Microsoft's many Outlooks are confusing users – including its own employees

Baffled by the plethora of Outlook options out there? You aren't alone. Microsoft veteran Scott Hanselman posted a list of some more variants that could be used to do the same thing. It's a problem common to several Microsoft products. A file needs to be opened, but which app should be used? Should it be Outlook New, or …

[Philip Storry]

Point of pedantry

Pedant Alert!

There never was an Outlook '95. It first shipped in '97. Prior to that we had to use either the Microsoft Exchange Client or Microsoft Mail and Schedule+, depending on whether you were on Exchange or Mail as your backend. Neither of those supported POP3 - the distinguishing feature of Outlook was that it could support multiple backends.

I think '98 came fairly quickly, as '97 was quite buggy. It was also given away on a lot of cover CDs as Microsoft wanted to keep people in their ecosystem rather than use, say, Netscape's mail client for their POP3 connections.

[Test Man]

Re: Point of pedantry

Yeah I remember all of this. In fact to me Outlook 97 looked like it was based on Mail and Schedule+.

[el_oscuro]

Re: Point of pedantry

There was an Office 95 though, which I used for many years. I had opened a service request with Oracle about an issue with their middleware, and they mailed me a CD with a patch for it. But in addition to their patch, the CD had a directory named "Sparky" which had the complete unlocked enterprise edition of Office 95 in it. Not sure if Oracle had a license to ship Microsoft software, but I didn't really care.

[ComputerSays_noAbsolutelyNo]

What about Outlook (less shitty)?

ffs

[Fonant]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

Like, perhaps, allowing the account username to be different to the email address for POP3/IMAP/SMTP servers. Without needing to find the route to get to the old settings UI?

[DamonR]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

I thought I was just being stupid. Could someone post how to do this? (not an Outlook user, asking for a friend)

[David Austin]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

Go to the Classic metro/Windows 7 style control panel, switch to Large icon view, then open the Mail (Microsoft Outlook) Applet.

Clicking email account, then change on the one you want to edit there will give you the full, oldskool Outlook 2010-2016 options screen, with all the features you need to both fix, and get yourself into trouble.

Only works for Outlook (Classic); Outlook (New) expect an ActiveSync account, or sends the details to the Microsoft servers to pickup POP3/IMAP email - that could be turned off in earlier versions, but not found a way to do that on the latest builds, yet.

[Lee D]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

I'd take any version with proper integrated and GPO'd signature management to be honest.

Jumping through hoops to do very primitive signature management is a nonsense, and having to have something like the very-expensive Exclaimer to handle it all just for a SIMPLE MAIL CLIENT FUNCTION is ridiculous.

[nijam]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

There;s no release date for that.

[VicMortimer]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

And never will be. Outsuck has been the WORST email client for decades, it's never going to get better.

Just use something, anything else. Thunderbird, Apple Mail, Alpine, find an old copy of Eudora, ANYTHING but Outsuck.

[StuartMcL]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

I'm still very happy with Pegasus Mail and I get happier ever time I have to set up an Outlook installation

[Andrew Scott]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

Used that in my office for years. rest of the campus was using banyan email in a dos box in windows but we had a decent windows email system. liked the rules system, much better than the current version of rules in outlook.

[PM.]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

Outlook 2003 was quite ok, likable even

[David Austin]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

Reminder that as an Email client, Outlook is definitely mid and there's so much better out there, but as a PIM tool, it's near unbeatable, especially so if you want everything in a single app.

It's this fact that's given Outlook the chokehold it has on the business world, and also why it's so perplexing that Microsoft is pushing (New) Outlook so hard to standard users before it's feature complete compared to (Classic) outlook.

[Helcat]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

Think it's waiting on the following to be released first:

Outlook (Even Shittier)

Outlook (Enhanced shitty)

Outlook (Ultimate Shitty edition)

and Outlook (Directors Shitty cut)

Obviously the (less shitty) edition will be a cut-down version of the (Ultimate Shitty Edition). One with any feature that's even remotely useful removed. Such as being able to view emails.

[FirstTangoInParis]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

> Outlook (Directors Shitty cut)

That’s the version that replaced Windows Mail (or whatever it was called). The old mail client was not broken and absolutely did not need fixing, but some droid at MS decided it wasn’t called Outlook and had to go.

The replacement is total sh*t. Open it, read / send mail, close it. So far, so average. Then try opening it again. Error message: it’s already running. Check Task Manager, no it’s not, or at least not as an application, and likely as some cryptically named TSR, and one has to reboot the PC to get it to work again. After a few weeks of it not working, guess what? I replaced it with Thunderbird. Calm is restored.

[Elongated Muskrat]

Re: What about Outlook (less shitty)?

