How does Outlook 2003 deals with IMAP configuration

[Fozzie Bear]

I have just transferred a customer from Outlook Express to Outlook 2003 and at the same time from POP3 to IMAP. The reason being when she travels on business and logs in to her webmail, her sent emails do not replicateto her PC on return so she has to copy herself in to every sent message and I believedIMAP would resolve this.


Outlook 2003 with Small Business Contact Manager waspreinstalled on her PC but not configured for her profile. I had to delete andrecreate her mail profile as on installation it was looking for a non-existent Exchange Server, although it had never been set up for exchange. I re-created the Mail profile and all her messages started downloading only to find that we needed to change to IMAP as outlined above. I therefore switched to Offline and deleted all the mail which had already downloaded and then deleted and recreated her mail settings for IMAP. Outlook successfully connected and started downloading 26000 mail headers (the client is busy deleting old messages off theserver )


There are several things I don’t understand about the way Outlook deals with IMAP and would really appreciate some help or guidance.


1) Firstly it creates a default Personal FoldersPST and then does not use it but instead creates a folder group completewith Inbox, Sent Box, Trash etc replicating the mail server which is what Iexpected. Is it safe to close and or remove this Personal Folders PST or doesit take part in mail delivery?





2) When sending a mail message from Outlook it replicateswith the mail server showing online as sent but the sent item remains in thedefault Personal Folders Sent Box above and not in the IMAP Sent folder. Is thisby design or is there a way to reconfigure Outlook to save sent mail in the IMAP group?





Finally the customer had created numerous subfolders in Outlook Express which she would like transferred, but I cant think of a way to import them without importing all the messages again from the Outlook Express message store which will create duplicates. Unless of course I can safely delete all .dbx files (inbox, Sent etc.) other than the folders required. I am sure its not as simple as this????




Sorry lots of questions on my first post but any help or advice on this would be appreciated


Regards


Fozzie

 

[Forum Admin]

1. The default pst is for calendar and contacts as the imap pst is only used for the imap account since mail syncs back to the server and calendar and contacts are not supported on imap servers. Outlook will not allow you to remove this pst file.

2. By design in Outlook 2003. Newer versions can be easily configured to use the imap account. You can turn off the option to save sent message and create a rule to save sent messages to the imap server. This works well, except if there are connection problems, then outlook won't save a copy anywhere.

More info on imap accounts and outlook is here: Configure and Use IMAP Accounts - Slipstick Systems - if upgrading outlook is an option, the experience will be better.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

1. The default pst is for calendar and contacts as the imap pst is only used for the imap account since mail syncs back to the server and calendar and contacts are not supported on imap servers. Outlook will not allow you to remove this pst file.




2. By design in Outlook 2003. Newer versions can be easily configured to use the imap account. You can turn off the option to save sent message and create a rule to save sent messages to the imap server. This works well, except if there are connection problems, then outlook won't save a copy anywhere.




More info on imap accounts and outlook is here: Configure and Use IMAP Accounts - Slipstick Systems - if upgrading outlook is an option, the experience will be better.

Many thanks for the quick reply. The customer lives in a village with poor broadband so I wouldnt want to risk her not having a copy of the sent file.


Is there a way in outlook 2003 to use a rule to move or copy from one folder to another. e.g on a certain event such as sending a message a copy is placed in the imap folder. I could then leave outlook to save a sent message which would still reside in the dfault pst sent box but always have a copy in the imap folder sent box.


If this is an option will IMAP then "sync" the contents of the Outlook IMAP sent folder with the mail server Sent box? If that makes sense??




Fozzie

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Many thanks for a quick reply. the link you gave me is very informative and answers many of my questions. I think I will set up a rule to copy the sent mail to thje imap folder so there is a record in one place. A few very simple questions:-


1) Will copies of the sent messages copied across to the IMAP folder be replicated to the mail server sent folder ?


2) If the customer deletes mail from the server will it automatically delete from Outlook or just be marked for deletion and requre purging.


3) Does the purge command only work in the folder being viewed or globally and is there a way to set up purge say on shutdown of outlook




Again many thanks for your help


Fozzie

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Many thanks for the speedy reply and for the link which was very informative. I will probaly do as you suggest and create a rule to put a copy in the imap folder and leave a copy in the Default PST inbox.


A few quick supplimentary questions though.


1) Sent emails copied to the IMAP sent box folder; will these be replicated to the server sent box?


2) If the client deletes files on the server will they be deleted from Outlook or just marked for deletion until purged.


3) Is the purge command global or only the folder being viewed


4) Is there a way to automate the purge with a rule on a certain event such as on closing Outlook


many thanks again


Fozzie

 

[Forum Admin]

Hopefully I've fixed the problem of all posts being moderated - only posts with certain spammer keywords and too many URLs are supposed to be held, none of which your posts included.

Is there a way in outlook 2003 to use a rule to move or copy from one folder to another. e.g on a certain event such as sending a message a copy is placed in the imap folder. I could then leave outlook to save a sent message which would still reside in the dfault pst sent box but always have a copy in the imap folder sent box.

You can use an after sending rule to copy the message to the imap server. You could also use VBA to move or copy all messages in the sent folder - this would not be automatic, but the user could control it, doing it when the connection is good. This would mean she wouldn't have all the mail on the server all the time though, and she'd need to remember to run the macro daily or weekly.

If this is an option will IMAP then "sync" the contents of the Outlook IMAP sent folder with the mail server Sent box? If that makes sense??

Yes, IMAP is two way sync - if you move or copy messages to the imap folders, they will sync up.

 

[Forum Admin]

Deleted items: if she deletes mail using web access, it's deleted when outlook syncs with the server. If she deletes it in Outlook, it's marked for deletion in Outlook and remains on the server until it is purged in outlook.

Purging: on shutdown, no. I'll have to double check as i sometimes get the features in all the different versions confused, but I think you can configure outlook 2003 to purge when you change folders. Otherwise, you do it manually. I'm pretty sure the outlook option to empty deleted on exit does not apply to imap. I really don't recommend empty deleted on exit - it slows the exit down and can cause problems if windows is trying to close outlook to reboot.

 

[Forum Admin]

On purging with rules: no, that is not possible. It might be possible with VBA, i never looked into it.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

I appear to have double posted very sorry. I had lots of problems with the forum page freezing and didnt realise that it had posted sucessfully as the message box was blank on recovering the page.

Many thanks for your responses though, I am not sure I can convince my customer to upgrade to Outlook 2010 just yet but at least I can answer her questions with some degree of certainty and can explain the limitations of IMAP in Outlook 2003.

Wocka Wocka

Fozzie