Archiving doesn’t appear to work (2003)

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Dear Loungers:

I recently set the default settings to correspond with my Microsoft Outlook Inbox (previously, only my sent mail was set to autoarchive). The default settings should cause the Inbox to move items older than 6 months to archive.pst. However, although Outlook recently autoarchived my folders, I still have messages in my inbox that go back several years. Any ideas as to why?

Sincerely,

JMT

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Has AutoArchive been turned on at all for the Inbox? You can check this as follows:
– Right-click the Inbox.
– Select Properties from the popup menu.
– Activate the AutoArchive tab.

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Hello Hans,

Yes, I think that may have done the trick.

One more question: what does the “Delete expired items (email folders only)” option in the Autoarchive dialogue box mean? What is an “expired item”?

Regards,

JMT

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The sender of an e-mail can specify that an e-mail expires after a certain date/time. After this date/time, the e-mail has become an “expired item”.
You can specify expiration in a new e-mail by selecting View | Options.

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Wow! So all this tme, Outlook has been deleting the items that senders set to expire? Do people actually use that feature. I guess I’d better turn it off.

Regards,

JMT

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I just realized that, although my inbox is definitely set to archive all items more than 6 months old, on one of my accounts (Gmail), I have messages way back from 2006, and these were not downloaded recently (nor are they set to remain on the server).

Any ideas as to what could be going on?

Regards,

JMT

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Make sure that all settings are correct and that AutoArchiving has actually been turned on. If it has, try the following:
– Turn AutoArchive off, then close the AutoArchive dialog.
– Turn AutoArchive back on, then close the AutoArchive dialog.
Sometimes Windows programs need this to refresh the settings.

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Deleting expired items only happens when Autoarchive is turned on, and you have it configured to delete them. I’m pretty sure that archiving is based on a last referenced date. So if you have it set to archive items more then 6 months old any item you read, open, move, etc. will not be archived until you just leave it alone for 6 months.

Joe

--Joe

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Dear Hans,

I tried those steps, but some of my accounts continue to have emails that go as far back as April of 2006, other accounts as far back as 2005! Could it be that archiving is only turned on for certain email accounts but not others? I was encouraged to find ONE of my accounts had no messages older than January of this year (I Outlook to archive items older than 6 months), but I don’t know what to make of the rest of the accounts.

JMT

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As far as I know, AutoArchive works at the application and folder level, it doesn’t depend on accounts. So I’m afraid I don’t know what causes your problem.

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Hans is correct. Autoarchive does NOT work on the account level. You must make sure Autoarchive is turned on in Outlook using Tools | Options | Other | Autoarchive. Then you should check each folder to make sure Autoarchive is turned on. You may also set each folder to something other than the defaults you created with Tools | Options ,etc.

Joe

--Joe

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Dear Joe,

By “each folder,” do you mean the Inbox, Outbox, and Saved Emails? Those are the only folders I am aware of, and they are all set to auto-archive according to the default settings.

Regards,

JMT

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Yes, I mean the various folders such as those you listed. Did you check to see that Autoarchive is set to run at all adn what the default setting are?

Joe

--Joe

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Dear Joe,

As you can see from the attached image, Autoarchive IS turned on in Outlook. The only option I have disabled is that for deleting expired items.

Furthermore, I have checked to make sure that Autoarchive is turned on for each of my folders (Inbox, Outbook, Sent Items), yet I still have some emails as old as 2005 in one of my accounts.

In any event, I just recently switched computers; let me see if this new computer solves the problem the next time Autoarchive runs.

Regards,

JMT

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You can force an AutoArchive using File | AutoArchive. You can either archive all folders according to their AutoArchive settings, or archive items from the selected folder older than a specific date. See screenshot.

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(Edited by joeperez on 02-Oct-08 09:52. Add link about calendar items )

Is this a work or home setup? If it is at work, an administrator may have set data retention policies that override the Autoarchive settings. See also The Archiving function stops working in Outlook 2002 and Outlook 2003.

Also, is this all one e-mail account? If not, see AutoArchive settings do not work for additional mailboxes.

Microsoft Office Outlook Team Blog : Moving and deleting items with AutoArchive: clearing up the confusion has a little more information about autoarchive. See also Calendar items are not archived as expected when you use the Archive or AutoArchive features in Outlook and the links at the bottom of the article.

Joe

--Joe

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Hans: in my version (Outlook 2003, Professional Edition), I have no archive option under file.

Joe: I took a look at the second link you sent (AutoArchive settings do not work for additional mailboxes). I think “maiboxes” means “email accounts,” in which case I don’t think that that page applies to me, since I think none of my email accounts are correctly auto-archiving.

But I read it anyway. It starts off stating, “The AutoArchive settings that you configure on the Tools menu, by pointing to Options, and clicking AutoArchive are for the mailbox found by clicking on the Tools menu, pointing to Services, clicking Microsoft Exchange Server, and clicking Properties. These settings are not for additional mailboxes specified on the Advanced tab.”

However, I don’t actually see “Servicing” in my Tools menu. I also don’t see an advanced tab.