They should take the easier route of renaming it Lookout, and making the icon a big red warning triangle.

[Anonymous Coward]

Slower and harder to use

Sure things about MS products;

New only means more buttons.

Cloud means slooooooower. Slow to open files, slow to save, slow to close.

How many sub versions of outllook do you have in your environment, yeah, that's not right.

If MS would stop building on the same csv and cmd back bone (now called excel and powershell) as they have for the last 40 years - and actually innovate,,,, never mind.

[Ramis101]

Re: Slower and harder to use

New in the MS play book generally means the same buttons but now in different locations & with different icons as far as i can tell.

any advanced use case of Outlook is impossible without resorting to the ancient Control Panel Mail settings programme

I use Thunderbird, unfortunately my clients generally use Outlook

[big_D]

Re: Slower and harder to use

At the moment, new means "we've removed all the features you've relied on for the last 30 years and around which you have built your workflows, and we have added new garbage nobody needs, oh and we've built in ads that look like emails!"

[The Central Scrutinizer]

"Baffled by the plethora of Outlook options out there?"

No, I haven't touched Microsoft's shit in years and years.

Bwahahaha

[sabroni]

re: No, I haven't touched Microsoft's shit in years and years.

That's all the qualifications you need to comment on a microsoft story.

[Anonymous Coward]

Security

Security would be tightened considerably if every character I typed wasn't pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered by the OS I run at work.

Remove all the MS telemetry hooks and my data would be perfectly secure thank you very much.

Microsoft's myopic view of the world, their marketing horse dung and their product line does nothing for me anymore.

[Roj Blake]

Re: Security

I would give you "Six" thumbs up for the reference, but one will have to do.

[m4r35n357]

Re: Security

So Nadella is just another Number Two.

[The Oncoming Scorn]

Re: Security

I'll give you half a dozen for the other.

Be seeing you.

[EricB123]

Re: Security

What, your AI isn't giving you 6 thumbs automatically? Simply change your AI then.

[Anonymous Coward]

So...

All that lovely slurped data is sent to Uncle Sam over a Signal Channel so that Putin's people can listen into it in real-time.

To see Tulsi G deny being on that group chat was magnificent. Almost as good at Trump saying that he never signed that War Exec Order even though it is his signature on it.

Never mind, we'll see the usual suspect on Pox Spews saying 'Hillary's Emails', 'Hunter's Laptop' and 'Bidens Garage' just to make out that this was a non event.

We, here in the UK will be left out of the joint force being put together by the EU and our defence makers will NOT get any orders from them. Another BREXIT Bonus.

Never mind People, Herr Starmer will proclaim that the slimmed down civil service will be more efficient than the old one even though people will die waiting for benefits (if they still exist).

We truly are doomed especially when Trump applies the same tariffs to us as the EU.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: So...

We can't all be Liberal Democrats (thankfully)

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: So...

You are correct. Some of us are actual leftists, not center-right Democrats.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Some of us are actual leftists

The word you're looking for is Socialist. It means believing that people have to look out for each other and not the bourgeoisie.

The fact you can't even speak it's name doesn't give much hope.

[Andrew Scott]

Re: So...

no that was "TG". You must know the difference. mendacious the lot of them.

[collinsl]

Re: So...

mendacious the lot of them

And how does one go about "mendaciousing" people?

[Helcat]

Re: So...

That's the fun of looking at what all sides say: Sometimes there's some good points raised, but often it's just amusing.

Yes, that actually does apply to all sides, not just those not aligned to a particular view. In the case of the Signal incident, hearing the claim it was a cleaver 4D chess move to uncover a mole: Okay, that might be true but those claiming it didn't sell it too well, and it's more likely someone mucked up. A good point, however, is the messages seem rather 'clean': Not much jargon or shorthand in use. It could be a decoy, it could be misinformation, it could be a hoax: The 'journalist' has been alleged to be involved in hoax stories before, after all, but that's the claim made to support the idea the whole thing is a hoax or a clever trap. Or a ploy to push out information into the media that wouldn't normally be carried by them, hence the messages being clear of jargon.

But most likely it's someone who added the Journo either by mistake or mischief (I'd say the latter's the most likely) and said journo's milking the situation for all it's worth.

As to Herr Starmer: Government bloat is a thing. The Civil Service could do with a careful trim, but I doubt the efforts of the government (of any flavour) will do much good. From my own experience (NHS, not central government) the go-to trick is to offer cost savings and reduced headcount but then dump the work associated with those cuts onto a different department. Most likely the one the work had been taken from along with associated headcount and budget, which will not be returned...

[FirstTangoInParis]

Re: So...

