The program used to create this object is Outlook

Many Outlook users are facing a number of problems after applying the recent June 2017 security updates.

In one of these issues, when you open an attachment in an email, contact, or task formatted as Rich Text you get the following error:
“The program used to create this object is Outlook. That program is either not installed on your computer or it is not responding. To edit this object, install Outlook or ensure that any dialog boxes in Outlook are closed”

Microsoft has acknowledged the problems and suggested that users make use of the following workarounds until the issue is resolved.

1. Forward the email to yourself and then open the attachments from the forwarded email;
2. Change the email format to HTML, or Text format;
3. Save the attachments to your computer, using one of the following methods, then open them from the saved location:
   - Drag and drop the attachments to your desktop;
   - Go to File -> Save Attachments;
   - Copy and paste the attachment to your computer.


This and other issues caused by the June 2017 updates are detailed in the Outlook known issues in the June 2017 security updates page. Microsoft said they will update this page when fixes are available, so keep an eye on it!

Exchange 2010 Calendar Repair Assistant Behaviour (Part 2)

In my previous post Exchange 2010 Calendar Repair Assistant Behaviour I discussed some of the behaviour of the new Calendar Repair Assistant [CRA] functionality of Exchange 2010. Namely, I mentioned the following issue:

“An attendee accepted the organizer's meeting request or recurring meeting request, but the meeting isn't on the attendee's calendar.

The assistant checks the attendee's record in the mailbox database and finds that the attendee deleted the calendar item without sending a response. If the assistant can't determine that the meeting item was intentionally deleted by the attendee, the assistant creates the meeting request again. If the assistant determines that the attendee intentionally deleted the meeting request, no further action is taken.”

Note that is says “The assistant checks the attendee's record in the mailbox database and finds that the attendee deleted the calendar item without sending a response”. However, in all my tests, I deleted the appointments after accepting them, and Exchange always puts them back... So, not sure how it detects if the appointment was “intentionally deleted by the attendee”...

What I forgot to mentioned is that this happened with Outlook 2007. When I tested the exact same scenario with Outlook 2010 and OWA 2010, this didn’t happen! Which means that the assistant does indeed check if the attendee deleted the appointment on purpose or not.   :)

So why does it work for Outlook 2010 and OWA 2010 but not for Outlook 2007? We all know Outlook 2010 has better integration with Exchange 2010, but I wanted to know. To try to find out why, I turned to MFCMapi and compared two appointments: one deleted in Outlook 2007 and one deleted in OWA 2010 (both without sending a notification to the organiser).

Besides some obvious differences in some properties such as subject, times, etc., here is the big difference (look at the value tags):

Outlook 2007

<property tag = "0x80630003" type = "PT_LONG">

      <ExactNames>0x80630003</ExactNames>

      <NamedPropGUID>{11000E07-B51B-40D6-AF21-CAA85EDAB1D0} = PSETID_CalendarAssistant</NamedPropGUID>

      <NamedPropName>id: 0x0015=21 = PidLidClientIntent, dispidClientIntent</NamedPropName>

      <Value>0</Value>

      <AltValue>0x0</AltValue>

</property>

OWA 2010

<property tag = "0x80630003" type = "PT_LONG">

      <ExactNames>0x80630003</ExactNames>

      <NamedPropGUID>{11000E07-B51B-40D6-AF21-CAA85EDAB1D0} = PSETID_CalendarAssistant</NamedPropGUID>

      <NamedPropName>id: 0x0015=21 = PidLidClientIntent, dispidClientIntent</NamedPropName>

      <Value>32</Value>

      <AltValue>0x20</AltValue>

</property>

The PidLidClientIntent property indicates what actions the user has taken on a Meeting object.

According to the MSDN website 2.2.2.4 PidLidClientIntentProperty a value of 0x20 (32 in decimal or 0010 0000 in binary) means that the ciDeletedWithNoResponse property is set which proves the user deleted the Meeting object with no response sent to the organiser.

So basically, OWA 2010 and Outlook 2010 set the PidLidClientIntent property correctly and, as such, the CRA knows that the user deleted the appointment on purpose and doesn’t put it back.

