unable to export Outlook 2007 address book email address

[Amy Jones]

We are using Vista Outlook 2007 in our office.
We use the address book inside the Outlook 2007 to set the outgoing email
address.
In the Outlook 2007, we try to export the address book person name and email
address.
We tried all methods, but the email address field in the exported file are
always empty.
What did we do wrong? Thank you.

 

[Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]]

You don't export from the Address Book - you export from the Contacts
folder.

--
Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]

Post all replies to the group to keep the discussion intact.
ALWAYS post your Outlook version.
How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/KB/555375


After furious head scratching, Amy Jones asked:

| We are using Vista Outlook 2007 in our office.
| We use the address book inside the Outlook 2007 to set the outgoing
| email address.
| In the Outlook 2007, we try to export the address book person name
| and email address.
| We tried all methods, but the email address field in the exported
| file are always empty.
| What did we do wrong? Thank you.

 

[Russ Valentine]

There is no address book in Outlook. Nor would you ever use Export to
transfer Outlook data.
Clarify what you want to do and we'll do our best to bring you back into
reality.

 

[Karl Timmermans]

Q. "We tried all methods...................What did we do wrong?"
A. Something

Obviously the above is unproductive for all concerned. No
one knows what "all methods" means nor does <something>
describe the cause of the problem.

Don't know what you did but this is what you need to do:

From file menu --> Import & Export
... follow the screens ... when you get to the screen
that has the "Map Custom Fields" button - click it
and select the exact fields you want to export
(i.e. FullName and Email Address)

If it doesn't work after that - state <explicitly> what exactly
it was that you did in order for someone to be able to provide
an answer. As has already been noted - you export info from
the contact folder - not an addressbook.

This also further assumes that you actually have info
in your contact folder versus selecting email
addresses from the "auto-complete list" which can't be
exported via Outlook (and is also not an address book).

Karl
--
____________________________________________________________
Karl Timmermans - The Claxton Group
ContactGenie - QuickPort/DataPort/Exporter/Toolkit/Duplicate Contact Mgr
"Contact import/export/data management tools for Outlook '2000/2010"
http://www.contactgenie.com

 

[Amy Jones]

Yes, you are correct. The export outgoing folder is from "contact".
The field map I selected was name, email and email address.
The output export to type of file is CSV or xls or txt.
Looking at the output: all the name fields was corrected filled in.
But all the email and email address fields are empty.
What did I do wrong?

 

[Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]]

Simply exporting to a .csv format requires no field mapping - why are you
doing it? Simply take the default output and edit it after export if you
want but don't mess with the process.

--
Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]

Post all replies to the group to keep the discussion intact.
ALWAYS post your Outlook version.
How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/KB/555375


After furious head scratching, Amy Jones asked:

| Yes, you are correct. The export outgoing folder is from "contact".
| The field map I selected was name, email and email address.
| The output export to type of file is CSV or xls or txt.
| Looking at the output: all the name fields was corrected filled in.
| But all the email and email address fields are empty.
| What did I do wrong?
|
| || You don't export from the Address Book - you export from the
|| Contacts folder.

 

[Karl Timmermans]

Are the email addresses resolved for the selected fields?
(resolved email address will appear underlined when you open a contact).
If not, the email field data will not be exported regardless of what is
contained in the field(s) and result in exactly what you are encountering.

Karl
--
____________________________________________________________
Karl Timmermans - The Claxton Group
ContactGenie - QuickPort/DataPort/Exporter/Toolkit/Duplicate Contact Mgr
"Contact import/export/data management tools for Outlook '2000/2010"
http://www.contactgenie.com

 

[Amy Jones]

Karl,
Yes, the email addresses for all E-mail, E-mail 2 and E-mail 3 are all
resolved.
The email addresses in all these three fields are underlined.
Also, clicking each entry of the Address Book: Contacts
showing the right hand side panel containing the:
Full name, last name, first name
all three email addresses.

 

[Amy Jones]

Milly,
If you click "clear Map", the Outlook will not allow you to export.
The "OK" button will be kept gray.
If you click the "Default Map" which includes every entry,
the email addresses in the exported file are still empty.

 

[Karl Timmermans]

This is totally bizarre to say the least.

Questions:
#1 - What, if any, addins are installed?
#2 - What kind of email addresses are these? (SMTP? Exch etc)
#3 - What is the folder source? (PST? Exch?)
#4 - Is this folder using a custom form?
#5 - What country are you in? (regional settings in use)

Suggestions:

#1 - Run the Office Diag. Check if issue remains....
#2 - Run ScanPST (if a PST based folder). Check if issue remains....