> We, here in the UK will be left out of the joint force being put together by the EU

This was the case even well before Brexit. The European Defence Agency viewed Brits as something they’d trodden in. The feeling was mutual; Brits already got Brit and NATO kit to train on and maintain, didn’t need a third.

In the meantime, the EDA appears to have been many times less effective than the average national defence ministry, if that is possible.

[tezboyes]

Re: Security

Yeah but, err, it's Office AI, sorry no I mean M$365 CoPilot Clowned, innit. The bastard offspring from Redmond needs to train itself on your every keystroke, pause, rewrite, then one day, you can just vaguely glance in the direction of your inbox and it'll fire off replies to all the other specIAl agents in use by everyone else, so they can reply to each other in a never ending cycle..

[User McUser]

To hell with a/the new version

How about you add some useful features instead? Like, IDK, how about when I setup a calendar event marked as "all-day" and "out of office" that you let me configure an automatic email message as part of the calendar event so I don't have to do that separately and manually? (Seriously, how is this not an option in 2025?)

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: To hell with a/the new version

configure an automatic email message

Just this week, CoPilot on Teams offered to help compose an Out Of Office message - for the time that I was off last week, for which, at the time, I did set an Out Of Office message

[FirstTangoInParis]

Re: To hell with a/the new version

Google Calendar does just that, and can automatically decline existing and new calendar invites.

[Roj Blake]

Coke Analogy

No matter which version of Outlook you open it's not so much Coke Zero or Caffeine-Free Coke as New Coke.

[Fruit and Nutcase]

Re: Coke Analogy

I'd like to buy the world a home

And furnish it with love

Grow apple trees and honey bees

And snow white turtle doves

(Chorus)

I'd like to teach the world to sing[email]

In perfect harmony

I'd like to buy the world a Coke[an OS]

And keep it company

That's the real thing

(Chorus)

(Chorus 2)

What the world wants today

Is the real thing

What the world wants today

Is the real thing

_{With thanks to Roger Cook, Roger Greenaway, Bill Backer and Billy Davis for their work on the "Buy the World a Coke" campaign}

[BonezOz]

Re: Coke Analogy

Folks, I'd like to sing a song about the American Dream

About me, about you

About the way our American hearts beat way down in the bottom of our chests

About that special feeling we get in the cockles of our hearts

Maybe below the cockles

Maybe in the sub cockle area

Maybe in the liver, maybe in the kidneys

Maybe even in the colon, we don't know

I'm just a regular Joe with a regular job

I'm your average white, suburbanite slob

I like football and porno and books about war

I got an average house with a nice hardwood floor

My wife and my job, my kids and my car

My feet on my table and a Cuban cigar

But sometimes, that just ain't enough to keep a man like me interested

(Oh, no, no way, uh-uh)

No, I gotta go out and have fun at someone else's expense

(Whoa, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah)

I drive really slow in the ultra fast lane

While people behind me are going insane

I'm an asshole (He's an asshole, what an asshole)

I'm an asshole (He's an asshole, such an asshole)

I use public toilets, and I piss on the seat

I walk around in the Summer time, saying, "How about this heat?"

I'm an asshole (He's an asshole, what an asshole)

I'm an asshole (He's the world's biggest asshole)

Sometimes, I park in handicapped spaces

While handicapped people make handicapped faces

I'm an asshole (He's an asshole, what an asshole)

I'm an asshole (He's a real fucking asshole)

Maybe I shouldn't be singing this song

Ranting and raving and carrying on

Maybe they're right when they tell me I'm wrong...

Nah

I'm an asshole (He's an asshole, what an asshole)

I'm an asshole (He's the world's biggest asshole)

You know what I'm gonna do?

I'm gonna get myself a 1967 Cadillac Eldorado convertible

Hot pink with whale skin hubcaps

And all leather cow interior

And big brown baby seal eyes for head lights (Yeah)

And I'm gonna drive in that baby at 115 miles per hour

Gettin' one mile per gallon

Sucking down Quarter Pounder cheeseburgers from McDonald's

In the old fashioned non-biodegradable styrofoam containers

And when I'm done sucking down those greaseball burgers

I'm gonna wipe my mouth with the American flag

And then I'm gonna toss the styrofoam containers right out the side

And there ain't a goddamn thing anybody can do about it

You know why? Because we've got the bomb, that's why

Two words: nuclear fucking weapons, okay?

Russia, Germany, Romania, they can have all the democracy they want

They can have a big democracy cakewalk

Right through the middle of Tiananmen Square

And it won't make a lick of difference

Because we've got the bombs, okay?

John Wayne's not dead, he's frozen

And as soon as we find a cure for cancer

We're gonna thaw out the Duke, and he's gonna be pretty pissed off

You know why?

