Imap support in Outlook - Multi PC Synchronised email and contact solution.

[Dave Smithz]

Hi there,

Is it just me, but why is IMAP support so bad in Outlook. I need to set up
someone who just had a few PC's in their office (5 tops). Each are running
different versions of Outlook and they are very light users of the PC to
justify getting a server and supporting it.

We wanted to get the Contacts and emails synchronised so sending email from
1 PC will show up on others and updating a contacts details will show across
the network.

Surely this can be achieved in a ROBUST, way that is easy to use without
having to spend an arm and leg on server technology. That is all we want and
thought IMAP was the way, but we have many problems. Any suggestions please!
Surely many people have this setup working somehow around the world.

Kind regards

Dave

 

[Diane Poremsky [MVP]]

imap doesn't support contacts, only email. What versions of outlook do you
have? Support is best in Outlook 2003.

 

[Dave Smithz]

imap doesn't support contacts, only email. What versions of outlook do you
have? Support is best in Outlook 2003.

A minute of Outlook 2003, 2002 and 2000.

Even if we do not go the IMAP route, what other suggestions are there for
sharing contacts without the need to buy and setup an Exchange server.

 

[Diane Poremsky [MVP]]

options are here - http://www.slipstick.com/outlook/share.htm

 

[Brian Tillman]

Is it just me, but why is IMAP support so bad in Outlook. I need to
set up someone who just had a few PC's in their office (5 tops). Each
are running different versions of Outlook and they are very light
users of the PC to justify getting a server and supporting it.

We wanted to get the Contacts and emails synchronised so sending
email from 1 PC will show up on others and updating a contacts
details will show across the network.

IMAP folders contain only mail items. IMAP has no concept of "contacts".
Your Contacts are completely separate from the IMAP account, so there's no
way to share them via an IMAP server. You'll still need some tool as
outlined here to share them:
http://www.slipstick.com/outlook/share.htm

Surely this can be achieved in a ROBUST, way that is easy to use
without having to spend an arm and leg on server technology. That is
all we want and thought IMAP was the way, but we have many problems.
Any suggestions please! Surely many people have this setup working
somehow around the world.

Outlook Express does a better job at handling IMAP and it's also easier to
pass a WIndows Address Book file between systems to synchronize the contacts
it contains, in my opinion.

 

[Dave Smithz]

Dave Smithz <[email protected]> wrote:

IMAP folders contain only mail items. IMAP has no concept of "contacts".
Your Contacts are completely separate from the IMAP account, so there's no
way to share them via an IMAP server. You'll still need some tool as
outlined here to share them:
http://www.slipstick.com/outlook/share.htm

Thanks for this. Any suggestions on which of the solutions on this webpage
is best? See the guys using the PC are very non technical and do not like
change. They are used to Outlook (as I was thinking of moving them to
Thunderbird for IMAP email - but this leaves no contact handling solution).
Anyway, I might have to opt for one of these extension software packages.
I just want it to be REALLY easy to use.

Therefore as far as they are concerned they still carry on using it as
normal, only when they send an email from one PC, they can see it in the
sent email on another (they all share one email account).

When they update a contact details on one PC, they can see the updates on
the other PC's

And being EASY is the key.

Cheers

Dave

 

[Brian Tillman]

Any suggestions on which of the solutions on this webpage is best?

I've never used any of them, so I can't recommend any. Perhaps someone else
has and can say which one they've used and how it has worked for them.