We have had reports from Entourage 2008 Exchange users, that emails and events are showing up as folders. The developer that is working on this problem is not able to reproduce and suspects it might be database corruption. He is asking for your help. If anyone that is experiencing this problem can provide a database for testing, please contact me via the comments. If you can’t provide a database, please send in the answers to the questions below.
[Note: This problem was never fixed in Entourage 2008. Options to fix. Create a new Identity and let Entourage 2008 connect back to your Exchange account. DO NOT REBUILD! This can make it worse and problems can sync back to server. or 2) Upgrade to Outlook for Mac 2011 to resolve this issue.]
He is asking these specific questions of folks who have experienced the problem:
- Does this repro on Exchange 2003 only, or has anyone seen this on Exchange 2007, too?
- Is your Entourage identity configured with only 1 account, or do you have more than one account?
- Did the problem happen after a rebuild or an update?
If you are experiencing the problem, could you please try creating a new Identity and let your account sync. If the problem goes away, let us know. If you have done a rebuild of your Identity, and tried after that to create a new Identity did that work?
Please include
- Version of Entourage you are using e.g. Entourage 2008 12.1.2
- Version of Exchange server. e.g. 2003 or 2007
- Version of OS. e.g. 10.5.5
- Type of machine. e.g. MacBook, iMac
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Yes, happened to me twice on my Powerbook G4 with 10.5.5 and both versions 12.1.3 and 12.1.4. Once it happened after a crash and could not be fixed with rebuild of the database. Had to restore from backup. Lost all events and messages on the server. Only one identity.
Also happened on another’s MacBook after setting up the exchange account. Also happened when trying to merge identities from Entourage 2004.
Not sure which server version but we are supporting Office 2007 on the PC’s.
I forwarded your comments to the developer. He might be contacting you for followup questions. Be on the look out for a message from Ash Savage. Try adding microsoft.com to your safe domains.
We have a user with Entourage 2008 (v 12.1.4) connected to an Exchange 2007 server, who has experienced Emails that appear as a folder with an extension in the subject of .eml. This user is using a MacBookPro with Mac OS 10.5.5.
We have created a new identity for the users and this appears to have solved this problem for now.
The person did have two accounts in her original Main Identity. One to her exchange account and the other to her old IMAP account. The problem did occur after an update to 12.1.4 in conjunction with a low disk space situation (which has since been addressed).
I have gotten a copy of the user’s Main Identity folder with the database, if the developer should want access to it.
Hi Clifford, I forwarded your comments to the developer. He might be contacting you for followup questions and to set up a download for the Identity. Be on the look out for a message from Ash Savage. Try adding microsoft.com to your safe domains.
I just got this today:
Entourage 12.1.4
Exchange 2007
OS X 10.5.5
MacBook (2.16GHz Intel Core 2 Duo)
Identity has only one account configured. About 2 mo back I had an additional IMAP account configured but have since deleted it.
The issue occurred after doing a database rebuild (37.5GB -> 3GB, I’m still baffled as to why I must do this every few months).
Another rebuild did not repair the problem.
During the rebuild I *was* using OWA, reading emails, deleting, sorting (normal every day actions). I’m not sure if this had any affect or not.
I just tried creating a new identify, this did not help. Right as the client started retrieving mail I had a number of EML folders.
I’m quite sick of this program and it’s endless bugs. It’s been a month and MS still doesn’t have a fix? This is a great reminder of why I moved to Mac and avoid MS products at all costs.
Yes that could be part of the problem. It’s recommended that when you have only an Exchange account that you just create a new Identity and let Entourage sync back up to your account.
It’s possible your might need to replace your account with a backup from the server.
BTW, 37.5 GB is HUGE!!
Let me know if this helps.
–
Diane
I didn’t see this message when I suggested you create a new Identity. Can you check to see if your IT can provide a backup from the server’s backup. That’s what Exchange servers are for….backup of your data.
