That setting is stored in the registry. For Outlook 2003 it's at
HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Outlook\Prefer ences\NewmailDesktopAlerts,
where 1 is an alert and 0 is no alert.

However, Outlook reads that value only on startup and when you change it in
the Options dialog it stores the change in memory as well as writing it out
to the registry. The only time it reads the registry for that is when it
starts up.

--
Ken Slovak
[MVP - Outlook]
http://www.slovaktech.com
Author: Professional Programming Outlook 2007.
Reminder Manager, Extended Reminders, Attachment Options.
http://www.slovaktech.com/products.htm


"G Lykos" wrote in message
...
Greetings! Would like to add a button to Outlook 2003 tied to a VBA
snippet
that would activate/inactivate the Desktop Alert function. This is so
when
using my laptop to make presentations, I don't get messages popping up.
Would much prefer not to have to dig down through the layers of the Tools
menu to activate/deactivate the function. However, am not having much
success finding information about the related VBA hook(s).

Thanks in advance for any ideas.
George