Well I think I’ve survived my first blogging mistake!
I posted a solution for resolving the pesky Ctrl+Enter problem of mistakenly sending an email within Outlook.
I found a hack on Allister Frost’s Microsoft site in the UK — I tried it on my Windows XP machine and it worked, then I tried it on the Windows Vista machine and it didn’t. I simply thought it was a Windows Vista issue — not a glimmer of a problem brought to me by reader Dr. Jurgen Combs!
Dr. Combs couldn’t find the Registy location mentioned in the article — and you know what? Neither could I!
My original Windows XP computer worked because it’s using Office Policies, somtething most people will NOT have. Note: If you are using Group Policies use this information.
So here now is the PROPER Long Solution!
You can disable CTRL-ENTER in Outlook by adding the two following registry keys:
Key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwarePoliciesMicrosoftOffice11.0OutlookDisabledShortcutKeysCheckBoxes
String Value: CtrlEnter
Value Data: 13,8
Key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwarePoliciesMicrosoftOffice11.0WordDisabledShortcutKeysCheckBoxes
String Value: CtrlEnter
Value Data: 13,8NOTE: I’m using Office 2003 = 11.0 (XP = 10.0, 2000 = 9.0)
Step-by-Step Instructions:
- Start –> Run, type REGEDIT press OK
- If you can locate the folder HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwarePolicies
MicrosoftOffice11.0 skip directly to Step #7ELSE:
We’ll need to create the necessary Registy KeysLocate and click on the folder HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwarePolicies
Microsoft - From the Edit pull-menu, select New, then Key
- Type Office
- Click on the new Office key folder you just created
- From the Edit pull-menu, select New, then Key, type 11.0
Note: Office 2003 = 11.0, XP = 10.0, 2000 = 9.0 - Click on the new key 11.0 folder you just created
- From the Edit pull-menu, select New, then Key
- Type Outlook (the second time type Word)
- Click on the new Outlook (or Word) key folder you just created
- From the Edit pull-menu, select New, then Key
- Type DisabledShortcutKeysCheckBoxes
- Click on the new key DisabledShortcutKeysCheckBoxes folder you just created
- From the Edit pull-menu, select New, then String Value
- Type CtrlEnter
- Double click on the CtrlEnter String Value and enter 13,8 in the Value Data field
- Return to Step #7 substituting Outlook for Word
- Close REGEDIT and restart Outlook for the changes to take effect
The Road to Know Where 
Thank you!! I have been annoyed by this "feature" on multiple occasion. Nice to finally have a solution. Now, how about configuring Outlook 2003 to use <BR> instead of <P> for carrriage returns in an HTML encoded email message? :)Pat
Interesting!I saw another instructions that were referring to key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Outlook\DisabledShortcutKeysCheckBoxes
Works great! Very clear instructions.
Is there any way I can get back the CTRL+Enter hotkey for inserting a page break when I’m using Word alone?
You can disable just the Outlook shortcut if you are not using Word for your email editor (and nobody should be using word as the email editor anyway…)
In Outlook, Use Tools/Options/Mail Format and uncheck both of the "Use Microsoft Word for…" boxes.
Then you can disable the Outlook CTRL-ENTER send the mail without prompt idiocy, and leave the page break CTRL-ENTER shortcut in Word.
Word has built-in spell-check and grammer-check that "I" could not live without (along with other features) — so I’m not sure why you would NOT wish to use Word?
Is there a way to day the same thing (disable ctrl+enter from sending mail) for Outlook Express?
I’ve not found a similar solution for Outlook Express — however you can use the very-old trick of "Not addressing the email until you are finished with the email. This way if you hit <Ctrl>+<Enter> the email will not be sent (because there are no email addresses)."
Hi, thank you. you suggestion help me solve a problem in news group. It seems you are exprienced in IT. Are you a Microsoft Staff?
I remember that before (it was in an older computer whose configuration I don’t remember) Outlook would prompt if I really wanted to send the e-mail with ctrl+enter. This features was good enough because I didn’t send e-mail by mistake and I even sou I could easily send e-mails (pressing ctrl+enter and then enter). Do you know if there is a way to reenable this behaviour?
Hmm, I tried both the key in the author’s post and the suggestion in the Office keys and neither worked for me. Using "10.0". Oh well.
Hi "no name" (Dec 7) — please send me an email . . . we’ll get it working! (^_^)
WOW :)
Thanks very much
what a stupid option you saved us from its stupidity :) :) :) :) :)
thanx a million.
Just when I think I solved it, Outlook 2003 has another shortcut to send an email: Alt-S. How many different ways do I need to send an email? Anyone knows how to disable that too?
Office uses the ampersand in the button "Name" field to define the Alt- hot key for a given window. To disable Alt-S send you just have to clear the ampersand:
1. Open a new email message (you will notice the S of send is underlined in the button by default)2. Right-click on the toolbar and choose Customize…3. Right-click on the Send button 4. Clear the ampersand ("&") from the "Name" field of the button properties. This should remove the underline from the S in Send and disable Alt-S.
Outlook also occaisionally sends when you hit CTRL+V and happen to be pasting a URL – and doesn’t even paste the URL before sending. I’ve had this intermittently (but at least once a week) on at least three different PCs running Office 2003.The workaround I’ve found is adding a rule which delays the sending of all messages by 1 minute. This has actually turned out to be invaluable on lots of other occasions as well. How many other people only realise they wrote the wrong thing almost instantly after clicking send?
You should add that for Office 2007 it is 12.0 I just tested it with Windows XP using Office 2007 and it worked!
Thank you so much! Great instructions. Solved my problem. I tried to look on the microsoft site for a solution and all I got was unintelligible jargon.
Thank you! Couldn’t find this anywhere in the MS Help Files. No more embarassing 1/2 finished messages going out any more.