OutlookEX UDF - Help & Support (IV)

[cag8f]

OK, before I start adding your lines, I want to update you on a test I just ran.  I switched to my laptop, which is running Win 10 x86. I carried out the same test.  Namely, I opened Outlook manually and ran the same AU3 program.  The program completed in under 100 ms, as expected.  Subsequent executions also completed in under 100 ms.  Again, on my laptop, the x86 version of Outlook is running.

So in light of that, what do you think?  I guess on my desktop computer (Win 10, x64) I am perhaps failing to carry out some additional required steps?  Do you still advise that I carry out the instructions from your previous message?  If so, I am fairly confused.  You seem to be now asking me to create an EXE, while all previous tests have simply run an AU3 file.  I don't understand why this is necessary.

[water]

31 minutes ago, cag8f said:

I guess on my desktop computer (Win 10, x64) I am perhaps failing to carry out some additional required steps?

There are no additional steps needed to use AutoIt to automate Outlook.
Maybe it is something you have added to your desktop that causes the delay.
Could be

• an external mailbox (GMail ...) or
• a bug in the 64 bit implementation or
• an unsupported feature you use (like PST files on a network share ) or
• ...

[cag8f]

>> Maybe it is something you have added to your desktop that causes the delay.

OK.  Are you able to provide a list of things I can check that might be the cause?

>> an external mailbox (GMail ...)

Can you clarify what you mean by this?  I have configured Outlook to fetch email from different servers, if that is what you're asking (although none of them is a Gmail server).  I can say that my desktop Outlook has several email accounts added, and contains several thousand emails.  While my laptop Outlook has absolutely no email at all--I use it simply to store my calendar and tasks.

>> a bug in the 64 bit implementation

Is this something I can check?

>> an unsupported feature you use (like PST files on a network share )

I do not have any PST files on a network share.

Again, I'm happy to do testing/troubleshooting.  But I'm a bit unsure on what exactly to test.

[water]

11 minutes ago, cag8f said:

Can you clarify what you mean by this?  I have configured Outlook to fetch email from different servers, if that is what you're asking (although none of them is a Gmail server).  I can say that my desktop Outlook has several email accounts added, and contains several thousand emails.  While my laptop Outlook has absolutely no email at all--I use it simply to store my calendar and tasks. 

That would be the place to start.
Maybe you could strip off account by account and test until you find the culprint.
Or you simply life with the delay

[cag8f]

OK got it.  So to confirm, the execution time of the _OL_Open() function is affected by the number of email accounts in Outlook, and possibly also the number of emails stored in Outlook--is that accurate?

[Skysnake]

Hmm, I think @water means that the connection time from your local PC to the remote mail server may the problem, not necessarily the number of accounts or mail items.  

It is possible that a specific mail server connection is very slow, causing a generally poor performance.

 

[water]

Never had to cope with Outlook performance.
Maybe articles like this one shed some light onto the subject: https://blogoffice365.com/troubleshoot-solve-outlook-performance-issues/

[cag8f]

@Skysnake Well let me first try to understand what _OL_Open() does.  When I run it, does it have to wait while it makes a connection to the remote email server tied to each of my Outlook email accounts?  To be clear, most of the email accounts in Outlook are IMAP, but one or two are POP.

[water]

I think so, but I'm not 100% sure.
You could add the TimerInit/TimerDiff lines before and after ObjGet in _OL_Open as described in this post

 

[cag8f]

@water OK.  So how can I confirm whether _OL_Open() makes a connection to my remote email servers?  This is fairly important to my program.  If the answer is 'yes,' then I have to find another solution.  If the answer is 'no,' then I'll continue to troubleshoot why _OL_Open() is taking so long on my system.

On first glance, I don't see why the answer would be 'yes.'  In this case, all I want to do is create a new Outlook task, which shouldn't have anything to do with my email or any of my remote email servers.

[water]

Unfortunately I know nothing about Outlook internals. Maybe it has to do with cache settings, antivirus programs or other things described in the blogoffice article I linked you to in a former post (https://blogoffice365.com/troubleshoot-solve-outlook-performance-issues/)

Did you try any of this settings?

