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Outlook Reply

Outlook Reply

Type: outlook-reply · Package: Outlook Activities v1.0.4

Replies to an existing email, keeping the conversation thread. It can reply only to the sender or to all recipients (reply all), and attach files.

How it works

Given the EntryID of the email to answer (from Outlook Get Emails), it creates the reply as Outlook would (subject with the reply prefix and the original recipients) and sends it right away:

The body is your body text, a blank line and the quoted original message below. The reply is composed as plain text.
With replyAll = true, it replies to all original recipients instead of only the sender.
attachments that do not exist on disk are skipped (the log says how many) and the reply is sent anyway.
The reply is kept in Sent Items, like any email sent from Outlook.

Required parameters

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
`entryId`	`string`	—	EntryID of the email to reply to (from `email.Id`).
`body`	`string`	—	Reply text, placed before the quoted message.

Optional parameters

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
`session`	`ZoanOutlookSession`	—	Session from Outlook Connect. Inherited inside the Connect `body`; without a session the default account is used.
`replyAll`	`bool`	`false`	Reply to all recipients of the original email.
`attachments`	`string \| List`	—	Path of a local file or list of paths to attach. Empty or missing paths are skipped.

Output

This activity does not return a value.

Common errors

Message	Cause and fix
`'entryId' is required.`	The parameter is missing or the expression returned `null`.
Outlook error when opening the item	The EntryID no longer exists (the email was moved or deleted earlier). Reply before moving or deleting the email.
Outlook error when sending	Outlook could not send (offline, account without send permission, attachment blocked by size or type). Check Outlook on the robot’s machine.

Example

Automatically acknowledge each email, with a receipt attached:

For Each   items = emails   itemVariable = email
 └─ activities:
      Outlook Reply
        entryId     = email.Id
        body        = "We received your message of " + email.SentAt.ToString("yyyy-MM-dd") + " and are processing it. Thank you."
        attachments = "C:/templates/receipt.pdf"
      Outlook Move Email   entryId = email.Id   targetFolder = "Inbox/Answered"

Outlook Send Email — send a new email.
Outlook Get Emails — get the email to reply to.