Microsoft ® Office Outlook ® 2007 Training Retrieve, back up, or share messages Sweetwater ISD presents:

Microsoft® Office Outlook® 2007 Training

Retrieve, back up, or share messages

Sweetwater ISD presents:

Manage your mailbox V: Retrieve, back up, or share messages

Course contents

• Overview: You stored them—now find them

• Lesson: Use your stored messages

The lesson includes a list of suggested tasks and a set of test questions.


Overview: Use your stored messages

You can create folders on your computer for storing e-mail, appointments, and other Outlook items, instead of keeping them on a server.

An Outlook file of this type is called a personal store (.pst) because you can store it on your own computer.

And just as other files can be opened, closed, moved, or copied, so can Outlook .pst files. That’s what this course will show you how to do.


Course goals

• Show Personal Folders or Archive Folders in the Navigation Pane to gain access to your stored messages.

• Avoid problems by following some best practices for common tasks like keeping backup files or archives of your e-mail, and for easily recognizing what’s inside those files or archives.

Lesson

Use your stored messages


Use your stored messages

Whether you’re using the Personal Folders method or the Archive method of storage, messages are kept in a PST file on your computer. And they are no different from other messages.

For instance, you can forward or reply to them, and you can search your stored messages if, for example, you need to jog your memory about a project you worked on or a decision you made.

To do these tasks with your stored messages, you need to open the PST file in the Navigation Pane.


Open a Personal Folders or Archive Folders file

To find messages that you’ve stored in a PST file, you’ll open Personal Folders or Archive Folders in the Navigation Pane by clicking the plus sign next to it.

If you don’t see the folder you want in the Navigation Pane, you’ll need to open the PST file.

The animation shows the steps.

Animation: Right-click, and click Play.

[Author: .swf gets inserted here; delete this placeholder before inserting .swf file.]


Open a Personal Folders or Archive Folders file

To find messages that you’ve stored in a PST file, you’ll open Personal Folders or Archive Folders in the Navigation Pane by clicking the plus sign next to it.

If you don’t see the folder you want in the Navigation Pane, you’ll need to open the PST file.

On the File menu, point to Open, and then click Outlook Data File. After you select the PST file you want — the picture shows Archive Folders — it will appear under All Mail Items.


Avoid the Open With caution message

One big difference between PST files and other types of files: You can’t double-click a PST file to open it.

If you try, you’ll see a message similar to this one.

It can be frustrating or confusing to get a caution message suggesting that you click Open With.

To avoid it, just remember that to open a PST file, you always start in Outlook and use the File menu, as described in the previous section.


Close the file when you’re done

You can display as many PST files as you like in the Navigation Pane at one time.

As mentioned earlier, having too many PST files open at one time will slow the performance of Outlook.

If you no longer need to review the contents of a PST file, you can remove it from the Navigation Pane.


Close the file when you’re done

You can display as many PST files as you like in the Navigation Pane at one time.

Do this by right-clicking it and clicking Close “Personal Folders”, Close “Archive Folders”, or Close whatever unique name you’ve given your PST file.

Closing a PST file keeps it from being displayed in Outlook, but it doesn’t affect its contents or its location on your computer.


Copy a PST to create a backup

If your computer crashes or if you don’t have access to the e-mail server, wouldn’t it be nice to have backup copies of your important messages somewhere else, such as a CD?

You can do this by copying a PST file. You can then move the copied file (and the messages it contains) to another computer or to a CD.


Copy a PST to create a backup

You’ll need to close Outlook before you do this.

1

2

3

Right-click the file in Windows Explorer and click Copy.

Move the pointer to the location where you want to paste the copy of the file, right-click, and click Paste.

The result: The copied file is pasted with the original file name and the word "Copy" so that you know it’s a copy.


Find a PST on your computer

So you like the idea of copying a PST file to back up your messages or to move them to another computer.

How do you find the file in order to copy it?

Before you close Outlook to start making your copy, use the Account Settings dialog box to identify the file name and location of the PST file that you want to copy.


