Article ID: 250398
Article Last Modified on 1/27/2007
APPLIES TO
- Microsoft Outlook 98 Standard Edition
- Microsoft Outlook 97 Standard Edition
- Microsoft Outlook 2000 Standard Edition
This article was previously published under Q250398
SYMPTOMS
When you try to view the details of an e-mail address that is in an Outlook contact, you may receive the following error message:
CAUSE
This behavior can occur because the e-mail address in the contact was added or modified with Outlook 97 in a public folder. If a different user that is located on another mailbox server in the site tries to access the e-mail address in this contact, the error message that is referenced in the "Symptoms" section occurs.
WORKAROUND
Use one of the following two methods to work around this behavior:
- Use Microsoft Outlook 98 or Microsoft Outlook 2000 to add e-mail addresses from the Global Address List (GAL) to your Outlook contacts.
-or-
- If you are using Outlook 97, create contacts that can be used by users on other servers that are in the Exchange site. To do this:
- Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.
- Click the Mail icon, click the Show Profiles box, double click the profile that you use to start Outlook, and then click Add.
- In the Add Service to Profile dialog box, double-click Personal Address Book in the Available information services box.
- Type the name and location of the file, click OK, and then click OK again.
- Start Outlook 97 with the profile that you just created or modified.
- Open your address book, and then click Global Address List in the Show names from the box
- Type the names that you want to add from your GAL to your PAB.
- On the File menu, click the Import and Export... Wizard, and then click Import from another program or file.
- Click Personal Address Book, and then import the Personal Address Book (PAB) that you created to a temporary Contact folder.
- Copy the temporary Contact folder contents to the public contact folder. As result, all information is stored as a one-off and you do not need to reference the GAL.
- Open your address book, and then click Contacts.
- Add the contacts one by one to your PAB.
- After you add all of the contacts to your PAB, continue with step 5 of the second work around.
STATUS
Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in Outlook 97.
MORE INFORMATION
Outlook 97 uses an Entry ID (EID) to link entries in the GAL to contact entries. The Exchange Server private store can provide a short-term or a long-term EID. In Outlook 97, a short-term EID is requested, which is only valid on the users local Exchange Server. This EID is added to the contact entry that is created. When a new user on another Exchange Server tries to open the contacts e-mail address, Outlook is not able to find the associated GAL entry based on the short-term EID in the contact.
As result, the error described in the "Symptoms" section of this article is displayed. Outlook 98 and Outlook 2000 use a long-term EID in contact entries instead of a short-term EID to reference the GAL, which are valid over the whole organization. So when users on other Exchange Servers open a contacts e-mail address, Outlook can find the associated GAL entry.
Keywords: kbprb KB250398