Have you ever taken a cold shower?

Well, multiply that by fifteen million times

That's how pissed off the Duke's gonna be

I'm gonna get the Duke, and John Cassavetes

And Lee Marvin, and Sam Peckinpah, and a case of whiskey

And drive down to Texas and

(Hey! You know, you really are an asshole!)

Why don't you just shut up and sing the song, pal?

I'm an asshole (He's an asshole, what an asshole)

I'm an asshole (He's the world's biggest asshole)

A-S-S-H-O-L-E

Everybody

A-S-S-H-O-L-E

I'm an asshole, and I'm proud of it

Songwriters: Denis Leary / Chris Phillips

[Graham Newton]

Re: Coke Analogy

More like Rola Cola (copyright Peter Kay)

[anthonyhegedus]

Baffling

Nobody does baffling quite like Microsoft.

They’ve perfected the art of giving things the same name but wildly different functions. Teams (Work) vs. Teams (Personal)? Cheers for that. A “Microsoft account” that might mean your Hotmail login or your work credentials—depending on the weather, presumably. Outlook behaving completely differently on Mac and Windows. It’s chaos by design.

Then there’s the branding circus: Microsoft 365 Personal, Microsoft 365 for Business, Office 365 rebranded as Microsoft 365, and now we’ve got Microsoft 365 Copilot. It’s like a game of corporate Buzzword Bingo.

But here’s the thing: they’re not just clumsy—they’re strategic. There is a plan buried in all this mess, even if it’s a terrible one. It’s never about what users want or need. It’s about funnelling us into whatever corner suits Microsoft best. Push Copilot, push Edge, quietly break the old stuff to make the new stuff look better. Outlook (Classic) has felt noticeably worse ever since the push toward Outlook (New). Coincidence? Doubt it.

They’ve been gaslighting us for years—adding friction, removing features, and slapping on higher price tags. But now, they’ve outdone themselves!

With Windows 11’s absurd hardware requirements, they’re about to send millions of perfectly good PCs to landfill. Just like they did with XP. It’s irresponsible and unsustainable. Why not offer a lightweight version of Windows 11 for older machines? Strip out the fluff, keep it secure, and let people carry on using their devices. It can be done—they just don’t want to.

Because pushing shiny new hardware is always more profitable than doing the right thing.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Baffling

They all do it.

Apple TV - A hardware device that connects to your TV and plays media

Apple TV - An app that runs on some TVs that emulates the functions of the hardware Apple TV

Apple TV - A Netflix-style TV streaming service (that may or may not be streamed to an Apple TV hardware device or app - see above)

Apple TV - An app for smartphones and tablets (both Apple and Android) that is used exclusively to stream the Apple TV streaming service.

Just to be clear; the Apple TV app that can used to stream Apple TV is not the same app as the Apple TV app that runs on some TVs that emulates the Apple TV hardware (although it can also be used to steam Apple TV).

I'm glad we got that all cleared up.

[Christopher Reeve's Horse]

Re: Baffling

But when you stream Apple TV (as a subscription service) it's Apple TV+. Clearly.

[Ishura]

Re: Baffling

Don't forget Apple TV - A Mac desktop app that can play your own locally-stored videos.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Baffling

And a Windows desktop app as well!

[Nematode]

Re: Baffling

But at least including "TV" in the name(s) gives you some sort of clue as to the function, unlike an increasing number of things these days where the name made up by marketing bears no relationship to what it does. Like, er, Outlook, or er, Excel, or er, Access, or, er Powerpoint, or, er... I think the point is clear. Mind you, Firefox, Thunderbird, Chrome, etc.

[Terry 6]

Re: Baffling

This is part ofwhy, as I've said previously, I will avoid Win 11. I have too many programmes I need to find on occasion, but with unhelpful names. In 10 I can group the links to the software into use folders (Graphics/video/office/..) If you know how.

In 11 it seems to be pretty much impossible. All software gets loaded into publisher folders, listed alphabetically by whatever dubious name they gave to it, and stuffed with all sort of extra marketing crap, as with 10. But then there's no way to sort it out.

[The Oncoming Scorn]

Re: Baffling

The Day Of The Outlook!

The Doctor: We should point out that at this moment it is a fairly terrible plan.

Ten: And Outlook (Classic) almost certainly won’t be able to work.

The Doctor: I was happy with “fairly terrible.”

Ten: Sorry, I was just thinking Outlook (New).

[Version 1.0]

Re: Baffling

I'm still using Outlook 2010 and Word 2010 and they are still working so much better than the current "updates" - I've bought the current updates but they are not as easy (or fast) to work with everyday.