Because Outlook 2007 doesn’t set this property to 0x20, CRA doesn’t know the user deleted the appointment, thinks it’s missing for some other reason and puts it back in the calendar!

Now the question: is there or will there be an update to rectify this for Outlook 2007?

I’m running version 12.0.6550.5003 SP2 with the update KB2412171 to have access to my Exchange Archive.

For more information:

• 2.2.2.4 PidLidClientIntent Property
• 3.1.4.7.3 Declining a Meeting
• 3.1.4.8.1 Sending a Meeting Cancellation

Outlook 2007 Update for Exchange 2010 Personal Archive Support

I have used Outlook 2010 to play around with Exchange 2010 Personal Archives but never Outlook 2007.

As most of you know, Outlook 2007 doesn’t support these by default. However, an update released last January (KB2412171) brings archives to Outlook 2007! However, not completely so support is limited...

After you download and install the update (you don’t need to restart you PC, just close and reopen Outlook), your archive will appear automatically (please see note below) and you will be able to do the following:

• Copy/move messages between your primary mailbox and your archive;
• Copy/move messages between any PST open in Outlook and your archive.

NOTE: if you have full access permissions to another mailbox or archive, these will automatically show up in your Outlook view! This is known as auto-mapping in Outlook 2010 and uses the msExchDelegateListLink AD attribute together with AutoDiscover to achieve this.

However, here’s what you will not be able to do:

• Search across your primary and archive mailboxes at once, only separately;
• Use Personal Tags to override Retention and Archiving Policies set up, if any, on your Exchange 2010 environment.

As this update is now somewhat old, I was expecting for these 2 issues to have been already addressed in another hotfix. However, I was unable to find anything related to this... So, as far as I know, this is still the latest functionality available for Outlook 2007 users.

Don’t forget that the archive is only accessible when you are connected to Exchange as it is never cached locally even when on cached mode.

Attachments visible in OWA but not in Outlook

Today I had a user saying that our e-mail scanners had blocked an attachment sent to him. Upon closer look, I realised that this wasn’t the case and looking at the transport logs I saw that an e-mail with more than 1MB was delivered to the users!
So, with the user’s permission I look into his mailbox. By using OWA I was able to see, open and save both attachments, but when I looked in Outlook (2007 v12.0.6557.5001 with SP2) there just weren’t there! However, the e-mail size in Outlook was showing more than 1MB, so they had to be there...

Tried forwarding the e-mail from Outlook to myself, and nothing... Tried from OWA and I received them with no problems!

I found this post on Microsoft Support which says this sometimes happens with inline attachments in Exchange 2007 SP1 (which is what we are currently using – I know, don’t ask!...).

Basically, for Outlook 2007 the attachment is hidden and it is unavailable for download. In OWA, it is still hidden but you can download and view it.

If you are using Exchange Server 2010:
- Stop the Exchange Transport service;
- Locate the EdgeTransport.exe.config file (located in the following path: :\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\Bin\);
- In the EdgeTransport.exe.config file, add the following entry between the /appSettings element and the /appSettings element: add key="TreatInlineDispositionAsAttachment" value="true" /
- Restart the Transport service.

(Please note I had to remove the < > tags because of the HTML here...)


With Exchange Server 2007, just install Service Pack 2 and run the following command:
Set-OrganizationConfig –ShowInlineAttachments $True


As soon as I am able to test this, I will post here the results.

Hope this helps!

Outlook 2007 Best Practices

The Outlook 2007 Best Practices article is intended to provide users of Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 guidance on how to best use the product.

Overview
The purpose of this paper is to provide customers of Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 guidance on how to best use the product. Created by the product team who created Outlook 2007, this guide represents our advice on how to get the most out of Outlook 2007. By no means comprehensive, it covers just a few core scenarios.

Why an Outlook "best practices" document?
We wrote this paper for the best possible reason: Our customers asked. We designed Outlook 2007 to be used by a wide audience with many work needs and styles. Although there's no one "right way," there are a few ways of working in the program that we know to be easier than others. We hope that by being aware of the best practices, you will have the best experience possible using Outlook.