Changed Message class; forms with data resist.

[swmagic]

Outlook 2007 w/Exchange. Have a client that created and published an
IPM.Contact.Contact form years ago with many custom fields. After
lengthy discussion we decided to return to standard form.

I ran a VBA routine to change all the message classes back to
IPM.Contact (in Public Folder. However, any record with data in
customized fields reverts back to displaying the old form even though it
reports IPM.Contact class.

Is this a normal behavior as those customized fields would otherwise
become inaccessible (even from All fields)?

How do I complete the conversion? The client is ok with a phone list
view of those customized fields.

Paul

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP]]

What's the size on those items? If it's larger than could be accounted for
by the field data alone, the form could have one-offed and become embedded
in the item. A check of the actual MessageClass value for those items could
help confirm the one-off situation.

 

[swmagic]

Upon reading your Chapter 20.2 and Microsoft's discussion
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/919596 it makes sense to me that one-off
forms are occurring.

I have yet to check the item sizes. But if they have ballooned and I
have the one-off situation, at least I see the several ways this could
have happened in their environment. (I don't quite understand why
Microsoft would state that one-off's can create unexpected behavior and
then turn around and explain how to intentionally create one, sigh).

But more to the point--how do I fix this mess? I used Ken's code to
change them all back to IPM.Contact but it appears that some MUST be
one-offed if they are in the default message class now but still showing
the custom form.

Also I noticed that many, but not all, of the contact items had the
post icon and not the contact icon. Did that come from some machines
that had the "Send Form Definition with Item" checked?

Although I understand that clearing the forms cache might NOT resolve
my issue, would you recommend that as first step and how do you do that
in OL2007 (or Exchange 2007).

Any other ways to fix the one-off?


Paul

What's the size on those items? If it's larger than could be accounted
for
by the field data alone, the form could have one-offed and become
embedded
in the item. A check of the actual MessageClass value for those items
could
help confirm the one-off situation.

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP]]

The first step is to diagnose exactly what the problem is. I'm sure the Size
and MessageClass property values will give you good clues, especially if you
correlate those results with the icon appearance.

If the items are one-offed and you want to remove the embedded form, there
are code snippets that show how to do that. See
http://www.outlookcode.com/article.aspx?id=34, at the end of the article.

Clearing the forms cache is almost always non-invasive and worth trying, but
I suspect it's not relevant here. You can either delete the entire contents
of the FORMS folder or use the Clear Cache button on the Manage Forms dialog
to delete only the FrmCache.dat file in that folder.

There was a point in time where one-off forms had some utility, but that was
two versions of Outlook in the past.

 

[swmagic]

All Good information Sue, thanks.

Before I invest in learning Redemption I'll just ask a simpl
question.

I noticed on the converted data (from the custom to ipm.contact) tha
those custom fields don't show up in All Fields. Are they hidden, gone
Are they recoverable? Would manual conversion be easier?

Thanks

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP]]

Did you look under both User Fields in Item and User Fields in Folder? Did
you originally define those fields at the folder level? If not, try adding
the folder-level field definition.

Outlook Spy or MFCMAPI.exe will tell you whether the data is still
available.