Custom Outlook forms will not open

[CCripe]

We have a library of Outlook forms on a network drive. All of a sudden a few
users cannot open ANY of these forms. They get the following message, "The
custom form could not be opened. Outlook will use an Outlook form instead."

On the individual computer, I cleared the forms cache and also made sure the
"Send form definition with item" box is not checked.

This started with one person....now there are three or four who cannot open
the forms. Ideas?

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

Outlook version? Does "a library of Outlook forms on a network drive" mean a bunch of .oft files?

 

[CCripe]

1. Outlook Version = Outlook 2003
2. "library of Outlook forms...." = Yes, a bunch of .oft files.

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

If these forms have custom fields associated with them, the users will need to open them with the Tools | Forms | Choose Form command.

--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Microsoft Outlook 2007 Programming:
Jumpstart for Power Users and Administrators
http://www.outlookcode.com/article.aspx?id=54

 

[CCripe]

This worked, so thank you for the work around. Do you have any ideas why
this suddenly stopped working? I 'm still curious why this happened. We've
had the current setup for years, so not sure why all of a sudden these forms
stopped working on a handful of computers.

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

Beginning with Outlook 2003 SP2, a change was made in the behavior of ..oft files. The article at http://support.microsoft.com/?id=907985 explains this change in more detail, suggests best practices, and provides registry keys that can return Outlook 2003 to the older, less secure behavior.
--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Microsoft Outlook 2007 Programming:
Jumpstart for Power Users and Administrators
http://www.outlookcode.com/article.aspx?id=54

 

[Richard Price]

That MS article does indeed talk about changes beginning with SP2, but
strangely, I have a form saved as an .oft file which worked quite happily
with SP2, but has stopped working now I've installed SP3. This is the old
"While You Were Out" message form which I downloaded from the MS site back in
the days when we had Outlook 98, although I think it was actually designed
for Outlook 97. (I can still open the copy of this form which is in my
Personal Forms Library via the Tools | Forms | Choose Form route, but that's
not ideal.)

Richard