"Could not open item. Try again" error message when adding a category to a mail

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Hi all,

We're using a shared mailbox for our support team. Each of us has a specific
color (category) and we mark all incoming mail with our color to have a
quick view of which mail are handled or not.

In some cases (randomly, mostly when we are at the office, rarely during the
night when nobody works) we get the "Could not open item. Try again" error
message when we click on the category box next to the message in the message
list.

In this case, when we open the mail and add the catetgory then escape, it
works just fine...

So we can add the category, but sometimes we have to open the mail instead
of doing it straight from the message list.

Any ideas?

Thanks,

Ambroise
http://www.alacrity.be
 
We have a similar approach here, and get this message all of the time. I
have searched and see no type of solution yet from Microsoft. The "old"
technotes out there referencing Office 2003 or 2000 are ineffective on this
issue.

Strange thing here is that one of our support guys does not see this error
at all, so perhaps this has to do with an Outlook setting that may be
affected by the user's PC settings.

This only happens to me when using the shared mailbox. When using my own
Inbox, i can right mouse click and Categorize just fine....

Joe
 
How close is it Microsoft to fixing this issue. This problem only exists in
shared inboxes. My staff has ownership of the shared inbox, but gets the
same error when right clicking the the category.
 
I do not work for Microsoft, so i am not sure if they are even aware of it
being a problem in Outlook 2007. Have you called TEch Support on this? I
have not yet done that, as I was hoping a solution would be readily available
online. THat does not seem to be the case...
 
We are also having the same issue in the same scenario. If anyone has
any suggestions or work around (apart from opening the email and then
assigning the category) it would be appreciated if you could post to
this thread.
 
I have a work-around and a possible cause, but not a fix. The problem
started for me three weeks ago when I installed SP2 for Exchange 2003
server (I had Exchange 2003 SP1 before). Not only have several of my
users been having the problem in this discussion thread, but a few of
my users are also having problems with their Outlook 2007 rules
working. These problems only seem to be occuring on my Outlook 2007
users, not on my Outlook 2003 users.

The work-around is to uncheck "Use cached Exchange mode". Then both
the Categorize and mail rules work.

I tried deleting the .ost file and having Outlook rebuild it. I also
tried docked and undocked modes on my laptops. I even created a brand-
new AD account and mailbox, and logged this user onto a brand new PC
that I put Office 2007 on (not an upgrade for Office 2003 like my
other users having the problem). Still this user got the error when
doing a categorize. If you check 'Use cached Exchange mode" the
categorize and mail rules work for a few minutes but then stop
working, or work intermittently.

Perhaps with this clue, one of you can help figure out the cause.
 
I have the cause now, which is one or more Outlook add-ins, and the
fix. I opened a case with Microsoft finally, who said a number of
customers have called in with this same problem.

Here are the steps they had me do to prove the cause:
- Make sure 'Use Cached Exchange Mode' is checked
- Close Outlook
- Open Outlook in safe mode (Start, Run, Outlook /safe)
- Try to categorize an email in the shared mailbox--it worked
- In Outlook, Tools, Trust Center
- Add-Ins
- Manage Exchange Client Extensions, Go
- In Safe Mode, these are all unchecked, but in regular mode they're
checked

Then they had me disable add-ins by renaming the add-in registry keys:
- Close Outlook
- Start, Run, regedit
- Go to each of the following registry keys and if you find an Addins
key then rename it to OldAddins
HKCU/Software/Microsoft/Office/Outlook/12.0
HKCU/Software/Microsoft/Office/Outlook
HKCU/Software/Microsoft/Office
HKLM/Software/Microsoft/Office/Outlook/12.0
HKLM/Software/Microsoft/Office/Outlook
HKLM/Software/Microsoft/Office
- Open Outlook normally (not in safe mode) and it again worked fine

Microsoft says that the problem is one or more of these add-ins
causing the problem. Add-ins are what 3rd parties write to interface
with Outlook.

So, they said you have several options to fix it.
1. You can leave the add-ins disabled permanently. These add-ins for
Outlook won't work and your users may complain or not notice,
depending on if they use the functionality provided by the add-ins. In
my opinion this is not a desirable fix, especially if your antivirus
add-in is disabled.
2. You can try to figure out which add-in is causing the problem.
Here's how:
- Back out all the changes you just made to Outlook by closing Outlook
and then renaming the OldAddIns registry keys back to AddIns
- Open Outlook normally
- Go to Tools, Trust Center, Add-Ins, Manage Exchange Client
Extensions, Go
- Systematically uncheck one option at a time, restart Outlook and see
when the categorize problem stops. Or uncheck all the add-ins and then
systematically check each add-in to see when the categorize problem
starts.
- When you've identified the offending add-in, see if there is a newer
version of that product available and upgrade to that product. For
example, if you discover that Symantec Antivirus 10.0 is problematic,
see if Symantec has released AntiVirus version 10.1 or newer.
 
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