Using Search with 'Using Microsoft Outlook'

[Amin from TO]

Current Environment

Exchange 2003 Sp2 with Outlook 2003 SP3 (11.8243.8210)

In our large organization Users found a way to search using above.
(Start>Search>Using Microsoft Outlook). The claim is they used to be able to
do it and now they cannot. The error they get is 'Could not start the
Miscrosoft Office Outlook Find Items Utility).

FYI: The latest security fix for OFFICE was applied with a slew of other
security fixes.

Is there any way we can figure out what is generating this error?

Technical findings: We think it is Finder.exe under Office 11 directory.
Running a search via step able causes this error. Double-clicking on the exe
displays 'Windows cannot access the specified device path or file. You may
not have the appropriate permissions to access the item."
YET: you can run this exe from a command prompt successfully.

We welcome any findings and solutions as I am at the end-of-my-technical rope.

 

[Roady [MVP]]

Can they still open the Advanced Find dialog from within the Outlook
interface?
CTRL+SHIFT+F is the keyboard shortcut.
It's the same dialog.

I'd instruct them to get to used doing that as both later versions of
Windows and Outlook do no longer support that method of external searching
and Outlook needs to be running either way to get search results via that
dialog.

 

[Amin from TO]

Thank you for the quick response.

Yes they can open using Advance Find. We will provide those instructions.

The 'mystery' is we have 2 workstations side-by-side and one exhibits the
issue, the other does not. What would be preventing it, a reg key?.

The Search function does not work from the 'outside' even if Outlook is open.

would you have specifics as to when Windows/Outlook disabled this feature?

 

[Roady [MVP]]

Windows Vista has gotten an overhaul to the build-in Search function which
is continued in Windows 7.
Outlook 2007 doesn't come with a separate finder.exe anymore for Advanced
Find.
So in that case, no matter what you'll upgrade first; your users will lose
that method of searching.

I'm not sure what broke it for you but I don't think it is registry
controlled. It could be broken by an update (as I think that feature might
not be used that often in that way), user/admin account restrictions, or
even because of an Outlook addin that is installed on the machine. It's a
bit hard to tell from here without further troubleshooting ;-)