Find a PST on your computer

Remember that a PST file is an Outlook data file. And finding the file is your first step to managing it.

So the command that you click on the File menu is Data File Management.

Before you close Outlook, select the file that you want to copy and click Open Folder, as shown in the picture. Then you can close Outlook. The folder containing the PST will remain open so that you can copy it.


More about finding PST files

Now that we’ve shown you how easy it is, we have to mention that the Data File Management method we just described does have a caveat.

Before you can see a file’s location using that method, the file must be open in Outlook.

That is, if you’ve closed a PST or if you’re looking for one that you recently copied to your computer and haven’t yet opened in Outlook, you may need to do a little looking around outside Outlook.


More about finding PST files

And sometimes PST files seem downright invisible when you start to look for them outside Outlook.

That’s because some of the places Outlook stores PST files are normally hidden in Windows.

To see these files in Windows Explorer, you must use the option in Windows to display hidden files and folders.


Avoid problems: Part 1 (Close, close)

Storing data in a PST file can have lots of advantages.

But if you’re not careful when you move, rename, or copy a PST, you may see an error message like this.

To avoid problems in Outlook later, follow this guideline: Before you move, rename, or copy a PST file, first close it from the Navigation Pane, and then close Outlook.


Avoid problems: Part 2 (One person at a time)

Look familiar?

In this case, though, the warning tells you that the PST file can’t be opened.

The most likely cause is that someone else already has the file open and so has locked you out.


Avoid problems: Part 2 (One person at a time)

How can that happen?

Although you’ll get the best performance with PSTs when they’re stored on your own computer, it is possible to open a PST that’s stored on any other computer on your network.

To avoid problems, remember that PST files are for use by one person at a time, on one computer at a time.


Search multiple PST files at one time

New to Outlook 2007 is the ability to search multiple PST files at one time.

Any PST file can be searched together with any others.

This means that if you’re searching for a message that you know you filed, but you’re not certain which file you put it in, you can find it easily with a single search.


Search multiple PST files at one time

How? Make sure that the data files that you want to search are open — if they are, you’ll see them in the Navigation Pane.

Select All Mail Items as the location for your search and then select the files that you want to search.

All Mail Items also appears at the top of the Instant Search pane, so you can clearly see that you’re searching multiple files.


Suggestions for practice

1. Open PST files.

2. Change the folder names that appear in the Navigation Pane.

3. Search multiple PST files.

4. Manage your data files.

5. Close the sample data folders.

Online practice (requires Outlook 2007)

http://office.microsoft.com/training/Training.aspx?AssetID=RP102387951033&CTT=6&Origin=RC102387941033


Test question 1

Suppose that when you start Outlook, you receive a message that a certain PST file can’t be found. What’s a likely cause? (Pick one answer.)

1. The file was moved, renamed, or deleted (and wasn’t closed from Outlook first).

2. Options in Windows are keeping it hidden.

3. The PST is too big.


Test question 1: Answer

The file was moved, renamed, or deleted (and wasn’t closed from Outlook first).

Before you move, rename, or delete a PST file, you should close it from the Outlook Navigation Pane first.


Test question 2

How many people can open the same PST file at one time? (Pick one answer.)

1. One.

2. Two.

3. No specific number (it depends on who has permissions).



One.

With PST files, it’s one person at a time.


Test question 3

What’s the right way to open a PST file? (Pick one answer.)

1. Use the Open command on the File menu in Outlook.

2. Show hidden files, and then double-click the PST file in Windows Explorer.

3. Right-click the file in Windows Explorer, click Open With, and choose Outlook.



Use the Open command on the File menu in Outlook.


Quick Reference Card

For a summary of the tasks covered in this course, view the Quick Reference Card.

http://office.microsoft.com/training/Training.aspx?AssetID=RP102387971033&CTT=6&Origin=RC102387941033

Microsoft ® Office Outlook ® 2007 Training Retrieve, back up, or share messages Sweetwater ISD presents:

Documents

stored messages

outlook file

archive folders file

copied file

pst files

file menu

messages overview

original file