Rebuilding Database

L

Lynn Quinlan

Hi there,

I have recently e-mailed myself on my MSN account several hundred e-mails.
(These would probably be about 4 GB in total.) These are now stored in Local
Folders on Entourage. (This was done so that I could have my Outlook 2003
available on my Mac.)

Around the same time I began this laborious but necessary process I have had
perhaps six occasions now where Entourage (2004) has required the integrity
check and had to rebuild the database.

No error messages are given, no reason as to why this is needed. I'm
wondering what causes this to happen. It's a time-consuming task to have to
check the database for problems and then rebuild it. After it has been
re-built I lose all my newsgroup subscriptions and have to go back in and
re-subscribe to them. The mail seems to be fine except that my MSN account
and my .Mac account now have to be re-downloaded again.

So, if someone could tell me what could be happening so that I can try and
avoid future repetition of this problem it would be appreciated. Perhaps
the size of the mailboxes under Local Folders has something to do with this.
If so, how do I check these?

Thanks in advance.

Lynn
 
D

Diane Ross

Hi there,

I have recently e-mailed myself on my MSN account several hundred e-mails.
(These would probably be about 4 GB in total.) These are now stored in Local
Folders on Entourage. (This was done so that I could have my Outlook 2003
available on my Mac.)
Click to expand...

If your Outlook 2003 mail was on an IMAP account it could be shared with
Entourage easily. See the Cross Platform page for solutions:

<http://www.entourage.mvps.org/cross_platform/index.html>

The link to Dave Riches tutorial is the most popular.

Outlook2Mac a third party application ($10) is also highly recommended by
users.

<http://www.littlemachines.com/>

One of the reasons I'm referring you to these pages, if the possibility that
when you emailed the emails through MSN, they were somehow corrupted and
this is the root of your problems. These are other ways to import your mail.

Suggestion: You might want to store your Outlook files in a separate
Identity. You can always switch Identities to search. If there are mails
there you access frequently, you might use a Custom View to save those mails
for your Main Identity and store the older mail in a separate Identity.

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

Around the same time I began this laborious but necessary process I have had
perhaps six occasions now where Entourage (2004) has required the integrity
check and had to rebuild the database.
Click to expand...

You can get false reports. Is the message you are receiving "Your Office
database is damaged. You need to rebuild"?

See this fix and steps to determine if your database needs to be rebuilt.

No error messages are given, no reason as to why this is needed. I'm
wondering what causes this to happen. It's a time-consuming task to have to
check the database for problems and then rebuild it. After it has been
re-built I lose all my newsgroup subscriptions and have to go back in and
re-subscribe to them. The mail seems to be fine except that my MSN account
and my .Mac account now have to be re-downloaded again.
Click to expand...

Are the MSN and .Mac accounts, IMAP or POP?
So, if someone could tell me what could be happening so that I can try and
avoid future repetition of this problem it would be appreciated. Perhaps
the size of the mailboxes under Local Folders has something to do with this.
If so, how do I check these?
Click to expand...
You can check the size of your database in the Finder.

~/Documents/Microsoft User Data/Office 2004 Identities/Main Bridge/Database

Size Limits of Database

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

Just to cover some basics since you are new to Entourage:

In System Preferences Startup Items, check to be sure you have only 1
Microsoft Database daemon. If you have more than one delete all and let
Entourage create a new one.

Read "How to rebuild":
<http://www.entourage.mvps.org/database/rebuild.html>

Make sure you QUIT THE DAEMON before rebuilding.

During a rebuild, Entourage backs up your database. You can delete this
after you are satisfied with the rebuild. Since database can be large, these
can quickly start filling up your drive if you are rebuilding frequently.

See Basics everyone should know about using Entourage:

<http://www.entourage.mvps.org/get_started/index.html>

Read the Most Popular FAQs. These answers wills save you a lot of time.

<http://www.entourage.mvps.org/faq/top_faqs.html>

--
Diane Ross, Microsoft Mac MVP
Entourage Help Page
<http://www.entourage.mvps.org/>
One of the top five MS Entourage resources listed on the Entourage Blog.
<http://blogs.msdn.com/entourage/>
 
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