I Thought I Knew How To Do This...

[John King]

...than I thought.

OK, after thinking that I was happily using Thunderbird I found a couple of niggly glitches:
1) It has not imported the Sent Mail boxes from my Webmail and Yahoo accounts, only from Gmail;
2) I can't seem to save attachments, even using the "text with attachments" option;
3) That's all so far

So, I wondered whether Outlook does the same job. - And is that now just called "Mail" in Win 10?

- - - Updated - - -

OK, it seems that this happens with all POP accounts - no import of Sent Mail boxes, only Inbox.
(Dunno what happened with Gmail, then???)

Am, I have completely lost track of who is replying to whom, and what ...

Outlook is a desktop client which manages inbox, outbox, sent mail, drafts and junk mail in whatever folder structure you choose under these heads. It also manages contacts and calendars. It is the biggest industry standard around.

Outlook is an utterly different program from Mail and Outlook Express (but don't ever uninstall Outlook Express from an XP or earlier OS if running Outlook ... ).

I run Outlook 2003. It works fine. I backup the Outlook data file (default = "outlook.pst" - bad choice ... ) in many different places. My data file is currently over 6 GB in size.

[ameerat42]

Ta, JK. Just an update.

[Tannin]

Outlook isn't an "industry standard", it is an industry.

I'm not kidding. There is an entire worldwide industry devoted to safeguarding, backing up, restoring, recovering, and otherwise fixing up the incredible, cumbersome, obscure, chaotic mess that is Outlook and its brother in crime, Exchange. Thousands, literally thousands, of programs exist simply to plug one or more of the many gaping holes, usability disasters, and data integrity gaps Outlook has. Yes, a whole damn industry, and a big one, purely devoted to fixing all the problems with Outlook.

Well, at least some of them. Nothing can fix Outlook's innate complexity and obscurity, nor its comprehensive and extraordinary failure to follow basic industry standards, including many decreed by Microsoft themselves.

Compare, for instance, the difficulty and complexity of recovering data from a crashed system. With a properly designed email client (any properly designed email client - I'll use Thunderbird as my example but there are plenty of others) recovery is simplicity itself.

Let's suppose perhaps the most common of all data recovery situations. You have a crashed computer running Windows which cannot start up. You need to recover the email from it onto a new or rebuilt computer. You require the address book, the server settings and passwords, all of the custom user settings, and of course all of the stored emails. With Thunderbird (or any other decent email client), you simply install Thunderbird onto the new computer in the normal way. Then to recover the data and set every little thing up exactly as before, follow this very simple one-step process.

(1) Copy the data folder onto the new system.

That's it. There is no Step 2. You are finished. Job done. Everything works. Your system can send mail, get mail, knows the name and port and protocol of your mail server(s), retains your address book intact, and has all of your old emails stored exactly where you left them.

What's more, you didn't even have to think about looking for the data folder in 30 different places, each one more obscure than the last, nor did you have to worry about which particular version of the program you are using, nor did you have to wonder whether some of the data was stored in one place and some of it (for no good reason) stored in a different place. The data is stored exactly where it is supposed to be stored; stored where it belongs; stored, in fact, precisely where Microsoft's own rules say it should be stored: the standard Windows user data folder, which is where every other program designed since the stone age puts it. And what's more, that folder stores the whole of the data. Unlike Outlook, it doesn't leave important stuff out and require you to waste anything from minutes to days manually recreating stuff.

(On Windows XP and earlier this folder is c:\documents and settings\yourusername\application data\thunderbird. On later systems it is c:\users\yourusername\appdata\roaming\thunderbird. You will see that it is stored right next to all the other data folders for all your other programs, exactly where you would expect to find it. Notice the the "c:\users\yourusername\appdata\roaming" part is always the same, for any program. So all you really have to find to restore Thunderbird is the "Thunderbird" folder. The same applies to all all other good software.)

Exactly what do you need to copy? Just take the whole folder.

Where do you copy it to? The same place it came from, only on the new system.

How do you copy it? Any way you like. Drag and drop is fine.

What do you have to do after you have copied it to make the system start using it correctly? Nothing at all.

What special software do you need to make it work? None.

What special knowledge do you need, other than knowing where Windows recommends you put data files? None.

What special skills do you need? None.

What is a fair price to pay for someone doing this task for you? Anything over $20 is a rip-off. Most technicians wouldn't bother to charge for it at all. Anyone smart enough to hold a camera with the lens pointing outward and the viewfinder pointing inward doesn't even need a technician. you can do it yourself. Takes two minutes. Less than two minutes if you don't stop to put the kettle on.

So let's just repeat the procedure so that we are clear:

(1) Copy the data folder from the standard place on the old system to the standard place on the new system.