If the issue still remains after the two items above,
the next suggestion may appear self-serving but assure you
that it is definitely not intended as such - purely being
suggested for trouble-shooting purposes

#3 - Would be interested in knowing if any of the
ContactGenie products are running into the same issue in terms
of the email addresses not being picked up. Doesn't matter
which of the newer CG products is tried (QuickPort,
DataPort 3, Toolkit, or the original Exporter.... all have export
functionality) and the only reason for bringing this is up is
because none of them use Outlook in the export process
(there is no cost to trying any of these - download:
http://www.contactgenie.com/download.htm

Reason for asking about the country is that we recently ran into
an equally strange case in Europe where email addresses (and
<only> the email addresses> would not import to an Exchange
folder under any circumstances when a text file was used
including one supplied by us but had no issues with any other
kind of data source such as Access, Excel or SQL. Realize
your issue is about export but it is equally as strange given that
it is only affecting resolved email addresses.

Karl

--
____________________________________________________________
Karl Timmermans - The Claxton Group
ContactGenie - QuickPort/DataPort/Exporter/Toolkit/Duplicate Contact Mgr
"Contact import/export/data management tools for Outlook '2000/2010"
http://www.contactgenie.com

 

[Amy Jones]

Karl, we are in Silicon Valley. The email addresses are standard run of the
mill yahoo and gmail and hotmail types. For our offices, we are told not to
use addins and use the systems as is from Dell. I do not know what folder
you are asking. But, since we are using Outlook 2007, I assume the data file
is in pst. No, all folders are standard from Microsoft and no custom forms
are used. We also do not use exchange. Just simple Outlook 2007 in Vista
systems.

 

[Karl Timmermans]

Is this occuring on every machine in your office or just a specific one?

One other thing you may wish to try - create a new profile on the machine
encountering the problem using the same PST file(s) to see if the problem
resolves itself.

If the same issue occurs on every machine, then the next step would be to
review what is common on all machines in terms of what is running (i.e.
anything in the background that is installed as part of the basic setup)
since whatever the cause is - pretty safe bet that it will be tied to
whatever is common and the first thing to review is how the machines
get prepped for initial use and how the migration to O'2007 took place
if these are not new systems.

Having dealt with a "lot" of import/export scenarios over the years, have
never encountered a case where the Outlook export didn't work just for
a specific set of fields.

If it's only one machine that is affected then the likely cause is either
#1 - An issue with the PST file itself (may or may not get resolved with
ScanPST)
#2 - Corrupt components for export wizard (which should get resolved via
Office Diag)
#3 - Something installed on the system not on the others (would doubt this
to be the case)

For what it's worth, the fact that you can select the Email Addresses while
in Outlook but can't export them is not necessarily contradictory since the
two (Outlook UI and Export Wizard) are not the same and use different
methods to deal with Outlook data (at least as best that we can surmise)

Karl
--
____________________________________________________________
Karl Timmermans - The Claxton Group
ContactGenie - QuickPort/DataPort/Exporter/Toolkit/Duplicate Contact Mgr
"Contact import/export/data management tools for Outlook '2000/2010"
http://www.contactgenie.com

 

[Amy Jones]

Karl, Yes, it occur in every machines in this office floor using Vista
Outlook 2007. We swap the pst files between machines and all have same exact
identical problems. We just check several brand new HP, Dell and Lenovo and
same exact identical programs. Only programs running in the background are
the anti-virus programs. Machines use different anti-virus programs, such as
MaAfee and Trend Micro and Norton, mostly depending on the machine
manufacturers.

We only use the name and email address in the Outlook 2007 address book.
Actually, most of the Outlook 2007 export fields are all empty, except all
first name, last name the first colume of the name fields are filled. The
un-used fileds anniversay and birthday are 0/0/00, Gender is unspecified,
some priority are Low and some are Nornal, and a few field in Private is
False.

 

[Amy Jones]

Karl, we now found another problem. The Outlook 2007 address book does not
match the exported list.

We edited the Outlook 2007 address book, by click Tools - Address Book. The
panel shows "Address Book: Contacts". We add new entry by clicking File -
New Entry, and select New Contact, then, we entered Full Name and Email
addresses, then Save & Close. To edit previous entered entries, we click the
In the selected entry.

When we export, at Outlook2007, we click File - import and export - export
to a file - Comma Separated Values (Windows) - select Contacts folder -
enter saved export files as: address-book1.csv - Map Custom fields - default
map (select all fields) - finished.

But when we looked at the exported file, the enteries are redundent and have
many previously deleted entries.

So, what did we do wrong?

