I don't understand the Contacts Folders in Outlook 2003.

[Margaret Bartley]

This is Outlook 2003 running on windows XP at home in a stand-alone desktop
computer.


There seems to be three different lists of folders:
I created a folder, SML, that has names I import for my monthly newsletter.
I recreate it for each mailing.

I've explored the different places I use the contacts folders and lists, and
they have different folder lists.


With 13 folders:

When I create a new email, and click on the To button, to get a list of
contacts, and then look at the drop-down box that is labelled "Show Names
from the:" which lists the folders available, I get 13 names, in addition to
Contacts. None of them are SML, one of them is "Temp"

This is the same list that shows up when I go into Tools: E-Mail Accounts |
View or change existing email accounts. They all have "Personal Folders"
after their name in the list.


14 folders:

when I am in Word, doing a MailMerge for emails, and am selecting an Outlook
folder, 14 folders are listed. All of the above 13, plus another Temp.
Again, none of them are SML, which is the folder with the email addresses I
want to use. Of these 14 folders, 6 are labelled "Personal Folders |
Contacts", and 8 are labelled "Personal Folders |"Deleted Items".


7 folders in my Folder List navigation pane:

Both the Contacts Tab and the Folders tab in Outlook's navigation pane show
7 folders, including the SML folder that I want to use, and the six folders
listed in the Word MailMerge that are labelled "Personal Folders | Contacts"

Those same seven folders show up when I am in the Mail section, and create a
new folder. (File | New folder (CTL + Shift +E). In the "folders" view,
six are subfolders of Contacts. In the Contacts view, they are all on the
same level, with a Contacts icon.


97 folders:

When I import new data for a Contacts Folder, under File | Import and
Export, I get a list that has the same seven folders and tree structure
shown in the Folder view, plus another 90 folders, two of which are named
Temp, which are folders I've created and deleted over the years. I've
compacted the Personal Folders several times, but those deleted folders
don't go away. They are not in my Deleted Items list, either.


So, how do I get my SML folder to be available to send emails to the
addresses in it, both with MailMerge and with Outlook Send?

How do I recover the space from all those deleted folders and get them out
of my system? Each folder has 350 or so names in it and there are 90 of
them.

 

[Russ Valentine]

Answered here daily. If you want folders to appear in the address book view,
you must enable them as email address books in their properties.

 

[Margaret Bartley]

Thank you.

Do you know why do some folders get listed as an address book without me
explicitly enabling them? Is there some action that triggers it, as well?
It appears to be random - I had not marked any of the folders explicitly as
Address books, but some are listed and some are not.


Also, any idea how to get rid of the dozens of old, obsolete folders that
are just cluttering up my system and taking up space?

 

[Brian Tillman [MVP-Outlook]]

Do you know why do some folders get listed as an address book without me
explicitly enabling them? Is there some action that triggers it, as well? It
appears to be random - I had not marked any of the folders explicitly as
Address books, but some are listed and some are not.

My experience is that any contact folders that exist in a PST when the mail
profile gets created, the PST added to the profile, and the Outlook Address
Book configured before opening Outlook should have the address book attribute
enabled automatically. Any new contacts folder you add should also have the
attribute enabled. Any contacts folder created while the Outlook Address Book
service is not properly configured won't until the OAB service is removed and
readded.

Also, any idea how to get rid of the dozens of old, obsolete folders that
are just cluttering up my system and taking up space?

Folders in Outlook do not correspond to files. If you see folders in the
Outlook Address Book interface that don't exist, click Tools>E-mail
Accounts>View or change existing directories or address books>Next, select the
Outlook Address Book service, click Change, and remove the bogus folder names.
Stop and restart Outlook when finished.

 

[Margaret Bartley]

Thank you, but this isnt' quite the answer to my very complicated question.

If you back to the original post, you will see that there are four (4)
different Contacts folders lists.

The list you are talking about is the first list, the one with 13 folders.

What I'm trying to get rid of is old folders in the last list, the list that
has 97(!) folders in it.
I see this list when I import data for a Contacts folder under File |
Import and Export.

 

[Russ Valentine]

You'll need to be more clear about where you see these folders that you
think you shouldn't.
Use Folder List view to examine your entire folder hierarchy and tell us
what you see.