This is not an official Microsoft support site. Send feedback to Microsoft.
When working in Office, you can use the “Send Feedback” option under the Help menu in all of the Office applications or visit
This just happened to one of my users. They are running Entourage 2008 and ran into a disk space issue, then they were required to verify or rebuild the database in order for Entourage to work correctly. Since doing this they ended up having double Contacts which I deleted. Now all new messages are coming in right under the Inbox (just like in your pic above). I have tried to compact the db 16>8GB but that did not fix the issue. I am trying to verify and rebuild the db but I think I will only resolve this by recreating this identity. This guy is a very high up person that is in charge of 6 different companies and has a 6GB mailbox. This problem just started to happend and he will not be impressed if we have to recreate the identity every couple months.
Let me know if you guys have had any progress on this.
Dave
You posted the same question under two different blog entries. This is rude! I answered your question yesterday and sent you a private message with help.
We donate our time so asking two different people to reply to your question is not acceptable.
–
Diane Ross, Microsoft Mac MVP
Entourage Help Page
Entourage Help Blog
You posted the same question under two different blog entries. This is rude! I answered your question yesterday and sent you a private message with help.
We donate our time so asking two different people to reply to your question is not acceptable.
To make matters worse, from your link it appears you are getting paid to help this guy and now you are abusing our free support. Don’t ever ask again on this blog. you are banned!
Hi Diane,
I have gone through the posts above and find myself a bit confused.
I started having this same problem two weeks ago whereby my Entourage inbox (Exchange 2003) is keeping empty folders with the .eml extension for every mail in the inbox. It is also happening in a few of the other folders. When I launch Outlook, running on Windows 7 through VMWare, I have no issues.
As a note, I am using two IMAP accounts in Entourage, and they have no problem
The other information I thought could be relevant is that I started using the BlackBerry service, on a Nokia E90 running BlacBerry Connect, about the same time that this problem started. I am accessing my mails through OWA onto the device, and not using the BlackBerry Enterprise Server.
I am using:
MacBook 2 GHz Core 2 Duo – 4 GB Ram
MAC OSX V10.5.6
Entourage 2008 – V12.1.5
Your assistance/advice would be most highly appreciated.
Thank you.
Charles
The best option to resolve this issue seems to be creating a new Identity in Entourage. If you have a database you could share for testing it might help them find the cause. However, no one in business has been able to share one because of confidential info in their databases.
Sorry there is no better news on a fix for this.
Hi Diane,
Thank you for your feedback, and my apologies for coming back to you late. One of the disadvantages of globetrotting I guess.
I will try with the creation of a new identity when I am back in my office next week as it would be easier to synchronize.
As for my database, I would be happy to share with you, if you feel that this would ultimately lead to a greater good. I am sure my data is in safe hands.
Please advise on a secure way to upload. This will also be done next week as I have a large database and will only be able to upload once I am back in home country next week.
Thank you.
Charles
I’m checking to see if there is a procedure to upload large files now. It’s a problem for me as a consultant finding ways other than burning Identities to a DVD and mailing them. Most services limit you to 1 GB at a time. You would think Microsoft would have some way figured out to do this by now.
Kindly send me an address to send the DVD to and I will burn in the next couple of days.
Thanks.
I sent you a private message with my address.
I am having the same problem. The emails that I send out appear as a folder with the suffix .emi on it, but nothing in the folder.
Please let me know exactly what I need to do in order to send you the database. I also am not sure what to do to get a new identity, and what will that do to all my emails etc.
Morry Blumenfeld
Do you have other accounts or just Exchange?
The only way to fix the problem is to create a new Identity.
1) Under Entourage in the Menu bar, select “Switch Identity”
2) Click on “new”
3) Enter your Exchange account info and let Entourage sync back up. This should clear up the problem. It’s possible your IT will have to replace your mail on the server with a backup. BTW, how large is your database?
I sent you a message privately with instructions on getting private consulting help if the above does not fix your problem.
