100% dumb about Outlook

[LifelineIT]

So..situation is as follows:
I switched a client over from a very expensive POP provider to Google Apps a couple years ago. (This is an NPO)

At the time, there were no mobile devices or anything in use, and the client wanted to stick with POP over IMAP.

Now I've got two large PST's (one is ~1.5Gb, one is 3Gb), and we're on a brand new machine bringing outlook back up, and we're switching to IMAP.

She needs access to those old PST's because there is contract info in there from ~5 years ago. Anyway...what's my best practice here? Using Outlook 2007. That's also where all her contacts are for now.

As far as I understand it, I

• Add the IMAP account
• Then somehow add the old PST's as data files? Or do I import them?

I tried adding the new account, at which point it proceeds to download the ~32k emails sitting on the server, which I guess is OK. Importing the old PST duplicates a lot of that stuff, and/or takes a million years. I've also somehow got 3 sets of personal folders here now and it won't let me delete any of them. So...I'm going to just start from scratch. I know this can't be this hard...any help is appreciated.

 

[nlinecomputers]

You need to stop trying to use the mail system as an archive.

If you need to store mail then get a mail archive system.

MailStore.com

 

[LifelineIT]

I'm aware. The system is changed now, but that doesn't help the mess I've got here.

 

[nlinecomputers]

I'm aware. The system is changed now, but that doesn't help the mess I've got here.

Yes it does. You don't shove her old PST files into her current mail. You import them into the archive program and be done with them. And it is index and searchable for the few times they need to get to it.

 

[LifelineIT]

Right. I get that there's a "institutional best practice" way to do things, and then I get that there's a "what the rest of the world actually does" way of doing things. Tiny NPO, tiny budget, with administration that's been searching outlook for things since Outlook came around, and I can't even get them to use the web interface for Google Apps instead, so a standalone mail archive software solution isn't gonna work for this client. Thanks, though.

I'm fairly certain that I can add the old PST's as data files while actually working in a new PST, I'm just not sure of the order of operations to do it.

 

[nlinecomputers]

A 5 user license is $190 bucks. How much are they paying you an hour to frak with this?

And the software integrates with Outlook. So they don't have to loose there favorite interface. Maybe you should actually visit the site and read up on the software before you flame it. You might even notice an even cheaper alternative.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

GMail has no way of directly importing contacts from an Outlook PST..that I know of. They did have a sync tool which they pulled a year or so ago.

You can export the contacts from your PST to a CSV file...and GMail can import that into its contacts. However...takes a few tries, and adjusting...format 'n stuff.

There are some 3rd party tools you can use, such as Outlook4GMail.
http://www.snapfiles.com/get/outlook4gmail.html

FYI, GMail's IMAP doesn't work well with Office 2007...should update to 2010, or 2013.

But...Outlook ...and GMail...they just won't work well together. Users that really use Outlook, will see the shortcomings of Google mail. They will probably end up using there local new PST that the GMail connection will build..and that will not sync up with GMail. So you have separate contacts all over the place.

Outlook really likes to stay in bed with Exchange. Since they're NPO..they can get Office 365 for dirt cheap, even free for first year.

 

[nlinecomputers]

GMail has no way of directly importing contacts from an Outlook PST..that I know of. They did have a sync tool which they pulled a year or so ago.

You can export the contacts from your PST to a CSV file...and GMail can import that into its contacts. However...takes a few tries, and adjusting...format 'n stuff.

There are some 3rd party tools you can use, such as Outlook4GMail.
http://www.snapfiles.com/get/outlook4gmail.html

FYI, GMail's IMAP doesn't work well with Office 2007...should update to 2010, or 2013.

But...Outlook ...and GMail...they just won't work well together. Users that really use Outlook, will see the shortcomings of Google mail. They will probably end up using there local new PST that the GMail connection will build..and that will not sync up with GMail. So you have separate contacts all over the place.

Outlook really likes to stay in bed with Exchange. Since they're NPO..they can get Office 365 for dirt cheap, even free for first year.

And that option will also have email archiving IIRC.

 

[LifelineIT]

I got it, and it wasn't complicated. The challenge is that Windows 8 doesn't make it easy for you to yank a mail profile because the mail settings applet isn't easy to get to.

The correct answer, in case anyone reads this ever again, is:
--set up new account in outlook
--go to account settings, data files, and add the old PST's. This doesn't import them, make duplicates, or anything, but it lets them be easily searchable.
--I then just had to copypasta the contacts from the old pst to the new one in the contacts pane.

Now...I did find GoogleSyncMod to keep the contacts synced, trying it now.

And yeah, I know it doesn't work well. It works exceptionally less well in Outlook 07 with Windows 8.1. Heh. The goal is to get her completely out of Outlook as nobody else at the agency uses it and it isn't necessary, and she's now 95% out of her ipad anyway.