[Nematode]

Re: Baffling

Ditto, on SWMBO's machine, though I went to 2019 on my latest laptop. That's the revision at which they started frigging with updates which change the functions and interfacing with the cloud yadayada. Mind, using a Local account does make things better.

[Mahhn]

Re: Baffling

"they’re strategic. There is a plan buried in all this mess"

Yes, it is the transition from things you Have, to things you Access. So that when ? says disconnect someone, it's like they didn't exist.

Data Control.

[anthonyhegedus]

Re: Baffling

You have a point, but it’s nothing more nefarious than making money.

[ecofeco]

Re: Baffling

It's both.

And it doesn't get any more nefarious.

[Fruit and Nutcase]

Re: Baffling

Nobody does baffling quite like Microsoft.

"There's No One Quite Like Grandma" the song by the St Winifred's School Choir https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsXJcIODLtQ

Revised lyrics - to be sung by the Microsoft Marketing Department

[Chorus]

Grandma[Microsoft], we love you

Grandma[Microsoft], we do

Though you may be far away

We think of you

[Verse 1]

There's no one quite like Grandma[Microsoft]

And I know you will agree

That she[Microsoft] always is a friend to you

And she[Microsoft]'s a friend to me

There's no one quite like Grandma[Microsoft]

She[Microsoft]'s there in times of need

Before it's bedtime, on her

To us a book she'll[Clippy will] read

[Chorus]

Grandma[Microsoft], we love you

Grandma[Microsoft], we do

Though you may be far away

We think of you

[Bridge]

And one day when we're older

We'll look back and say

There's no one quite like Grandma[Microsoft]

She[Microsoft] has helped us on our way

You might also like

[Chorus]

Grandma[Microsoft], we love you

Grandma[Microsoft], we do

Grandma[Microsoft], we love you

Grandma[Microsoft], we do

[Verse 2]

There's no one quite like Grandma[Microsoft]

A love we always share

At party time and Christmas too

We know that she[Microsoft]'ll be there

There's no one quite like Grandma[Microsoft]

She[Microsoft] always has a smile

She[Microsoft] never hurries us along

But stays a little while

[Chorus]

Grandma[Microsoft], we love you

Grandma[Microsoft], we do

Though you may be far away

We think of you

[Bridge]

And one day when we're older

We'll look back and say

There's no one quite like Grandma[Microsoft]

She[Microsoft] has helped us on our way

[Chorus]

Grandma[Microsoft], we love you

Grandma[Microsoft], we do

Grandma[Microsoft], we love you

And we know you love us too

[ecofeco]

Re: Baffling

InTune, Azure, Entra, anyone?

Or how about Software Center, SCCM, Configuration Manager?

[Michael Strorm]

Re: Baffling

They’ve perfected the art of giving things the same name but wildly different functions.

Confusing their customers by using the same name for numerous different things is a hallmark of MS's marketing department that goes back decades. (And will likely continue until the heat death of the universe....)

As is its flip side, i.e. their equally infuriating and ingrained habit of constantly rebranding the same thing with multiple different names over the years.

Mix and match both for maximum confusion.

It’s never about what users want or need. It’s about funnelling us into whatever corner suits Microsoft best.

Exactly what I've said in the past. People complaining about the latest in-your-face nonsense and asking why MS "can't" make a nice, clean OS any more miss the point.

Unless you're an extremely large and important corporate customer, MS doesn't give a toss about what you want- it's about what suits MS.

That's why they're railroading and dark patterning you into using some service that offers little obvious benefit- because it's not about benefit to you, it's about hoping that you (or enough Windows users) will end up using that service by default so they can make money from it- and you- further down the line.

[Tron]

Well, they could...

...allow it to handle rich media, encrypted between users in e-mails, storing data on their own systems, switching the display to a social media feed and they would have a free, largely distributed social media network working within an e-mail client. Then they could give users the option to see offers of interest to them (monetising it) and allow them to pick and choose the posts they see off their own bat or using a group filter. Then they would have a better social media network than anyone else. Near zero overheads as no centralised servers, bandwidth requirements or possible content censorship, with a fat revenue stream from user requested advertising and happy punters, sharing what they want, only seeing what they want, controlling their feed and their own data.

But this is Microsoft, so you'll just get a shittier version of what you had with fewer options that stores your data on someone else's system and falls over when they update it.

[GBE]

mutt -- it sucks less.

mutt:

"All mail clients suck. This one just sucks less."

[EnviableOne]

Re: mutt -- it sucks less.

but it doesn't work with Winders

[Doctor Syntax]

Re: mutt -- it sucks less.

Which just goes to show that it sucks less.

[el_oscuro]

Re: mutt -- it sucks less.

