you can download a zip file containing the registry entries for the map addresses listed above. After downloading  the file, double click on the *.reg file for the mapping service you want to use.

Registry files for Outlook 2000 | Registry files for 2002 | Registry files for Outlook 2010

Merged with Tip 44 Change Map Link

Related posts:

Tags: contacts, customize, links, outlook 2007, outlook 2010

This article is filed under How to....
Last reviewed on Oct 31, 2011