There is no Step 2. This works with any version of the software, old or new. It even works going from an ancient Windows XP system to a brand new Windows 10 system. It just works. And it's one easy step. Most other rescue, recovery, and maintenance tasks are equally simple.

I look forward to the reading the equivalent instructions for Outlook, though where the instructions for a properly designed program like Thunderbird can be summarised accurately in one short sentence, those for Outlook, if they are sufficiently comprehensive to be useful in the majority of situations across different software and Windows versions, will fill several pages at very least, and quite often an entire book or expensive IT course.

(Actually, I lied. I won't really read the Outlook instructions. I'll just laugh at how long and complicated they are, or (if I happen to feel like it) I'll point out a few of the many gaping holes there will be in them short of a novel-length reply. I've spent half a lifetime being paid to deal with that steaming pile of donkey vomit known as Outlook and Exchange, and no matter how much money I made from it on the day, it was never enough to make up for the experience. Retirement from that horrorshow couldn't come fast enough.)

[arthurking83]

..... Retirement from that horrorshow couldn't come fast enough.

So the upside of Outlook is that it allowed you a retirement.

If everyone had migrated to Thunderbird .. they'd never have enlisted your services to repair dud software .. and you'd still be slaving your life away.

[John King]

Tony, with Outlook, you copy one file from wherever it is on one system to wherever you want it on the other system. By default, it is exactly where Microsoft says to put all data - in the user data folders.

This location is the one place data should (almost) never be stored, particularly on multiuser systems where all users require access to the same data.

The standard location is also almost impossible to backup because of all the other crap stored there.

It is also where poxware will look first for data it might want.

Outlook also comes with its own database repair tool - scanpst.exe. Works very well.

You might think I disagree with almost everything you said. You would be right. Outlook provides a complete solution to personal communications and associated functions. To my knowledge, no other program provides such broad and simple integration. Certainly not Thunderbird ...

[ameerat42]

Lots of info, ta...

[Tannin]

Cheers John.

with Outlook, you copy one file from wherever it is on one system to wherever you want it on the other system No you don't. You have to set up the entire communication system again - accounts, server names, passwords, ports, the lot. And all manually. (Unless you have spent whatever it takes to enrich the Outlook-fix industry by buying software specifically designed to fix this particular one of Outlook's many problems.)

By default, it is exactly where Microsoft says to put all data - in the user data folders. Not so. I can't even remember how many different places the various Outlook and associated Microsoft mail product versions have dreamed up to store their data over the years, but there have been plenty. Outlook is very nearly the only program to store user data in such an obscure location. Everything else puts it where it belongs - in users/username/appdata/

(the standard location) is the one place data should (almost) never be stored Requires no comment.

is also almost impossible to backup because of all the other crap stored there. Nonsense. It's the easiest thing in the world to backup. I have no idea how many times I have backed up the data stored in that location over the years, but it would be many thousands. Utterly trouble-free.

Outlook also comes with its own database repair tool Compare to properly designed programs which (a) tend not to mess up their databases in the first place, and (b) have this facility built in. (Thunderbird is an example. There are others.)

Outlook does have an advantage in the corporate world where its non-email features are useful, and where there is an expensive and highly skilled IT department to overcome its many failings. Without that backup, it's a minefield of difficulty and complexity. And as for Exchange, nothing I could say here would do it justice. I'd rather kiss a Cane Toad than work with Exchange again.

[John King]

We will just have to agree to disagree, Tony.

Third party s/w is usually a security nightmare (security? What's security ... ); and has given me more grief over many years than I care to contemplate for all sorts of reasons.

I won't even start on Chunderbird.

[Tannin]

Cheers John. Yes, I don't think we will ever agree on this one. Security, of course, is vastly superior with open source software where problems with the code are right there for all the world to see. No secret bugs. In the trade, back in the day when the awful Outlook Express was common, we always used to call it Outbreak Express. In those days, Outbreak Outlook used to practice a number of downright insanities, notably auto-running macros and auto-opening attachments. Yes, it's hard to believe, but it's a fact: a number of the all-time biggest world-wide virus events were specific to Outlook. That was back in ... oh ... probably about Windows 98 days. They have fixed it up a bit since then, obviously.

For those of us with grey hair and long memories, here is a flashback to one of them more famous ones: https://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/...melissa-virus/

[John King]

Outlook and Outlook Express are very different programs, which I'm sure you know.

Completely different data model, just for starters.

Some myths persist in spite of all evidence to the contrary - e.g. that Macs can't/don't get viruses ... Where does the term "rootkit" come from again? .

And nothing will protect against a user doing something ill-advised.