Is that actually in the mutt man page? I sure hope so.

[TBH666]

My elderly father in law recently made the mistake of clicking the button to accept the upgrade to Outlook (whateverthehelltheyarecallingitnow).

While no technical slouch (we have built PCs from scratch together) he understandably hated it and was hugely confused.

I helped him get rid of it, and moved him back onto his favoured Outlook 2007. It's a great application that does the job!

[Version 1.0]

In the old days of Microsoft clicking on an update was highly recommended by everyone (even the Register originally)

These days Microsoft is just tiny and floppy, it never got bigger and stiffer. It's never been as easy to use as Windows 7 Professional with Word 2010 ever since.

[mark l 2]

Just wait for them to cram in 365 and Copilot to the Outlook branding, as they seem to be wanting to do with all their legacy applications and services now.

[IGotOut]

What,you don't have Microsoft Office Outlook 365; Copilot already?

[ecofeco]

Uh, that already exists. Just saw it on my corporate desktop last week.

[mevets]

8ball

outlook not so good.

It's okay, I know the way out.

[chivo243]

Re: 8ball

It was called Notlook in some circles! 8ball is right!

You forgot your coat!

[Someone Else]

Re: 8ball

I've always known it as "LookOut"...

_{As in, "Look out! Here comes another update!"}

[Mark Fenton]

Outlook is my only reason to run windows

...I need an outlook desktop app that can access PST files and notes and all the other goodness therein.

It is the only reason I have a windows machine.

Without that I see nothing holding me back from going full linux and ditching MS forever.

[Ken Hagan]

Re: Outlook is my only reason to run windows

If these are old PST files with historical mail, the thing to do is set up an IMAP server (Dovecot on an RPi will do, visible purely over the LAN) and run that old Outlook one last time to copy the entire archive over to that server. It's then accessible to any email client on any OS.

[gfx]

Re: Outlook is my only reason to run windows

It might be that newer outlook versions can't read the older pst files not sure but they are dropping useful features

[navarac]

Time

It's taken someone at Microsoft to finally "get" it all this time? Bunch of plonkers.

[ecofeco]

Re: Time

Actions speak louder than words and their actions say they do indeed, STILL not get it.

[kmorwath]

It's already in the opt-out stage

For non-business customers, Outlook will now actively switch you to the new one after a warning. To avoid it, go to File -> Options -> General, at the bottom there should be a checkbox to avoid the automatic switch. Otherwise it will switch when starting Outlook - it will allow reverting the change, but then will try again - and I do not now how long before it can't be reverted.

Maybe this forced switch is not rolled out everywhere, but it's already happening.

And still, the worst is not the new webui running on some javascript runtime, it's the Microsoft-in-the-Middle attack on any mail account not already hosted by Microsoft. It you accept, your email credentials and all your emails will be transferred to Microsoft, and any new message sent or received will go through Microsoft. Nadella's AI is hungry....

[ecofeco]

Re: It's already in the opt-out stage

This has been ongoing for the last 6 years.

That said, your advice for preventing it as much possible is spot on.

[IGotOut]

This is what tech bros don't get

"is inspired by the Outlook web experience."

Yes, we're inspired by the even more crippled, shitty, Illogical version of Outlook because......it's all we know how to make now?

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: This is what tech bros don't get

They've made New Outlook similar enough to the web version that to ordinary users it will superficially look the same and they'll think they know how it works. But no! It has assorted differences - e.g. public folders, where New Outlook handles them badly whereas the web version doesn't handle them at all and gives a helpful message telling you to use the desktop app (which one isn't made clear).

I've not worked out how to create public folder calendars yet, if it can even be done. In proper Outlook they were easy to create but new Outlook doesn't seem to have this capability, and Exchange Online's web console seems to only allow creating empty public folders, not the calendar variant.

And it's STILL not possible to pin folders from shared mailboxes to the favourites in new Outlook, despite pages and pages of complaints on MIcrosoft's forums about this specifically.

[Sam Shore]

We looked at new outlook a year ago-ish. It wasn't a standalone application, it was the Outlook Web HTML app wrapped up in a front end that would run locally. However, if you wanted to do anything besides start it up, say send or read emails, it was online only, with no local cache or storage. It also didn't do IMAP, POP or SMTP. I don't know how much it's progressed since then, because it was pretty much useless as a business tool, for a company that heavily uses the features of real Outlook.

