Understanding the infrastructure of an OL2007 profile.

[BudV]

I would like to make sure that I understand profiles, in order to work with
OL2007 intelligently. I realize that I'm only skimming the top of OL here
and there's an awful lot more that I'm not getting involved with.

As I understand it (stop me when I go wrong), a profile, with its own name,
comprises one or more mail accounts and the emails associated with those
accounts, a set of contacts, a calendar, and other stuff that I'm not
concerned about right now. A second profile with a different name comprises
a separate set of mail accounts and emails, contacts, and calendar,
*completely independent* from the first, with no overlap -- no confusion.
This is accomplished through having all of this material stored in a .pst
file associated with the profile; i.e., one .pst file for each profile.
Which profile is being used is determined when OL is opened.

If I'm okay so far, then my next question has to do with rules. If a
profile is using rules, does it have its own set, also completely
independent from rules used for a different profile?

 

[DL]

Your understanding is correct
The rules are specific to the Data File

However in Outlook 2007 you can have seperate, and distinct Data Files for
each mail account, so each data file has its own folders, within that one
Profile
It very much depends what you are wanting to achieve with seperate Profiles,
or what aim you have in mind

 

[Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook]]

As I understand it (stop me when I go wrong), a profile, with its own name,
comprises one or more mail accounts and the emails associated with those
accounts, a set of contacts, a calendar, and other stuff that I'm not
concerned about right now. A second profile with a different name comprises
a separate set of mail accounts and emails, contacts, and calendar,
*completely independent* from the first, with no overlap -- no confusion.
This is accomplished through having all of this material stored in a .pst
file associated with the profile; i.e., one .pst file for each profile.
Which profile is being used is determined when OL is opened.

A mail profile is actually a hive in the registry. You can have multiple
profiles and they _can_ (and usually do) have their own accounts and PSTs, but
it's not _required_ that they have separate accounts and PSTs. You can define
accounts with the same settings in multiple profiles and each profile will
access that account independent of the other profiles, but each account will
be accessing the same mailbox on the mail server. You can also define the
same PST in multiple profiles. I've done this before: two profiles (two
distinct users) with two separate PSTs as the delivery locations but a third
PST that is common to both profiles so that a set of contacts and a calendar
common to both people could be shared. This isn't typical, in my opinion, but
it worked well enough for me at the time. If you define the similar accounts
in multiple profiles, any one profile will have no idea that other profiles
also reference the mailbox that account represents and you can get some
confusing message delivery issues if you're not aware of the multiple access.

 

[Roady [MVP]]

A mail profile is actually a hive in the registry.
That is only part of it. It also consists of several files containing
settings and data. It is the combination of the registry settings and the
files that make up the mail profile. They all have a relation to each other
and dependencies which is why you cannot simply export the registry key
and/or move the additional files to make it work again on another computer
without issues.

 

[Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook]]

That is only part of it. It also consists of several files containing
settings and data. It is the combination of the registry settings and the
files that make up the mail profile. They all have a relation to each other
and dependencies which is why you cannot simply export the registry key
and/or move the additional files to make it work again on another computer
without issues.

Well, yeah. The point I was trying to make was that multiple mail profiles
don't necessarily imply complete independence of the data, that's all.

 

[Roady [MVP]]

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Well, yeah. The point I was trying to make was that multiple mail
profiles don't necessarily imply complete independence of the data, that's
all.