 

[Karl Timmermans]

At this point - would suggest going back to basics with the following:

#1 - Take any one of the machines (since this problem occurs on all as per
your note)
#2 - Close Outlook
#3 - Using the Mail applet (Ctrl Panel, User Accounts, Mail) - create a
completely new Outlook profile using a new PST file (translated - don't
change anything in the process) and make sure this new profile is the one
assigned to "Always Use this profile"
#4 - Restart Outlook using the new profile
#5 - Create a single new contact with name and a valid SMTP address - value
irrelevant as long as it's properly constructed and resolved
#6 - Export that contact folder (with the single contact item) - either by
mapping only the desired fields or selecting all.

Am betting that the above will work. If correct, the issue is how your
systems are getting configured since am also assuming that every new
machine does not represent a new employee starting from scratch - ergo -
somewhere data is being migrated from old to new. If it works, then it's
definitely not an operational Outlook issue and would proceed with the
following:

#7 - Close Outlook, change the default PST mailbox in this newly created
Outlook profile to use your original PST file
#8 - Export the contact folder
......does the export work? If yes, repeat and rinse the process on every
machine that has encountered the problem and review the issue with
whomever is configuring your systems for initial use with pre-existing
Outlook data.

One red flag that you mentioned in your other post is that the unused
Birthday and Anniversary fields appear as 0/0/00. Reality is that if those
fields aren't used when a new contact is created - the value should show as
"none" - not "0/0/00" which also begs the question - how were these
contacts originally created?

If for any reason step <#6> doesn't work, feel free to send that newly
created PST file (with the single test contact) to
cgsupport at contactgenie.com.
(if you do send the PST file - just mention in the body that this was
requested by me via the newsgroup). Would like to see if the issue
can be replicated as well as do some forensics on it in a controlled
environment. Am betting that the issue won't be reproduced.

Also as aside - the terms "contact folder" and "address book" represent two
very distinct items and just to keep things clear for all concerned, would
suggest not using the term "AddressBook" or if you are actually doing
things from the AB for any of this - you shouldn't. Only the contact folder
should be used.

In short - the objective of this exercise is to narrow the possibilities of
what is going on with your systems.

Karl

--
____________________________________________________________
Karl Timmermans - The Claxton Group
ContactGenie - QuickPort/DataPort/Exporter/Toolkit/Duplicate Contact Mgr
"Contact import/export/data management tools for Outlook '2000/2010"
http://www.contactgenie.com

 

[Amy Jones]

Karl, thank you. I submitted your instructions to my boss and request his
approval to make changes to our systems.

I am confuse with your terms of "contact folder" and "address book".

In Outlook 2007, click tools - Address Book (Control-Shift-B) - is the
"Address Book: Contacts" we are using. When we write message, the To: CC:
fields are filled automatically with the email address from this address
book. We do not know how best to save, retreive, transfer, this address
book.

So, we think this is part of the contact folder. So, we export the contact
folder by:
file - import and export - Export to a file - Comma Separated Values
(Windows) - Contacts (select this folder only) - save exported file as:
adbk.csv - The following action will be performed [x] Export "Contacts" from
folder:Contacts - Map custom field - Default Maps (select all fields) -
finish

This file has multple old previous deleted name entries and all emaild
address are empty.

What did we do wrong?

 

[Amy Jones]

Karl, we found it.
In Outlook 2007, can you please tell us the difference in two different
places:
1. tools - address book - Address Book: Contacts === we are unable to save
or retreive this address book
2. Go - Contacts - Control+3 - current view by [x] outlook data file == this
is the one being exported from the contact folder.

we only want to automatically fill the email addresses in the To: and cc:
fields in writing our messages.

Which of of this two should we use?

 

[Karl Timmermans]

Question becomes - what contact folder(s) are included in the
Outlook Addressbook versus the contact folder you are attempting
to export? In a non-Exchange environment, the AddressBook
represents one or more contact folders that can be utilized for the
purpose of retrieving email addresses to send emails. (an
Exchange environment simply adds the Global Address List to the
mix). Or to put this more succinctly, you do not/cannot export
an addressbook which <represents> one or more contact folders.

As for the exporting process - will leave that until the suggestions
yesterday are tried - there are too many unknowns in this so until
there is a basic benchmark to work from - everything is simply
speculative. There is something missing in this conversation but
just not quite sure what it is yet. The first priority is
to start from scratch to definitively determine if Outlook is working
the way it's supposed to in a clean environment (new profile,
new PST etc).