[cag8f]

@water 

>> Unfortunately I know nothing about Outlook internals.

OK.  I was under the impression you were one of the developers who built this UDF.  Is that inaccurate?  Wouldn't one of the UDF devs be able to confirm if `_OL_Open()` makes a connection to my remote email servers?

>> Maybe it has to do with cache settings, antivirus programs or other things described in the blogoffice article I linked you to in a former post (https://blogoffice365.com/troubleshoot-solve-outlook-performance-issues/)

>> Did you try any of this settings?

Well I don't want to do any testing until I first know what to expect.  Right now, I just want to determine whether I should expect `_OL_Open()` to connect to each my remote email servers.  

[Juvigy]

@Water,

Good day to you. Could you please advise or point me at the right direction. I have a problem with outlook on my company PCs. A policy or something (i couldnt figure out what)  is changing the macro security settings like the bellow:

This totally brakes my scripts and efforts. I am using a regfix to update it to:

But i dont know when and what is changing my settings and i need to close and open outlook after the regfix for the changes to take effect. Do you have any ideas or suggestions i can do to fix this?

 

[water]

5 hours ago, cag8f said:

>> Unfortunately I know nothing about Outlook internals.

OK.  I was under the impression you were one of the developers who built this UDF.  Is that inaccurate?  Wouldn't one of the UDF devs be able to confirm if `_OL_Open()` makes a connection to my remote email servers?

>> Maybe it has to do with cache settings, antivirus programs or other things described in the blogoffice article I linked you to in a former post (https://blogoffice365.com/troubleshoot-solve-outlook-performance-issues/)

>> Did you try any of this settings?

Well I don't want to do any testing until I first know what to expect.  Right now, I just want to determine whether I should expect `_OL_Open()` to connect to each my remote email servers.  

Your impression is correct. I am the Dev of the OutlookEX UDF.
_OL_Open just uses the AutoIt functions ObjGet and ObJCreate to connect to Outlook or create a new instance. What Outlook does under the covers (connect to all stores as defined in the Outlook profile synchronous or asynchronous)  is what I meant by "internals".
You should expect _OL_Open to connect to ALL defined stores of a profile may they be located on an Exchange server, in a local PST-file or on a Google mail server.

[water]

@Juvigy Never had to cope with Group Policies.
How does it affect you? Is this limited to VBA macros in Outlook or do you encounter problems with Autoit scripts accessing Outlook as well?

[cag8f]

@water OK thanks.  It is becoming clearer to me.  But I have a follow-up question.

>> What Outlook does under the covers (connect to all stores as defined in the Outlook profile synchronous or asynchronous)  is what I meant by "internals".
You should expect _OL_Open to connect to ALL defined stores of a profile may they be located on an Exchange server, in a local PST-file or on a Google mail server.

What exactly is a 'store' in this case?  In my particular case, when I open Outlook, there are 10 different email accounts--some IMAP (using OST files) and some POP (using local PST files).  In addition there is a separate local PST file that contains all my tasks and calendar items.  Would each of these be a 'store' in the way you are referencing?

[water]

Here you'll find the needed definitions
https://docs.microsoft.com/de-de/office/vba/outlook/how-to/items-folders-and-stores/storing-outlook-items

[cag8f]

@water OK thanks for that.  So if I have four OST files and one PST file stored on my computer, each corresponding to a different email account, then each is a 'store.' Is that correct?

Edited March 22, 2019 by cag8f

[water]

Correct

[cag8f]

@water OK thanks for that, I'm getting there 🙂  Earlier you said

> You should expect _OL_Open to connect to ALL defined stores of a profile may they be located on an Exchange server, in a local PST-file or on a Google mail server.

I want to be sure I understand what you mean by 'connect.'  Let's say I have an OST file on my computer corresponding to a particular remote email account (e.g. on a remote email server), and a separate PST file on my computer corresponding to a different remote email account (on a different remote email server).  When _OL_Open "connects" to each of these stores, does it simply establish a connection to each of the local files on my computer?   Or does it instead/also establish a connection to each of the remote email servers in-question?