Thanks for the links Stonecat, I think I got it sorted now. Hoping the autofill entries will autopopulate...whee.

Edit: Also, Office365 would be free for us if we didn't need desktop versions of the apps. The challenge is that we've already got an onsite backup solution (a 12Tb Synology array) and we're using gapps, so we've already got mail backup. Using Office365 Outlook to pull gmail and thus bypass the local and already integrated backups seems dumb, especially because the gmail webapp is really very very powerful if you know how to use it.

 

[SAG]

I think I got it sorted now. Hoping the autofill entries will autopopulate...whee.

That would be the N2K file I do believe.

 

[LifelineIT]

I thought so too...but it seems strangely missing.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Yup back with Outlook 2007 (and prior) it was those nickname files, the .NK2.
Starting with Outlook 2010 those are now stored in the PST database (if home user...pop, etc) or up in the mailbox of Exchange (if business user).

Yeah that's anothey way of skinning it...create fresh virgin mailbox (PST), drag 'n drop from the old PST.
I though you wanted to bring the contacts up to Google though. You just moved them from one PST, to another PST. Still local only.

 

[LifelineIT]

I did. The challenge was that because I didn't import, I just added data files, it didn't import the contacts, so I had to move them over.

I want to use the G-cloud to keep the contacts in order, so I had to go outlook to Google, then google to ipad/other devices, and I got that, but of course the contacts were a little buggered up.

 

[Vicenarian]

Yeah you can just 'Open' a PST in Outlook, and then you can drag/drop items (mail/contacts/calendar data) from one PST to another PST/account. You can also do an import from a PST to your new email account, but just select to import one folder (such as Contacts, etc.)

 

[TenYardFight]

administration that's been searching outlook for things since Outlook came around, and I can't even get them to use the web interface for Google Apps...

This is an important takeaway for all of us here. If they like Outlook, don't put them on Google Apps.

 

[LifelineIT]

Haha. Too true. I mistakenly thought I could migrate her away...

I'll have to look into that "open a PST" business.

I also finally got smart and used the before:yyyy/mm/dd gmail search to locate and isolate all her old email, so now I can start over without it trying to download the whole mess...I think.

 

[Vicenarian]

Are you trying to migrate mail from Gmail to an Outlook PST?

If so, why not open the Gmail account via IMAP in Outlook, do a search for messages from your specified date range, and then drag/drop them into the Outlook PST folder you want to move them to.

 

[LifelineIT]

Vicenarian-
Sorta, but not really, part of this was that I did a dumb (a series of dumb) things.

I've go ~2 years of email in the gmail archive, right where it's supposed to be (or they are now, they were in the inbox). Those emails ALSO exist, already downloaded, in a PST. I've ALSO got ANOTHER PST from before that, stretching back an additional ~5 years, way before I was ever part of the picture. Those emails need to be accessible if not loaded every day.

The issue is that I WANT all the IMAP folders to exist as Gmail tags, which they will do if I just create (or drag and drop them) to the active account personal folders in Outlook. HOWEVER, those folders are already populated in the second, newer, PST, which again, I want, as it's actually ~22k emails.

I just went through this on another machine in the same office when I finally got her OFF outlook and into the web interface for gmail/cal, uploading all those emails took a bazillion years (and continuously wanted to crash Outlook) even just doing ~500 at a time, even on a big fat business connection. 20Mbit up, fwiw.

So part of the issue is that as soon as I connected the (new) account in the (new) install of Outlook, it was trying to download all ~22k emails sitting in the gmail inbox, which takes forever but ALSO duplicates all the emails in the 2 year old PST.

I was too stupid to realize that all I needed to do was use the integrated "before:yyyy/mm/dd" syntax in the google search, then select/all, and archive everything older than say, 5 days, or ~21900 emails, leaving only ~100 in the inbox for outlook to download, thus preventing dupes and allowing me to add in the folders...or not, again just leaving the old PST's as data files that remain searchable whenever but not actively indexed or accessed.

Another part of the kludge here is that, as far as I can tell, Windows 8.1 genuinely hates Outlook 2007.

A bunch of people have told me to move to Office365, which is free for this NPO if they don't want desktop apps. But using online outlook to archive an IMAP of a Google email seems completely, utterly, ridiculously stupid, especially when google already provides such a powerful tool in the gmail web app, and when we're already mirroring the PST on the local NAS, 3 revisions deep.

The user has now mostly switched to ipad access for her email, which is jim dandy as far as I'm concerned.

 

[TechPJC]

But...Outlook ...and GMail...they just won't work well together.

The opposite (i.e. Outlook and GMail working well together) would have been strange...