Some Users unable to Compose form until they have been the recipie

[Guest]

I have created a form and ran into a strange problem. Some users are unable
to compose the form unless they are first the recipient of the form. I
emailed the OFT file as an attachment and when they open it they see nothing,
but if I open the OFT file, put the user's name in as the recipient and Send,
once they receive the email and open it, they will see the form as it is
inteded to be seen. They can then close and delete the form they just
received and re-open the OFT file I sent as an attachment and it will work
correctly. Does anyone have any idea why this is happening and what I can do
to fix this globally instead of having to deal with it on an individual basis?

 

[Guest]

I don't know if it matters, but I searched and found some advice to someone
to Publish the form under Organizational Forms... or something like that. I
have never published a form. I have only saved them as OFT templates. Could
this be the cause of my problems?

 

[Hollis Paul [MVP - Outlook]]

I have created a form and ran into a strange problem. Some users are unable
to compose the form unless they are first the recipient of the form. I
emailed the OFT file as an attachment and when they open it they see nothing,

That is because, in the name of security, Microsoft no longer allows .oft to be
run from a form. You have to save it to disk. Then you have to open it, which
places it as an item in the default folder of its type, in the users mailbox.
So, when they close it, they have to find it in their mailbox folder of that
type.

But if I open the OFT file, put the user's name in as the recipient and Send,
once they receive the email and open it, they will see the form as it is
inteded to be seen. They can then close and delete the form they just
received and re-open the OFT file I sent as an attachment and it will work
correctly. Does anyone have any idea why this is happening and what I can do
to fix this globally instead of having to deal with it on an individual basis?

I suspect that this works because the send and receive process installs the form
into the users cache, and confuses the security mechanism which would ordinarily
prevent it from opening. I would not count on using this mechanism forever,
because, if it comes to the attention of the security hawks, it will be treated
and a security flaw and prevented, also.

What you really should be doing is publishing it to the Exchange Organizational
Folder, and the user will pick it up from there. This, of course, leaves the
great unwashed segment of Outlook users, that do not have an Exchange server,
out in the cold. Microsoft has not shown very much concern for that particular
user base. So, if your operation gets along just fine without an Exchange
server, you are stuck with telling your users to save the attachment to memory,
and opening it from there, and then find the closed item in there default mail
delivery folder of the same type as the item in the .oft. Not nice.

You may have also noticed another security precaution where you cannot open a
new item and get to Forms Design from that new message's toolbar. You have to
put something in it, save it, and then open it again to get the Tools > Forms
option. Just doing a CTRL-S doesn't get you the Forms option. You actually
have to close the item. I would have been really peeved if that nonsense had
been necessary back when I was interested in designing forms.

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

You should either publish the form to the Organizational Forms library or instruct users to open the .oft file by saving it to their hard drive, then using the Tools | Forms | Choose Form command.

--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003

and Microsoft Outlook Programming - Jumpstart for
Administrators, Power Users, and Developers