My Favorite Prayer .....

Problem: First the prayer, then I'll get to the problem:

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference."

(Okay, so that's out of the way)

Now, what the hell is it with dbx files!!!!!? I guess I'll never be able to figure out why people design things the way they do. Maybe they want to provide me with something to do for the rest of my life or maybe they just enjoy watching me squirm. Whatever the reason, I keep running into these idiotic situations that really ought to have a simple solution but seem to be made intentionally difficult.

We have a poor user that, for whatever reason, lost her local mail after a reinstallation of her Outlook Express profile. I didn't do this, so I don't know how it happened, but I was told that all the data is there, in the form of dbx files. Fine. All I need to do is import them into Outlook Express, ............. Right? .............. WRONG!! When I follow the Microsoft instructions I get a nastygram that tells me the files can't be imported because they are in use. I even get this message when I copy the files to another location and attempt the import. Is it just me, or does everyone have these problems? If anyone should be able to read the dbx files and import them into OE, it ought to be Microsoft, shouldn't it? So, I searched the internet for a solution and find nothing but a bunch of 3rd party products that claim they can do it. I tried a freebie; (I won't mention any names) you guessed right, it didn't work. Then I downloaded a couple "evaluation" products to see if they might do the job. But as evaluation products go, they give you just enough of a taste of success to keep you interested, but don't really do the job until you pay up; I can understand this. I'd probably do the same thing. What I can't understand is why I can't find a Microsoft solution!! (I know, I've GOT to stop this crazy talk). But seriously, if there is an MS solution, I will gladly apologize. Anyhow, ........

Solution: I'll pretend that there is a solution and hope that I find it. If I do, I'll post it here. If not, I'll keep repeating the prayer, .......

Okay, here it is: I was able to obtain a copy of Mail Navigator to solve the problem. The Mail Navigator browser allows you to open and format dbx files into readable messages. At this point you can decide if you want to put them back into Outlook Express. If so, you can select all messages and do a save as .... Eudora Mailbox. Once you have the Eudora Mailbox, you can open Outlook Express and do an import "messages"; navigate to the saved Eudora file, select the file and PRESTO! You're back in business. (Thanks, Mail Navigator ... :o)