infinityeight: The new Outlook updates are designed to make the interface more tablet/phone friendly. I really hate the craze to make websites compatible with all devices. I understand why websites want to do that, of course, but these changes generally represent a regression in design/ functionality in every way that is not directly related to tablets/phones. Some of my annoyance surely comes from the fact that I use my laptop and a work computer almost exclusively to browse the internet, so it's frustrating that website design is being optimized for devices other than the ones I use. Nevertheless, people who want to use their phones for anything more than the occasional Google search or email check are crazy and should've upgraded to a bigger screen for most of their business if at all possible.
Yes, I can understand that they want to appeal to the large market of tablet/mobile users, and that is fine. However they have not done that. The new outlook doesn't work or only partly works on my windows phone/IE. So in effect this is rubbish on pc/table/mobile now. Its hardly surprising seeing certain design and political choices made by the company since Gates left. As a long time (I mean since the good old days of DOS) user of M$ products its quite disappointing.
Thanks to everyone for their suggestions, it will take me some time to go through each one and assess them, but thanks again for all the advice.