"Office Database is Damaged" Message

[LMT]

Version: 2004
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger)
Processor: Power PC
Email Client: Exchange

Can anyone explain why a user's Entourage Identity at the local level (their Mac) would indicate a 27gb file, but at the Exchange Server 2003 side, it says it's 356kb?

I have done an "Office Remove" and then reinstalled Office 2004 letting it fully sync with the server. The user continued to get the error message Office Database is Damaged. I verified it and it indicated a problem, so I rebuilt it. I let it fully re-sync with the Exchange server and it still tells me that this Identity is 27gb in size at the local Mac level. This is a huge discrepancy. Could it be that I need to throw out all Office preferences? Thank you.

 

[Diane Ross]

Can anyone explain why a user's Entourage Identity at the local level (their
Mac) would indicate a 27gb file, but at the Exchange Server 2003 side, it says
it's 356kb?

Do you have messages in folders "On My Computer"?

I have done an "Office Remove" and then reinstalled Office 2004 letting it
fully sync with the server. The user continued to get the error message Office
Database is Damaged. I verified it and it indicated a problem, so I rebuilt
it. I let it fully re-sync with the Exchange server and it still tells me that
this Identity is 27gb in size at the local Mac level. This is a huge
discrepancy. Could it be that I need to throw out all Office preferences?
Thank you.

I would create a new Identity and let Entourage sync. This should result in
the same size on the server give or take a few mbs.

If the size is showing 27GB in the Finder then that is the size. When you
rebuild unless you compact the database it stays the same size.

How to rebuild Office 2004:
Entourage 2004: Hold down the Option key and re-launch the application. In a
few seconds, you'll be greeted with the Entourage 2004 Database Utility.
Select to rebuild. (Note: Compact the database (Like X's "Typical rebuild")
Rebuild the database (Like X's "Advanced Rebuild")

Emptying the cache does not reduce the database size itself. The database
will be left with 'wasted' space in it every time you delete something.
However, this is not all bad, since the wasted space is used up with new
data as it is added. This way, over a period of time (assuming that you are
deleting stuff as you go) the database will probably reach an optimum size,
after which the stuff you delete is roughly equal to the stuff you add, and
no further growth takes place.

If you need to recover the wasted space on your hard disk, you will have to
do a 'typical' rebuild to compact the database. This will create a compacted
version of the database without the wasted space. You will then have to
manually delete the backup copies of the original database that the rebuild
process creates AFTER you are happy the new one is OK.