The problem

The "e-mail" option is greyed out or otherwise unavailable in the Mail Merge Helper (Word 2000 and earlier), the Mail Merge Wizard (Word 2002 and later) or the Mail Merge toolbar.

Background

The general situation appears to be that Word will only enable the "merge to e-mail" options and buttons if it finds certain entries related to e-mail in the old Windows system configuration file WIN.INI, or (for Word 2003 and later) in the Windows registry. If those entries were not created when the relevant e-mail software was installed, Word will "grey out" the merge to e-mail options, making them unavailable.

To enable the relevant options and buttons, you must create the entries Word expects in WIN.INI or the registry. However, just enabling the buttons does not necessarily enable merge to e-mail! Obviously, you must have a suitable e-mail program on your system and it must be properly configured.

What is a suitable e-mail program?

In theory, Word should be able to merge to e-mail using any properly configured e-mail client that is MAPI-enabled. In practice, things are not so simple.

"MAPI" stands for "Mail Application Program Interface" and is a set of standards used on Windows that enable the various components of an e-mail system to communicate and do their jobs. Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Outlook Express are MAPI-enabled. Many third party e-mail programs such as Eudora are also MAPI-enabled, or optionally MAPI-enabled. However, some programs are not - for example, the Thunderbird e-mail client is not currently MAPI-enabled as far as I know. Also, if you use your Web browser to retrieve, compose and send your e-mails using a service such as Hotmail or Google gmail, that isn't MAPI-enabled either.

Even if a program is MAPI-enabled, you may find that it does not work well with Word "merge to e-mail". For example, you may find that you can only send one e-mail at a time without manual intervention. There are even differences between Outlook and Outlook Express: Word can (sometimes!) merge to HTML format e-mails using Outlook, but not using Outlook Express. Finally, as a general rule, if you are using Outlook it should be the same version as the version of Word, i.e. use Outlook 2003 with Word 2003, Outlook 2002 with Word 2002, and so on.

A solution

This solution only applies if you are using Outlook or Outlook Express. However, the entries required generally seem to work with the other e-mailers I have tried - i.e. they are really to do with MAPI and not with the individual e-mailer.

First, you should ensure that the e-mail client (Outlook, Outlook Express etc.) is configured to be the default client on your system. If you have Internet Explorer, you can go into Tools|Internet Options|Programs and select the correct program from the drop-down list next to "E-mail." Or, you may be able to use the Internet Options icon in Windows Control Panel. When you use an e-mail client for the first time, there is sometimes a bit more configuration to be done, so you should open the e-mail client and create and send at least one message using that e-mail client to ensure that the e-mail client is correctly configured.

Then, start Word and see if the merge to e-mail options have been enabled. If they have, create a small test merge and see if you can successfully merge to e-mail. If you can, we're done. If not...

If you are using Word 2002 or earlier,

 a. find the WIN.INI file in your Windows folder (typically c:\WINDOWS), make a backup copy of it, and open it in Notepad.
 b. ensure that the following text is in there, and add it if not
 

[Mail]
MAPI=1
CMCDLLNAME32=mapi32.dll
CMCDLLNAME=mapi.dll
CMC=1
MAPIX=1
MAPIXVER=1.0.0.1
OLEMessaging=1
 

If that isn't enough, or if you are using Word 2003, you have to edit the Windows registry. Proceed with caution, because modifications to the registry can damage your copy of Windows and even prevent it from running.

 c. In your Windows folder, locate and run regedit.exe. If you're using an
older version of Windows you might need to use regedt32.exe.
 

Look for a key called
 

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows Messaging Subsystem
 

It should be there in recent versions of Windows, but if it is not, add it.
 

If it is there, I would expect to see
 d. a subkey called MSMapiApps
 e. a number of "values" with the same names as are in the above list - MAPI, MAPIX etc.
 f. an additional value called InstallCmd
 

If you cannot see the values mentioned in point (e), you need to add them. For each of the values in the above list
 g. right click "Windows Messaging Subsystem" and select New|String Value.
Note that although some of these items have numeric values, they should all be entered as String Values.
 h. enter the name, as above
 i. double click on the name. A dialog box appears. Enter the value (e.g. for the name CMCDLLNAME, enter mapi.dll) and click OK
 j. You may also need to create the InstallCmd value, although I rather doubt it. I am less sure about this and about what should go in there. On my  system, the value is:
rundll32 setupapi,InstallHinfSection MSMAIL 132 msmail.inf
 

Rather than add these values manually, you can do the following:

 k. Open Notepad
 l. Copy/paste the following text into it. Remove any blank lines at the beginning and end.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows Messaging Subsystem]
"CMCDLLNAME32"="mapi32.dll"
"CMCDLLNAME"="mapi.dll"
"CMC"="1"
"InstallCmd"="rundll32 setupapi,InstallHinfSection MSMAIL 132 msmail.inf"
"MAPIXVER"="1.0.0.1"
"MAPIX"="1"
"MAPI"="1"
"OLEMessaging"="1"

 m. Save the file using a .reg extension (e.g. in c:\a\WMS.reg)
 n. In Windows Registry Editor, click FIle|Import, select the .reg file you just saved, and import it.

When you have created the entries, press F5. Then close all copies of Word and restart it - or restart Windows, then restart Word and see if the e-mail option has appeared.

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