Saiweb

Outlook is one of those programs we all love to hate at some point in time, particularly when it does something completely random like say _lose_ that selection of emails you were trying to move to another folder, if you can find these emails i.e. one was flagged and showing up under “flagged for follow up”, the “in folder” field displays IPM_SUBTREE.

Let’s start with some _conceptual_ background (In that this is how I logically see this working due to the errors that have occurred).

Your exchange mailbox is effectively a database, however in the more traditional sense of a “Containers” model.

i.e.

Grandparent > Parent > Child is a standard logical representation of programmatic relationships, in this case however it is more relevant to think of the structure as if it were a file system, with folders (containers).

i.e.

C:\Grand_Parent\Parent\Child

Ok so that’s the “container” concept out of the way, now for the moving procedure, from what I can tell all mail is stored within the IPM_SUBTREE, this essentially is the CHILD object which contains a subset of further folders, inbox etc … (Grandchildren)

When copying / moving email to a folder in outlook (Grandchild object), the email is first copied / moved to the IPM_SUBTREE (Child) folder, if an error occurs for any reason however that is where it stays!

The IPM_SUBTREE and higher up folders / containers are not visible in outlook, so to the end user these emails are lost.

To the sys admin however you now know they are simply “misplaced”, to recover these you need a program that can see the IPM_SUBTREE, this is available from http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=887724 “MFCMAPI_BIN.exe”

You will need to run this from the computer that is having problems, the user will also most likely need local administrative rights on that machine, alternatively as a Domain Administrator, set yourself with full rights to the problem mail box, and create a new outlook profile.

After downloading the .exe you will be prompted to extract the program, i.e. to C:\MFCMAPI, now run it:

C:\MFCMAPI\MFCMapi.exe

Once started Click Session > “Logon and Display Store Tables”

You will them be prompted for a profile to use (Default: Outlook)

The top line in the Display Name field should read: “MailBox – Username”, click to select this line and right click to bring up the context menu, now click “Open Store”

You will be presented with a new window, on the left there will be a tree navigation displaying “Root – Mailbox”, expand this list and click on IPM_SUBTREE, right click and select “Open Contents Table”, again you will get a new window, ideally with nothing listed, if items are listed, select them and right click copy messages.

Now close the window, right click the destination folder i.e. inbox, and “Open Contents Table”, in the new window right click anywhere in the list and select “Paste Messages”, you may also be prompted to choose whether to move or copy the messages.

Follow the prompts and once complete the messages will be in the destination folder.

Any problems leave a comment.

Yes the title seems a little weird, but it’s a little problem that has been the bane of my and a fellow techs existence for a couple months now.

An international office on permanent VPN connection to where I work would experience extremely slow load times of office documents even if they were local to the machine, strangely this only occurred when connected to the network (and hence to the domain).

What was eventually found by the afor mentioned fellow tech was that every time an office application would load (i.e. open a new document) it was “polling” the entire domain for listed printers and folders, not a problem in the local office with Gigabit connectivity, but a major problem for an international office with several employees over a low bandwidth line …

So how to fix this?!?

 (Assuming windows XP & Classic Menu)

START > CONTROL PANEL > Folder Options > View

 Uncheck “Automatically search for network printers and folders” > OK

 Now make sure you exit all office applications (better yet just reboot)

If this does not solve the issue, or only provides a slight gain it’s time to remove the “recent files” list, from within excel

TOOLS > OPTIONS > General

 Uncheck “Recently use file list” … Exit all office apps (or reboot).

And try again, this _appears_ to solve the slow down.

Any problems drop me a comment.