This is most odd, because the article itself says the info applies to Outlook 2003.

Is there something wrong with my program?

Regards,

JMT

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Are you saying that when you select the Inbox of any of your e-mail accounts without opening any items and then go to file that “Archive” is NOT on the file menu? Is this a work PC?

For Outlook 2003 you would go to Tools | E-mail accounts to find the information to which that KB article is referring.

Joe

--Joe

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Make sure that you display full menus. Outlook 2003 does have File | Archive.

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> Make sure that you display full menus. Outlook 2003 does have File | Archive.

Now Archive is showing up.

However, before I force an Autoarchive, a question: suppose I have an email in my inbox from 2005, but five months ago, I did a search of my inbox in which this email turned up. I opened and then closed the email. Today, Outlook’s auto-archive runs, archiving all items in my inbox older than six months old. Does Outlook see the 2005 email as 5 months old or 4 years old? Perhaps this is why I have so many unarchived emails (although I am not sure that I have run searches in the last six months in which these hundreds of much older emails have turned up).

Regards,

JMT

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As far as I know, Outlook uses the Received date, not the date you last looked at a message.

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Calendar items are not archived as expected when you use the Archive or AutoArchive features in Outlook has a table in it which describes the dates used by autoarchive. As does Microsoft Office Outlook Team Blog : Moving and deleting items with AutoArchive: clearing up the confusion.

Joe

--Joe

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By any chance would the items which you are attempting to archive have the Properties “Do Not Archive” set? Open the e-mail and choose File, Properties… see attached picture…

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Hi there,

I looked at two emails from 2008 and one from 2006 and none of them had “Do not autoarchive this item” checked.

Regards,

JMT

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According to the Microsoft article that Joe Perez pointed to, Outlook looks at the most recent of sent date, received date and modified date. All three are displayed in the properties of the e-mail mesage (see screenshot in the reply by tkrohosh). So if the modified date of the e-mails is recent, they wouldn’t be autoarchived yet.

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None of this makes much sense: items whose sent, received, and modified dates are back in 2005 are not being autoarchived, despite the folder setting that any items more than 6 months old be auto-archived. These items do not have “Do not Autoarchive item” checked in their properties dialogue.

Today, I tried to force an autoarchive of my inbox, but nothing happened. A small message on the bottom right of the screen appeared stating “Archiving,” but nothing was archived! The same happened when I tried forcing an archive of my calendar items that are older than 7 months. Is there another way to force an autoarchive?

I have 6 months as the default date for autoarchiving all items in Outlook. Does this count only for all email items (sent mail, inbox, saved emails, etc.) or does it include old calendar items as well? If it is the latter, why aren’t my calendar items that are older than 6 months being autoarchived?

Regards,

JMT

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I gues I’m confused as to what the General Autoarchive settings are and what the individual folder settings are. Are the setting under Tools | Options | Other | Autoarchive still as posted before in post 735,935? If so, does Autoarchive run? Do you get prompted? What are the autoarchive settings for the individual folders? Right click the folder, then select Properties, then click on the Autoarchive tab.

Joe

--Joe

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Joe, the AutoArchive settings are the same as they were in the post you mentioned. I have not changed them since then. Autoarchive does run and I get prompted. The AutoArchive settings for the Inbox, Deleted Items, Sent Items, and Outbox are set to the default settings.

I think I found the culprit behind this problem. The items in my inbox and calendar that stubbornly appear to not become archived are showing their “modified” dates as being in August in September of last year. This is why the AutoArchives of items older than August 2008 are not having any effect. Now, I have no recollection of ever modifying any of these items, neither those in the calendar nor those in my inbox. However, when I switched computers, I copied them from my former computer’s PST to my new computer. Could that be why their modified date is showing as late August/early September, when I was switching computers?

I just ran an archive of my calendar of all items older than September 1, 2008, and it looks like it got rid of 90% of the items older than September 2008. The only ones left are showing a modified date of Oct. 25, 2008. I have no idea why they are all set on that random date, because again, I have no recollection of modifying any of them.

Thank you for all your help! The only mystery left is why the modified dates of all of these items is appearing to be in Aug., Sept., Oct.

Best regards,

JMT

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It might well be that the modified date was changed when you copied the items to your new computer.
You probably did something with the items whose modified date is October 25, 2008, but if you can’t remember what, it’ll probably remain a mystery.

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AutoArchive looks at the general settings specified in the Tools | Options dialog *and* at the AutoArchive settings in the AutoArchive tab of the Properties window for each individual folder.
For each folder, you can specify one of three settings:
– Do not AutoArchive this folder at all, or
– AutoArchive this folder using the general settings from the Tools | Options dialog, or
– AutoArchive this folder using custom settings specified in the same tab of the Properties window.
This applies to mail folders, calendar folders, task folders and notes folders, but not to contacts folders (contacts are never AutoArchived).

Apart from that, you can force an Archive action at any moment using File | Archive…
You have two options here:
– Archive all folders according to their AutoArchive settings.
– Archive items older than a specific date from the selected folder and its subfolders.

And of course, you can manually drag items from a folder to your Archive .pst file.

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