That aside, what exactly is it that you are trying to accomplish in
terms of "save, retrieve, transfer this addressbook". When this
is all said and done, suspect that "importing/exporting" is
probably going to be the absolute wrong approach for whatever
it is that you are trying to do given the word "transfer". Sounds
like you are trying to find a way to use a single contact list on
multiple machines in a non-Exchange environment.

Did your office ever work without any issues in terms of contact
lists or is something very recent? If recent, what practices changed
in terms of how your office works(ed)? Fact - all machines don't
suddenly encounter the exact same issue at the exact same time
unless someone has done the exact same thing to each of the
machines.

Karl
--
____________________________________________________________
Karl Timmermans - The Claxton Group
ContactGenie - QuickPort/DataPort/Exporter/Toolkit/Duplicate Contact Mgr
"Contact import/export/data management tools for Outlook '2000/2010"
http://www.contactgenie.com

Karl, thank you. I submitted your instructions to my boss and request his
approval to make changes to our systems.

I am confuse with your terms of "contact folder" and "address book".

In Outlook 2007, click tools - Address Book (Control-Shift-B) - is the
"Address Book: Contacts" we are using. When we write message, the To: CC:
fields are filled automatically with the email address from this address
book. We do not know how best to save, retreive, transfer, this address
book.

So, we think this is part of the contact folder. So, we export the
contact folder by:
file - import and export - Export to a file - Comma Separated Values
(Windows) - Contacts (select this folder only) - save exported file as:
adbk.csv - The following action will be performed [x] Export "Contacts"
from folder:Contacts - Map custom field - Default Maps (select all
fields) - finish

This file has multple old previous deleted name entries and all emaild
address are empty.

What did we do wrong?

 

[Karl Timmermans]

Think your post overlapped with my previous reply so this is going to
contain duplicate info. In any case, to try and keep this as simple and as
short as possible.

#1 - Contacts are saved to a contact folder. The default contact folder is
(default contact folder is one that is located in the same folder tree as
your Inbox) is (should) automatically checked with "Show this folder as an
e-mail address book" - right click contact folder --> properties -->
Outlook Address Book tab. Any folder can be added to the Outlook Address
Book (OAB) in this fashion - ergo - more than one contact folder will
appear in the AddressBook folder list (this refers to the drop down list -
top right side when you open the Outlook Address Book).

#2 - The AddressList is "purely" a representation of the contact folders
that are flagged as members - the "critical" thing when selecting a contact
from the OAB is making sure that you are selecting the contact from the
correct contact folder. In your case - it sounds like more than one contact
folder is part of the OAB and if you look at the drop down list - there
will be more than one entry with the same folder name (i.e. "Contacts"
listed more than once) - one or more of which you don't want and which is
probably the source of the invalid data.

Thing to check - when in OAB window - from the OAB menu bar click on -->
Tools --> Options - get rid of any folders you don't want in the OAB.

#3 - As for Go Contacts - that will show the default contact folder but
that folder may not necessarily be the first on the list of folders in the
OAB. That also has nothing to do with the export issue.

#4 - Re: Export folder/issue - already provided the instructions as to what
needs to be done as a starting point to verify that Outlook in and of
itself has no problems. Once that's confirmed, you have the solution to
correcting all other machines. Will leave how your office got to the
current problem point to others.

Karl

--
____________________________________________________________
Karl Timmermans - The Claxton Group
ContactGenie - QuickPort/DataPort/Exporter/Toolkit/Duplicate Contact Mgr
"Contact import/export/data management tools for Outlook '2000/2010"
http://www.contactgenie.com

Karl, we found it.
In Outlook 2007, can you please tell us the difference in two different
places:
1. tools - address book - Address Book: Contacts === we are unable to
save or retreive this address book
2. Go - Contacts - Control+3 - current view by [x] outlook data file ==
this is the one being exported from the contact folder.

we only want to automatically fill the email addresses in the To: and cc:
fields in writing our messages.

Which of of this two should we use?

 

[Amy Jones]

Karl, OK, thank you for your help. we found:

A. In Outlook 2007, tools - address book - Address Book: Contacts
(Control+shift+B)
1. we can edit each entry. We can add new entry
2. we cannot save or retreive or transfer

B. Go - Contacts - Control+3 - current view by [x] outlook data file
1. we can edit each entry.
2. we can export and import this folder
3. we cannot add new entry.
4. there are more entries here compare to OAB.

In the OAB (Ctrl+Shift+B) tools-options: addressing panel
- show rhia address list first: contacts
- keep personal address in: contacts
- when seeking email check name using these address list in the following:
contacts

Our boss told us not to change the system settings in the office. So far, I
assume we are unable to correctly use Outlook address book, but I assume
Microsoft did not design this in a friendly manner.