Microsoft Outlook Add-In: Contextual Regex for Links

joostwmd 5

I want to develop a Microsoft Outlook add-in that highlights links in Emails. I found this example for a add in that highlights order numbers and displays a popup when clicking on it. The Code "responsible" for that is this regex in the manifest:

<Rule xsi:type="RuleCollection" Mode="And">

<Rule xsi:type="ItemIs" ItemType="Message" />

<Rule xsi:type="ItemHasRegularExpressionMatch" RegExName="OrderNumber" RegExValue="CO-\d{9}" PropertyName="BodyAsPlaintext"/>

</Rule>

I basically want the same for any link in an email. I thought I could just use a regex for a link, bit somehow it is not working. Here is my current code:

<Rule xsi:type="RuleCollection" Mode="And">

<Rule xsi:type="ItemIs" ItemType="Message" />

<Rule xsi:type="ItemHasRegularExpressionMatch" RegExName="Link" RegExValue="(https?:\/\/(?:www\.|(?!www))[a-zA-Z0-9][a-zA-Z0-9-]+[a-zA-Z0-9]\.[^\s]{2,}|www\.[a-zA-Z0-9][a-zA-Z0-9-]+[a-zA-Z0-9]\.[^\s]{2,}|https?:\/\/(?:www\.|(?!www))[a-zA-Z0-9]+\.[^\s]{2,}|www\.[a-zA-Z0-9]+\.[^\s]{2,})" PropertyName="BodyAsPlaintext"/>

</Rule>

My goal is to prevent the default behaviour which is opening the link and displaying the popup instead, like in the example:

Screenshot 2024-12-15 at 20.52.04

Has anyone figured this out?

Digvijay Chauhan 1 Reputation point

2024-12-15T23:05:50.6+00:00

Hi joostwmd,

please see my answer below!

Hope that helps!
Joan Hua-MSFT 3,485 Reputation points Microsoft Vendor

2024-12-16T02:37:48.4533333+00:00

Hi @ joostwmd

Welcome to our forum!

Please kindly understand that the Outlook tag here we mainly focus on general issues about Outlook desktop client. Looks like your issue is more related to Office Development, to better solve your problem, I will add Office Development tag for you.

Thanks for your support and understanding!

1 answer

Digvijay Chauhan 1 Reputation point

2024-12-15T23:06:10.4933333+00:00
Hi joostwmd,

Could you get the example to run locally before you started to play around with your regular expression?

It is actually two parts :

In the file contoso-order-number-manifest.xml line 52-56

<Rule xsi:type="RuleCollection" Mode="And"> <Rule xsi:type="ItemIs" ItemType="Message" FormType="Read" /> <Rule xsi:type="ItemHasRegularExpressionMatch" RegExName="9Digits" RegExValue="\d{9}" PropertyName="BodyAsPlaintext"/> </Rule> <DisableEntityHighlighting>false</DisableEntityHighlighting>

Notice 9Digits - it must match so it goes to second one: line 74-77

<Rule xsi:type="RuleCollection" Mode="And"> <Rule xsi:type="ItemIs" ItemType="Message" /> <Rule xsi:type="ItemHasRegularExpressionMatch" RegExName="OrderNumber" RegExValue="CO-\d{9}" PropertyName="BodyAsPlaintext"/> </Rule>

So i guess if you just put the rule either in top block or make it pass on to second rule it should work!

Hope that helps!
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joostwmd 5 Reputation points

2024-12-15T23:36:10.38+00:00

Hey Digvijay Chauhan,

thanks for the response :)

I have managed to get it to run locally. This is my current code:

Upper block

<Rule xsi:type="RuleCollection" Mode="And"> <Rule xsi:type="ItemIs" ItemType="Message" FormType="Read" /> <Rule xsi:type="ItemHasRegularExpressionMatch" RegExName="9Digits" RegExValue="\d{9}" PropertyName="BodyAsPlaintext"/>  </Rule>

Lower Block

<Rule xsi:type="RuleCollection" Mode="And"> <Rule xsi:type="ItemIs" ItemType="Message" /> <Rule xsi:type="ItemHasRegularExpressionMatch" RegExName="OrderNumber" RegExValue="CO-\d{9}" PropertyName="BodyAsPlaintext"/>  </Rule>

The 9Digits/OrderNumber example works as expected, but i cannot get the link regex rule to work. I have tried only the link rule which doesnt work and also the link rule in combination with the working example. In this case both the link rule and the previous working order number rule arent working.

Do you have any other ideas?

Thanks in advance :)

Digvijay Chauhan 1 Reputation point

2024-12-16T18:28:24.0466667+00:00

Hi joostwmd

Thanks for the comment and just to make sure - you can't get the link regex to even work locally?

I shall try to set up a project and debug before i make more suggestions! However, i do realize that regular expressions in Outlook Add-ins might have limitations or nuances different from what you'd expect in typical environments. If your regex is too complex, it might not be supported. Try simplifying your regex first and test if it works. You can start with smaller components and gradually increase complexity for example

https?:\/\/(www\.)?[a-zA-Z0-9\-]+(\.[a-zA-Z]{2,})+

PS: Do let me know if that works so i can change this comment to an answer!

regards,

Digvijay

joostwmd 5 Reputation points

2024-12-16T22:24:18.51+00:00

Hey again :)

No the link regex wont work in any way i try and at this point I believe the issue is not the regex but the links default behaviour clashing with the effect of the regex.

I created a repo with further information for reproduction: https://github.com/joostwmd/outlook-link-detector

I would really appreciate if you would take a look at it, I have been stuck at this for days :/
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Microsoft Outlook Add-In: Contextual Regex for Links

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