Have you used Outlook express? Outlook compact messages is for?
By lovedude
@lovedude (4447)
India
December 31, 2011 9:04pm CST
Yesterday one of my company co-worker was working with outlook express.. when he sends and receives email, he got a alert box that do you want to compact your outlook message? he clicked yes and when outlook restarted some of his mail got deleted.. :-O
have you used outlook express? what does outlook do to compact messages?
2 people like this
5 responses
@chiyosan (30184)
• Philippines
2 Jan 12
I have used outlook express before with my previous company, i know when you compact your messages, it is compressed to a lower space consumption. You should tell him to look for the compacted messages in the "archived"portion of the outlook, it should be there and it is not deleted, i believe. :D goodluck!
@venkataraman_vc (5293)
• Chennai, India
1 Jan 12
I have used Outlook express previously. But after my system got a virus I had to format it. After that I stopped using OE.
Yes. OE's compact facility is having a bug. (Your friend's mail is still there but not displayed in OE. This is due to time-stamping system of the OE. The compact file created by OE might have a older date stamp. Only files with latest dates will be displayed, others won't be displayed even if it is on the disk/folder.)
This compacting facility is useful, if we want to shift our mails to another PC. Just copy the compacted folder to the new PC and it's all ready. (The files will have an extension of .dbx, but the files will be somewhere into a complicated location. You will have to search for it.)
@LaDeBoheme (2004)
• United States
1 Jan 12
I haven't used OE for several years. Is it still around? Yeah, I guess it is, but it is sort of outdated. Windows Live Mail is the replacement client.
If you close OE during the compacting process or shut down the computer before it is complete, there is the possibility that the database (dbx) files will become corrupted, hence the missing mail.
Your friend can try exiting OE, looking in the recycle bin for the dbx file, restoring it, and then starting OE again.
Here are some more tips: http://email.about.com/od/outlookexpressrepairutil/Outlook_Express_Repair_Recovery_and_Troubleshooting_Tools.htm
@knicnax (2233)
• Philippines
2 Jan 12
I haven't used Outlook Express but I've used Outlook before. I quit using it cause it tends to hang a lot.
Anyway, compact messages is a tool that makes the size of your pst smaller. It compacts the messages, meaning, it makes the messages small (like archiving or "zipping" the files). The reason why the messages seem to be "deleted" is because the messages were moved to the archive folder
@Sanitary (3968)
• Singapore
2 Jan 12
I ever tried using it but i failed miserably on that. It's not as easy as it looks because of some set up stuffs to do, links everywhere. I gave it up in the end. I first tested it on my online blog shop but it's so complicated. Now, i'm stuck with it and everytime i tried to send an email on some sites, it's auto directing me to my outlook express where i'm stuck. I don't like it.
