Cannot Delete Items in Entourage

R

Ralph Quinn

This morning I went to delete emails from the Delete Folder and I get this
message:

Entourage cannot open the item due to an error. It states I should restart
and then try again. I have done that a number of times.

It also says to verify and rebuild the Entourage database. How do I do
that?

Also, I cannot access my sent folder. . . Same message.

Could anybody give me an answer? Thanks in advance.

Ralph Quinn
[email protected]
 
D

Diane Ross

Hi Ralph,

All these are signs of database corruption. You will need to rebuild. It's
possible that the rebuilt Identity will not be stable and you will then need
to move into a new Identity. I highly suggest you backup Entourage on a
daily basis in case it fails and your data is not retrievable. There is a
series on backing up Entourage on the Entourage Help Blog.

Make a duplicate in the Finder first as additional backup. A rebuild does
make a duplicate, but sometimes in the process the original and backup get
merged resulting in total disaster. It's rare but it happens.

How to rebuild:

<http://www.entourage.mvps.org/database/rebuild.html>

Note: how much free space you have will on your hard drive will affect how
successful your rebuild will be.

It's advised by the developers not to let Time Machine backup your Entourage
database. If the database is copied while being used, the backup could be
corrupt. You can set the Time Machine to exclude the Microsoft User Data
folder and create an iCal event to copy it over at night while not in use so
you get one backup daily in Time Machine.

Alternative method to use Entourage and Time Machine (does a once a day or
whatever time period you select)

<http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/2008/01/alternative_method_to_use_entourage_
and_time_machine.html>

Entourage and Time Machine (creates chronological backup of Identity can be
used by both Tiger and Leopard)

<http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/2008/01/entourage_and_time_machine.html>
 
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