Remove PErsonal Folders

[Ben]

Our company policy is to no longer user personal folders(.pst) in Outlook.
We run Exchange and so all Outlook clients are configured to connect to a
Exchange server. Ideally what I would like is a script that will check
their mail profile when they log in and if personal folders exist it would
remove them from the profile. Is this possible? Outlook clients are 2000
and 2003. Thanks.

Ben

 

[Brian Tillman]

Our company policy is to no longer user personal folders(.pst) in
Outlook. We run Exchange and so all Outlook clients are configured to
connect to a Exchange server. Ideally what I would like is a script
that will check their mail profile when they log in and if personal
folders exist it would remove them from the profile. Is this
possible? Outlook clients are 2000 and 2003. Thanks.

So are you not going to allow people to use archives?

 

[Ben]

No archives.

So are you not going to allow people to use archives?

 

[Brian Tillman]

No archives.

I hope you have terabytes on the disk server.

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

If you want to completely disable the ability to create a .pst file through the Outlook user interface, you can use this registry entry:

Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Outlook
Value name: DisablePST
Value type: REG_DWORD
Values: 1=disable .pst use; 0=allow .pst use (default)

Outlook 2000 would be Office\9.0. There is also a recent Outlook 2003 hotfix that allows it to be deployed in HKCU rather than HKLM, and another one to allow the continued use of SharePoint proxy .pst files.

When DisablePST is set to 1, users will not be able to create Personal Folders .pst files and most features that depend on .pst files will be disabled.

Oddly enough, setting DisablePST to 1 does not disable the ability to open an existing .pst file. To block that feature, you can disable the File | Open | Outlook Data File command with a Group Policy Object using the setting "Disable command bar buttons and menu item." That command's ID is 5576.

See these MSKB artcles:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=258277 (Outlook 2000)
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=323244 (Outlook 2002)
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=896515 (Outlook 2003)
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=897658 (Outlook 2003)

--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003 (NEW!)

and Microsoft Outlook Programming - Jumpstart for
Administrators, Power Users, and Developers

 

[Ben]

Thak You. Exactly what I was looking for.

If you want to completely disable the ability to create a .pst file through
the Outlook user interface, you can use this registry entry:

Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Outlook
Value name: DisablePST
Value type: REG_DWORD
Values: 1=disable .pst use; 0=allow .pst use (default)

Outlook 2000 would be Office\9.0. There is also a recent Outlook 2003 hotfix
that allows it to be deployed in HKCU rather than HKLM, and another one to
allow the continued use of SharePoint proxy .pst files.

When DisablePST is set to 1, users will not be able to create Personal
Folders .pst files and most features that depend on .pst files will be
disabled.

Oddly enough, setting DisablePST to 1 does not disable the ability to open
an existing .pst file. To block that feature, you can disable the File |
Open | Outlook Data File command with a Group Policy Object using the
setting "Disable command bar buttons and menu item." That command's ID is
5576.

See these MSKB artcles:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=258277 (Outlook 2000)
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=323244 (Outlook 2002)
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=896515 (Outlook 2003)
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=897658 (Outlook 2003)

--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003 (NEW!)

and Microsoft Outlook Programming - Jumpstart for
Administrators, Power Users, and Developers