online Exchange mode - Preview Pane behaviour question

  • Thread starter Thread starter bob_smithley
  • Start date Start date
thanks, do you know if this behaviour is different in Outlook 2007? I
have a hosted Exchange. My primary mailbox is cached (Cached Exchange
Mode on), and I have an additional mailbox open (online mode). When I
click on a large message in the additional mailbox (to preview it in
the Preview Pane), Outlook 2007 seems to download the text +
attachment. Example - a small message (text only) displays almost
instantly in the Preview Pane. A message with a large attachment (e.g.
3MB) (and small amount of text) takes 40 seconds to preview. I can
only speculate that the entire message is being downloaded in Outlook
2007, even though I am just previewing the text in it.
 
thanks, do you know if this behaviour is different in Outlook 2007? I
have a hosted Exchange. My primary mailbox is cached (Cached Exchange
Mode on), and I have an additional mailbox open (online mode). When I
click on a large message in the additional mailbox (to preview it in
the Preview Pane), Outlook 2007 seems to download the text +
attachment. Example - a small message (text only) displays almost
instantly in the Preview Pane. A message with a large attachment (e.g.
3MB) (and small amount of text) takes 40 seconds to preview. I can
only speculate that the entire message is being downloaded in Outlook
2007, even though I am just previewing the text in it.
Click to expand...

If you're using cached Exchange mode and you have the account set up to
download headers and text in the Send/Receive group, Outlook will download
the message in its entirety when viewed in the Reading Pane. Attachments
are part of the body of the message. If you download the message, you
download the attachments.
 
If you're using cached Exchange mode and you have the account set up to
download headers and text in the Send/Receive group, Outlook will download
the message in its entirety when viewed in the Reading Pane. Attachments
are part of the body of the message. If you download the message, you
download the attachments.
Click to expand...

thanks. Doesn't quite answer my question. My primary mailbox is Cached
Exchange Mode. I have an additional mailbox which isn't cached
(because additional mailboxes can't be cached). So I guess the
additonal mailbox is in "online" mode. The problem is, in the
additional mailbox, when I single-click on a message to view it in the
Preview Pane, there is a long delay as though Outlook is downloading
the text and attachment. The delay *only* occurs for messages with
large attachments, which is why I suspect that Outlook 2007 is at
fault.

The behaviour I would expect is (in the additonal mailbox), I single-
click on a message to view it in the Preview Pane and the body of the
message is downloaded. To download the attachment, I would double-
click them.

I hope this explanation makes sense.
 
Obviously, messages do need to be "downloaded" to preview (just as if you
were viewing a webpage in a browser), even though they aren't actually
stored locally. Attachments (including embedded images) are downloaded to
the local system when you preview messages - they get written to the
securetemp folder when you select the message for preview and are scanned by
the AV. To verify, open windows explorer to the securetemp folder and
select a message (with an attachment) that was never downloaded before.

It used to be that attachments were only d/l when you went to open them but
a recent version of outlook (2003 I think) changed the behavior to write the
files to the securetemp as soon as it was selected.
 
thanks for the replies. I will confirm whether attachments are being
written to the secure temp folder when they are being previewed
shortly.

"Attachments (including embedded images) are downloaded to the local
system when you preview messages - they get written to the securetemp
folder when you select the message for preview and are scanned by the
AV."

Any way to turn this off? In my situation, with a hosted remote
Exchange server, it makes using the additional mailbox almost useless,
as Outlook hangs whenever a large message is previewed (obviosuly
until the attachment has finished downloading). Pretty frustrating. I
have many employees who share this additional mailbox - this issue was
unnoticeable with a local Exchange Server.

I am sure that Outlook 2003 behaved differently (well, I really need
to test this to confirm)

This article : http://www.slipstick.com/outlook/securetemp.htm seems
to imply that the data is written to secure temp when the attachment
is opened, rather than the message just being previewed?
 