Same problem.
After identity was recreated I lost all my messages on Exchange server. I have backup of my local DB but it contains those .EML folders. How I can fix my old database and synchronize it with Exchange server?
When you created a new Identity, are you saying when you synced back to the server those messages disappeared? Can you provide exact steps on how you created the new Identity and account?
We too are fighting this issue with a user in my company.
Entourage 12.1.9
Exchange 2007
10.5.7 on a MacBook Pro.
We we advised by our Exchange host to make a new profile, and use the Export function to create a .rge file to import mail new. Unfortunately, Entourage consistently fails with a “there was a problem saving one of your messages” error, so I can’t make a .rge export. I’m manually dragging folders to make .mbox exports right now, in hopes they can be imported to a clean profile….
This is a serious problem, and quite frustrating that it’s been documented in October, 2008 and still not addressed by July, 2009.
If export as .rge fails for all items, then export by individual item. It’s possible there is corruption in other items than messages.
There is a script that will do this for you and it gets subfolders. It will fail on the folder with corruption. When you find the folder that contains corruption, you will have to divide the folder and drag each subfolder to desktop to finally get to the corrupt message(s). I’ve had some folders that it took over 10 subfolders to get to the bad message. A lot depends on number of messages in the folder.
Export folders as MBOX files (includes subfolders)
Diane,
Thanks for the script- I’d already manually drug the folders to a Finder window to create .mbox archives. Thankfully he kept all his folders in one long, shallow hierarchy.
This foldername####.eml problem has made a complete mess out of my bosses Exchange mailbox. The bug can change the content *on the exchange server* into these .eml folders- it’s not contained specifically in the Entourage database. We verified this by both seeing the folders in OWA, and having them replicated into Entourage when a brand new identity was created. There is a GIANT problem in the interaction between Entourage and Exchange, which has led to data loss for us.
I want to be able to trust an industry powerhouse like Microsoft with our email, but Entourage has just proven that we can’t.
I wasn’t aware that the problem synced back up to the server. I agree this is totally unacceptable. Please send feedback to Microsoft and I will also forward this on to my contacts so they know it is affecting mail on the server.
Send MSFT feedback
Feedback sent. I’m glad you’re sending it too- in hopes that the voice of an MVPS with direct access to contacts speaks louder than me filling in the feedback form that anyone can type into.
First of all, Diane is my hero(ine)!
You have the patience of Job to deal with all this and a variety of replies with varying tones of frustration.
Anyway, I was simply “relieved” to see that I was not alone with this issue that cropped up over the weekend. I will take your advice and create a new identity and conduct a new sync and report back to you the results either way.
I am more that happy to share my database with your developer if you so desire.
Just FYI, now that Apple’s mail app can connect to exchange servers I decided to give that a try to see what happens. Everything works fine when using mail.. none of the .eml folders show, just the correct mail. Go Figure.
My General Manager is experiencing the same issue. The .eml folders were even put into his contacts folder.
I hope that you have produced a different fix than just creating a new identity. Because this is the GM, he cannot give up his machine long enough to go through the long process of re-syncing from a backup.
Is there another fix to this?
OS 10.6.2
MacBook Pro
Entourage is version 13.
There is no other fix. I suggest doing this at night or on the week-end.
I also encourage you to send Microsoft feedback.
Send MSFT feedback
Diane,
Have you received any info back from Microsoft that would indicate if there’s any hope in resolving/preventing this? It’s happened again in my company, separating a user from her email and keeping me from doing anything else useful while I try to fix this…..
AFAIK there is no fix other than to create a new Identity and let Entourage sync back up to the server. Sorry!!
So, is the correct process to create an RGE file, then a new Identity, import the RGE, then synch? I have a bunch of locally saved messages I can’t lose.
Thanks for your patience!
WFM
You can export as .rge or .MBOX files.
