in message
I figured that since Hotmail was also owned my microsoft it would be
easy to
use it in my Outlook 2003. However, I am unable to get the two to
connect.
What should I do? Why can't I use Outlook for my hotmail email
address?
Hmm, and you didn't bother to mention whether this was a free or paid
Hotmail account why? That you neglected to mention that this was for
a new Hotmail account is why?
WebDAV access (the scripting language used to communicate to
Microsoft's HTTP mail hosts) was dropped for freebie Hotmail accounts
back in November 2004. While Outlook and Outlook Express still have
the WebDAV command set encoded within them, it also requires the
Hotmail account to be enabled for WebDAV access. Microsoft turned off
WebDAV for new freebie account created after November 2004. If you
pay for a premium Hotmail account then Microsoft will enable WebDAV
access in your Hotmail account and then you can use Outlook or Outlook
Express to connect to it.
You could also try using the Outlook Connector plug-in to see if that
gets you connected to your new freebie Hotmail account. Get it from
Microsoft's download site. It only works with Outlook 2003 & 2007 (so
I'm out of luck with Outlook 2002). It won't help you with Outlook
Express but then you can replace OE with Windows Live Mail (WLM) to
provide Hotmail access. WebDAV was considered vulnerable (insecure)
so Microsoft is replacing it with the DeltaSync protocol; see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeltaSync. The Outlook Connector plug-in
and WLM support DeltaSync. Of course, as always with *freebie*
accounts at Hotmail, you are stuck using Microsoft e-mail clients and
why I discarded my Hotmail account (it stays alive for purposes other
than e-mail). There are way too many freebie POP3/IMAP4 alternatives
to Hotmail for me to bother trying to make Hotmail work.
