The Enigma Called Outook Express

Problem: The user reported that she could not see all of her IMAP folders in Outlook Express. I asked how she knew that some were missing. She said that she had accessed her business email from home and had created some new folders on the server, so she knew they were there, but Outlook Express at work didn't show them. I was able to logon to the email server with another email client, and sure enough saw the new folders.

Solution: I selected the mail server in her folder view and displayed the synchronize page. Next to the Synchronize button there's an IMAP button which shows the IMAP folder configuration page, where All folders are listed under one tab and Visible folders are listed under another tab. As you might have guessed, the lists were the same, and neither list had the new folders. The buttons to the right of the lists are named Show (to show hidden folders), Hide (to hide visible folders) and Reset List. The Reset List button causes OE to go out to the server and refresh the list of All folders. After the "All" list was refreshed, the new folders were there and I was able "Show" them on the "Visible" list.

Cumbersome, but par for the course in this imperfect world ruled by email ....