The cynic in me says that all this is intentional. Switch people to new Outlook, force everything to upload to the cloud, and because there's no user-accessible export-to-pst facility, you're locked in. You want to keep your old emails, keep on paying the MS tax. Want to keep your old Outlook add-ins working, shame, you need to get the authors to pay a developers tax, and buy another license. Office 365 already reduces your "Security Score" if it detects you are using Outlook add-ins, if you tie that in with Insurers who are already asking for copies of your Office 365 score now, in addition to PCI DSS conformance etc for cyber insurance purposes, things are about to get expensive. You want to maintain your insurance? MS Office 365 all the way, with approved add-ins from licensed developers and a whole range of additional licenses.

[Anonymous Coward]

New Outlook can cache locally now, but it's still shite in many other ways!

[Mr. Impartial Pants]

This is actually only half true in my experience. If you don't have connectivity to the Interwebs, the wretched abomination refuses to start up!

So no, even with a cache you can't just start it up to look at an old E-Mail or your calendar, you have to be online. One of the hundreds of cuts inflicted upon me, making me switch back to Outlook 365, the slightly unstable but functional one.

[ecofeco]

It is intentional.

I've said it a hundred times, M$ end game is total SaaS.

[el_oscuro]

My dad predicted that 25 years ago. At that time, the term he used was: "Microsoft wants to rent Windows".

[steelpillow]

Never understood why

We get integration with workflow tools such as calendars and tasking, but not with other messaging apps/protocols.

I basically don't give a shit what toy or medium I use to get hold of someone. But I /would/ like one contacts toy to rule them all. Let a separate workflow app look after the workflow, and let there be an open protocol for it to fetch contact data.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Never understood why

The open protocol exists. It's called CardDAV.

It works better than anything Micro$uck ever released.

Ditch Outsuck, and get a real email client.

[steelpillow]

Re: Never understood why

>sigh!< If only I had the choice.

[Terry 6]

Yet another Microsoft doenshift

Re: Microsoft would like users to move to the new version despite it lacking many of its predecessor's functions.

They keep doing this- continuous deimprovement.

I use Onenote. 2021 version.

And it's perfect for my use case. Sharing notes and bits of information across various devices. But the iPhone version lacks almost all of the editing control- like adding rows within an existing table-so anything beyond that basic functionality needs to wait until I get to my PC. Items needing to be added to a table get typed underneath and copy/pasted into a new row later.

They now want us to use a PC version installed from their "store". So I keep the install files for if ever I need to reinstall ( and of course my disc images will have it if I need to go back to that point).

Because the Store version is such a crap item. It's had much of the functionality chopped out.

And the number of versions is totally bewildering.

https://www.onenotegem.com/a/faq/onenote/2019/1126/1300.html

Store version called UWP these days, moving from something that made sense to something that doesn't, which is itself a microcosm example of them making things crappier.

[Apocalypso - a cheery end to the world]

Re: Yet another Microsoft doenshift

A heads-up for OneNote users: the latest O365 version allows you to set a reminder flag on a note which then appears as a to-do item in Outlook (click the tick mark in the left bar where you normally choose between email, calendar etc).

I'm finding this really handy for notes where I want to quickly set a reminder for actions that will be done in a day or two. (Anything longer and the list starts to get too long.) YMMV.

[steelpillow]

Re: Yet another Microsoft doenshift

Just you try exporting your notes to anything other than more of the same microshite. You are doomed for all eternity, I tell ye, DOOMED!

[Terry 6]

Do I miss Outlook?

Not really. I use Thunderbird/Betterbird. It took me many years to switch but I'd never go back.

It lacks some of Outlook's useful stuff, not the least the flexibility of Outlook's complex Boolean rules creation. Which I do miss.

But in general, once they'd integrated the calendar (formerly known as the Lighting Extension) into it it's done all I need.

[coderguy]

Re: Do I miss Outlook?

Have you tried creating a feature request for this missing functionality?

Developers aren't mind readers, so can't know everyone's 'one true way' to perform a given task.

You know there's a mailing list (https://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird/tb-planning)?

[MnK72]

Thanks MS for the job security, at home I use Thunderbird

Lets not poo poo MS too much, their incompetence is keeps many of the readers employed with pretty good salary I might add. During work hours, I am a slave to MS stack, however, at home I am a Linux user and use Thunderbird as my client. I believe MS products have gotten better over the years and as stated by someone else, if all Telemetry data collection is removed, MS would be a viable option.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Thanks MS for the job security, at home I use Thunderbird

Micro$hit wasn't a viable option before the telemetry, not sure why you think it would be a viable option if it suddenly disappeared.

[ComicalEngineer]

Re: Thanks MS for the job security, at home I use Thunderbird

I ditched Outlook when M$ wanted to charge me £99 for the privilege after my old machine died and was replaced by a new machine running Office 2007.

I currently look after 9 windows machines (wife, kids and my own two laptops & CAD machine) in our household and two Linux Mint PCs. All of them have Thunderbird installed.