Export folders as MBOX files script (includes subfolders)
What about the situation where the damage appears to have been sync’d to the server? There is a set of messages in the inbox which show up as folders.eml under Apple Mail, Entourage (new identity), and OWA.
Your IT should be able to restore from a backup.
For us, this seems to be happening more and more and in almost every case, the folders do sync back to the server. Unfortunately, we’ve had users who don’t notice the corruption for months. As a result, there are thousands of eml folders, and no practical way to use backups as a method of correcting the issue.
I would need to check with legal, but I may be able to provide you with a sample, if you’re still looking for samples.
I’ll check to see if they still want samples.
I’m not sure, but it’s possible that the EWS version is not having this issue. Do you qualify to upgrade to EWS?
Requirements
* Microsoft Exchange Server: Connectivity to Update Rollup 4 for Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1 (KB952580) or later version.
o Update Rollup 4 for Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1 (KB952580) must be applied to both the Mailbox server and the Client Access server roles.
* Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac 12.2.1 Update
Hi Diane,
Thanks for that info. We just recently upgraded to SP2 on our Exchange 2007 servers, and I’m not sure which rollup of sp1 we were on beforehand. Most users don’t have the EWS version of Entourage, but their computers should be able to handle the update. I’ll work with our mac guys to push out the update to people, and will update the thread if we have any occurrances on the EWS version.
I have a user experiencing this…
1.) Exchange 2007, his machine is a MacBook Pro running 10.6.3
2.) Entourage is configured to only one account
3.) Problem did not start happening after a rebuild or update
I’ll try rebuilding his identity tomorrow, and I’ll let you have the feedback on that then.
I don’t advise rebuilding. I would create a new Identity and let Entourage download all messages from the server. I’ve had reports where a user did a rebuild and then all the bad crap was synced back to the server compounding the problem.
I just got hit by this yesterday, so far it has not synced back to the server. I have a 4GB database, this appeared after a rebuild due to Entourage suddenly wanting to download 2000 messages again in two POP accounts. Has there been any resolution? Everyone keeps saying “this will be fixed by Outlook for Mac” but that’s so unacceptable.
First keeping thousands of POP messages on the server is not what POP is designed to do. Second, rebuilding Entourage will not fix downloading mail from the server. It will actually cause you to download all old mail since the message IDs are reset during a rebuild. Usually this happens when the server does a reboot and resets message IDs.
You can move messages out of the Inbox using your browser so you don’t have to download again in the future. Entourage only sees the Inbox for POP accounts.
The only resolution is to create a new Identity.
If you want your views to be known, you need to let Microsoft know. Under Help in the Menu bar you can select to send feedback. We are not an official Microsoft site.
Actually, the rebuild solved the POP problem (and FYI, it is 3 POP accounts and 2 week’s worth of mail, I don’t keep stuff past 2 weeks) but introduced the Exchange problem. I have reverted back to the pre-rebuild database and am cautiously syncing it to Exchange…
I would export the POP messages as either .rge or MBOX files and import those into a new Identity THEN sync back to your Exchange account.
You can drag over the Sig and Rules files, but you have to reset folder IDs in Rules.
Well, the end result of all of this is that 9 year’s worth of email is gone. The IT people are attempting to pull a backup from the Exchange server, but they are not hopeful. The folder structure in my Exchange account is still 95% there, but every folder is empty, and the only messages in my inbox are from the day of the error onward. I have a Time Machine backup from my home machines running 10.6 that I will try and convert to a format acceptable to Entourage and re-upload to the server, but it’s 25,000 files in a complicated folder structure. It’s going to take weeks.
Rest assured, I have sent ‘feedback’ to Microsoft, I was even relatively calm!
I think the lesson is, if you see this error, BACK UP IMMEDIATELY. Do not trust the data retention policies in place on the Exchange server. I wish I had known this.
Do you have the copy that was made during the rebuild? It has [backed up xxxxxx] after the name? You can use switch Identity to try reverting and salvage some data.