Microsoft Outlook Archiving

Microsoft Outlook

Archiving

What is Archiving?

On-line On-line

Archiving is moving messages from an “on-line” folder to an “off-line” folder, thus freeing server space.

While organizing mail in folders is a great way to keep them organized, if the folders are under your Mailbox folder, they are not archived.

Offline Folders (.pst files)

An archive folder file is created by Outlook when you use auto archiving. While Outlook archives, it will create subfolders that match the subfolder in your mailbox that the message had been stored in. Thus, your messages will be organized exactly as you organized them, only off line.

Personal Folders

Personal folders are used for manual archiving. You can create subfolders within the Personal Folder file (and subfolders within the subfolders) to organize your mail.

Creating New Offline Folders and Subfolders The difference between a pst and a subfolder

Imagine that a pst file is a file cabinet. It is a piece of equipment that holds your files in drawers and folders. A subfolder within a pst file is like the drawers and folders within a file cabinet.

Creating an Offline Folder

An Archive Folder is created automatically the first time AutoArchive runs. You create Personal Folders yourself.

Creating a Subfolder

Archive Folders create the subfolders automatically to match during an archive. You can create your own subfolders in an Archive Folder just as you do in any folder – online or offline.

Auto Archiving

Folder structure

Outlook will duplicate your current folder structure. For example, if you have created a folder within your account named Department Policies, and within that folder there is a folder called “Vacation” which contains an old message, Outlook will create the “Department Policies”

folder, then the “Vacation” folder under it and move the old message to the “Vacation” folder, just as you have it.

Email dates

Outlook uses the items’ “Created Date” to determine which items to move. If you move an item from an off- line folder into an on-line folder, the “created date” will change to the current date.

Global Settings

You need to first set the global Auto Archive settings. Go to Tools… Options… Other…

Auto Archive…

Individual Folder Settings

You can change the archive settings on individual folders. Note: The Inbox does not inherit the auto archive settings – they must be set manually.

Running AutoArchive manually

If you need to do an archive before it is scheduled, you can perform it manually. This function is found under Tools… Mailbox Cleanup… AutoArchive Now. This function runs automatically according to the AutoArchive settings.

Manual Archiving

If you prefer to store your mail in folders according to category, or simply want complete control over which messages are moved (and where), then you want to use Manual Archiving.

Creating a Personal Folder

To create a Personal Folder, go to File… New… Outlook Data File. Give it a location (the default location will be in a secure location accessible only with your login or by an

administrator).

Creating subfolders

You can go to File… New… Folder, or right-click on the folder you want the subfolder under and click New Folder.

Moving items and folders

To move Outlook items and/or folders, you can either drag and drop them on the folder, or right-click and choose Move to Folder (this option is also on the Edit menu).

To move multiple items (folders must be moved individually), hold the Ctrl button on the keyboard while you click (if the items are not next to each other):

or if the items are in a block, click the first item, hold the Shift key and click the last item:

Finding your archived messages

Selecting Find will search the To and Subject fields (or all text in the message if you select that option under the Options pull-down). You can specify the folder in the Search In pull- down. Once you have set your parameters, click Find Now.

Advanced find

With Advanced Find, you can set a variety of criteria, such as urgency, file size, sent or received dates, etc.

Managing your Mailbox

Faculty and Ph.D. students have 100Mb of email space, while staff have 50Mb of space.

To check the size of your mailbox, either go to Tools… Mailbox cleanup…

or right-click on your mailbox from the folder list, choose Properties, then Folder Size.

Identifying large emails

If your mailbox is still large after archiving, add the Size field to a folder (especially the Inbox and Sent Items folders) to see if you have any large messages (probably with attachments) that are causing the problem.

Or you can have Outlook search for items of a certain size through Tools… Mailbox Cleanup…

Compressing your folders

Adding, deleting and moving messages can leave gaps in your pst file, causing it to use more memory than needed. Fortunately, Outlook XP makes it easy to manage and compress your offline folders. Go to File… Data File Management… choose the file and click Settings… then Compact Now.

You can also compact a folder by going to the properties of the file (click the top level of the file in the folder list, go to either File… Properties… or right-click and choose Properties…, then click Advanced).

Opening pst folders

You can open a pst file through Data File Management under the File menu

or under File… Open… Outlook Data File…

Closing pst folders

You can close a pst file by right-clicking on the top level in the Folder List and choosing Close “????????”

or through Data File Management under the File menu.