My mother is not very handy with the computer, but she can do e-mail, basic web surfing, and letter writing. She wanted a program she could use to print envelopes. Microsoft Word' envelope features were too complicated. And its address book? Fuhgedaboudit! No way she'd use it.

So I looked on the web for software - preferably free, but possibly cheap - that would be good for her. I couldn't find any that I thought she would be comfortable with.

So I wrote my own. It ended up being so wonderful (IMHO) that I use it myself. You can download a copy of it below for free. I've posted the program below. Sorry, all you guys using Macs, Linux, OS/2, Flex9, and RSTS; it's Windows only (XP or newer).

What's So Great About It

A screen shot of the envelope printing program.

Its window looks like an envelope, so typing addresses in couldn't be easier. You can easily configure different fonts for the return address and mailing address - set it once and forget it. The same is true of the printer configuration. I set it up for my Mom and she never had to deal with it.

The address book is really easy to use, too. There's an address book button near each address field. Click it and a list appears of the people in your address book. Select one, and it gets pasted into the address field. The UI works well only for small address books: a couple dozen names or so. But really, how many people do you send letters to?

Adding to the address book is straightforward: type in an address, click the address book button, and select Add.

Finally, there's a print button that simply prints. There's no intermediate Print Dialog, since you configured that when you installed it.

Installation

Download envelope.zip, unzip it, and put the two files (envelope.exe and envelope.chm) anywhere you like (C:\Program Files\envelope is a good choice). Run envelope.exe and click the Help button if necessary.

Download Envelope.zip