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cannot create new rules for messages in hotmail

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  • 69 have this problem
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  • Last reply by MonicaS

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Unable to create new rules in hotmail in "Rules for sorting new messages" option. OP system is vista, using Firefox 5.0

No error messages just a big resounding nothing when i click "new" button.
Unable to create new rules in hotmail in "Rules for sorting new messages" option. OP system is vista, using Firefox 5.0 No error messages just a big resounding nothing when i click "new" button.

All Replies (8)

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It appears to be a bug they recently introduced. It's not specific to Firefox. Here's a link to a workaround. I just used it and it workded fine.

http://eksith.wordpress.com/2011/07/21/cant-add-new-mail-rules/

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Hi robperez thanks for the suggestion....but sadly it didn't work, when i searched the source code I couldn't find anything resembling the line of code in the example...and I searched for various character strings!!

Any other ideas anyone?

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cmalt, I'm on FF5 as well and you just have to make sure that when you right click, you select "This Frame" > "View Frame Source" near the "New" button.

You were probably selecting the source for the whole frame which doesn't have "EditRule" anywhere.

I'll update my blog post to make this more clear.

(edit_ I was on FF5 "now" to test this :P)

Modified by eksith

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You are absolutely correct - I selected This Frame etc and followed your suggestion and ...BINGO!! it works so thanks very much - nice to have someone smart like yourself helping punters to overcome these type of problems WHICH HOTMAIL HAVE DONE NOTHING TO REMEDY. Big tick to you a big @#$%$#@ to hotmail.

Makes you wonder why hotmail don't get onto it quicker - it must be in their interest to keep 'customers' happy.....I was going to give it a few more days then ditch them and their tardy customer support for gmail.

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Pathetic isn't it? FYI, Hotmail *still* hasn't fixed this issue and it's been more than a week now.

Interestingly, when you view the load progress for the Rules page in the WebConsole (Firefox > Web Developer > Web Console), there are some undefined errors. So Microsoft probably should have used FireFox to debug and test this page before making it live :P

Someone told me recently that we shouldn't expect stellar support considering it's a free service and all, but I disagree. We still support the service through their banner ads so this isn't exactly "free" as in gratis. "Free" doesn't give someone an excuse to have poor service, especially since it has millions of users world-wide.

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Indeed - and really, they're all free aren't they (Yahoo, gmail, hotmail, whatever else) all paid for by ads (which I never even noticed until about 2 years ago *). Suppose the bigger effort gmail 'seem' to make is reflected in the meteoric rise to success of google - they seem to want to give a better service.

  • Interestingly, or not - as the case may be - and as a total aside, some Google advertising outfit phoned me a couple of years ago to see if I wanted to advertise on Google. I said - much to the bewilderment of the annoying salesperson - I'd never seen an ad on Google.....which was true as in I'd never noticed an ad on Google! I just completely filter ads out and totally ignore them - don't even see them.

I wish I could do the same for the annoying twonks who phone me on my mobile trying to sell some crap.

Anyhoo, I digress, ta again for your excellent help and...... hotmail - ARE YOU READING THIS???

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Use the "Sweep" feature in Hotmail!

After a couple of hours of trying to figure out why I couldn't create a new "rule" I gave up. Today quite by accident I decided to use the "sweep" feature to clear out multiple emails from the same sender.

  1. Select the sender whose messages you to move
  2. Click on the "sweep" button at the top of the Inbox
  3. You will get a message asking of you want to move all of them and you get a drop down box where you can select where to send the messages.
  4. Below that option is a box that you can check "Also move future messages.
  5. I followed these simple steps and then I went and looked at the rules and a new rule was created for that sender.

Modified by jaysees72

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My problem is a bit different. I can write rules for incoming and outgoing emails but they only seem to work on the incoming ones. Any ideas? I've checked the rules and they look ok

Does gmail have working rules? In which case, I'm outta here!

Monica