I am curious, does Send/Receive Groups apply to the additional
mailbox? For example, if I select either "Download headers only" or
"Download only headers for items larger than" - will this apply to my
additonal mailbox? Or does Send/Receive only apply when working
offline?
 
Because they are not cached, they should not apply to the secondary
mailboxes. Secondary mailboxes use online mode.
 
thanks. so is there anything I can do to address my original issue?
What I need to do is stop Outlook 2007 downloading the entire message
when previewing a message (for the additional mailbox). With my hosted
Exchange, I can't use the additional mailbox as Outlook hangs while
previewing (downloading) any message with a large attachemnt.
 
it can't be disabled.

The last time I tested securetemps (late in the outlook 2007 beta),
attachments were written to the folder when the message was previewed or
opened. It's possible they changed the behavior since then. It may also act
differently if you use cache or online mode, which is why I suggest opening
the folder and watching how it works.

I don't think the OS you use matters - other than for the location of the
securetemp folder.
 
Did you try turning off the preview pane? this lets you see the message size
so you can avoid opening the large ones. You can use autopreview (3 line
preview) but offhand I can't think of a way to avoid downloading the full
messages.

Do you have OWA or POP3/IMAP access to the mailboxes?
 
Did you try turning off the preview pane? this lets you see the message size
so you can avoid opening the large ones. You can use autopreview (3 line
preview) but offhand I can't think of a way to avoid downloading the full
messages.

Do you have OWA or POP3/IMAP access to the mailboxes?
Click to expand...

Yes, I have OWA access. I just hoped I wouldn't have to resort to it.
It will be annoying for employees to check the size of the message in
Outlook 2007 before opening it, then potentially switching to OWA to
open it....

I will test what happens when I preview the message in relation to
what is written to the securetemp folder (don't have access right
now). I will also try to test the same scenario in Outlook 2003.

One strike for the hosted Exchange solution... and I was so sure that
Outlook would behave differently for the additional mailbox (NOT
download the attachment when previewing) before deciding to go with
the hosted solution....

I guess every other person who has an additional mailbox open and who
has a slow/remote Exchange server would experience the same problem?
How can I send feedback to MS about this?
 
can you open the mailbox directly, not as a secondary mailbox? then you
could cache it.
 
can you open the mailbox directly, not as a secondary mailbox? then you
could cache it.
Click to expand...
Yes, I could. Would that mean I need to close my Outlook first, and
then start up a 2nd profile where the additional mailbox is the cached
primary mailbox?

I assume I can't run 2 sessions of Outlook at the same time, one with
my primary mailbox cached, and one with a different mailbox cached?

I am thinking about the employees - they really need access to their
primary mailbox and the shared addtional mailbox at the same time...
 
What about doing the shared mailbox as a Public Folder instead of a mailbox
and then caching it? You can assign an e-mail address to the public folder
and control which employees have access.
Click to expand...

Is a public folder cached if Cached Exchange Mode is on? I don't think
it is. Otherwise I suspect I may run into the same issue? I really
would need to test the behaviour of a mail-enabled public folder and
the Preview Pane. In addition, employees can choose who they reply as
with the additional mailbox - I wonder if I can still do this with a
shared public folder (bear in mind my Exchange is now hosted, so I am
pretty limited in what I can do re: custom permissions).

Thanks for all replies to date, any further suggestions much
appreciated.
 
public folder favs can be cached.

they can reply as the PF, if they have send as permissions. if not, they
would need to use an imap or pop3 acct with that address configured to
send - having send as permissions makes it much easier.
 
public folder favs can be cached.

they can reply as the PF, if they have send as permissions. if not, they
would need to use an imap or pop3 acct with that address configured to
send - having send as permissions makes it much easier.
Click to expand...

my hosted Exchange providers offers public folders, but there is no
option to mail-enable them :( Plus they say "Public folders cannot be
accessed via OWA on E2007 platform in general" So the public-folder
solution doesn't seem viable. I think I'm stuck.

MVPs - can you give feedback to MS about this? This seems like an
issue which would affect anyone with a remote/slow Exchange and
additional mailboxes.
 
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