I quite liked the older versions of Outlook and was sorry to see it go, but damned if I'm going to fork out £1,000 for an email client.

[Chipwidget]

Throw in a change of corporate domain name, entanglement with Teams, things that work only on the desktop and some that work only on mobile devices (thanks to corporate security tweaks) at the same time as the new outlook arrives and this semi-tech literate user is struggling.

[0laf]

Once I walked into an Alfa Romeo dealership, the cars were beautiful, but looking in every showroom car you were met with a rats nest of wires hanging out somewhere in every vehicle. Every single car clearly had issues and the dealers hadn't bothered or couldn't fix, and hadn't bothered to tidy up the mess meaanwhile. My worry at that point being "If these were the show cars what are the customers cars going to be like?".

That was the vehicle equivalent of this mess from Microsoft. It's a untidy, it's unnecessary and it should be cleaned up.

The fact that the mess continues and no one within MS seems to care about cleaning it up or even sees it as a problem to me is indiciative of a business that really doesn't care. It's given up on even pretending that it delivers competence and quality. Basically here is the crap we could be bothered to produce you'll take it and like it.

Unlike Alfa you can't easily walk out the showroom and just go buy something better if you're tied in with a long legacy of MS Email services.

[Luiz Abdala]

Don't forget Outlook Express.

Outlook Express was surprisingly stable and fast, reading POP3 and newsgroups with ease. Seriously.I only remember fondly of it. For ages it came with Internet Explorer and just worked (tm).

Outlook 97 full had the damned PST files that grew over 2GB and froze, because nobody tolerated the 10MB limit of Exchange and every file was shared as an email attachment. Very few people used more than one machine, so that worked to empty your claustrophobic allocation on the server.

[LateAgain]

Re: Don't forget Outlook Express.

The last version of lookout that I counted as an actual email client !

[CrazyOldCatMan]

"Currently, the new Outlook is at the opt-in stage and is off by default'

Not if you are on a Mac and using Outlook 365. Sure, it's "optional" but, if you don't use it, you don't get email. Or calendar updates. Or anything else that's the Outlook core funtionality.

Which (kind of) makes it mandatory.

[Liam Proven]

Tsk tsk

Outsuck? Notlook?

Come come. Have you all forgotten the superior sobriquet that is right there in front of you?

LookOut. It's Microsoft -- Lookout!

[ecofeco]

M$, how do I hate thee?

Let me count the ways.

[TRT]

"built upon modern service architecture"

You mean like there's not a trace of Windows 7, Windows XP or even NT in the completely rebuilt from the ground up Windows 11?

[TRT]

What's the etymology of "Outlook" anyway? For the job it purports to do? I mean, they renamed Yammer, and Azure Active Directory, and Office 365, and Remote Desktop Client...

Shorter is also better now, so... Slant?

[Abominator]

Everything since Outlook 2016 has been dog shit and getting worse.

[J.G.Harston]

Why on earth is *Outlook* trying to open any file? If it's a document, the word processor should be opening it, a spreadsheet file the spreadsheet program, an image, an image editor/viewer, a video file, the video player. etc. etc.

[blu3b3rry]

To add to the fun, about a year ago the default setting for web links was changed to MS Edge. Annoys the hell out of me after every update where it seems to get switched back from Waterfox to Edge.

[el_oscuro]

Missing feature from "New" outlook

Tried to use the "New" outlook recently, but found one feature missing: The ability to download attachments. Seriously. There is no option to download email attachments like plain text files, anything that isn't a MS Office file. This is functionality I have been using for 30 years, and makes the "New" outlook unusable to me.

[TSM]

Re: Missing feature from "New" outlook

"Tried to use the "New" outlook recently, but found one feature missing: The ability to download attachments. Seriously. There is no option to download email attachments like plain text files, anything that isn't a MS Office file. This is functionality I have been using for 30 years, and makes the "New" outlook unusable to me."

Hmm, it shows up for me. In the preview pane there's a dropdown next to the attachment name with options "Preview", "Open", "Save to OneDriv", "Copy", and "Save As".

If there are multiple attachments, there's also a couple of small text labels underneath them for "Save all to OneDrive" and "Save All Attachments" (yes, "all" is lowercase in one and title case in the other).

"The new Outlook for Windows, built upon modern service architecture, is inspired by the Outlook web experience."

I do believe this, because the Outlook web experience was always pretty awful.

Having said that, in its current iteration the new one, once you spend the usual amount of time fiddling with the settings to get a usable display, is not too much worse than the classic one, although naturally all the menu items are in a different place and harder to identify (that's just SOP of course). The main reason I am sticking with the old one for now is that in the old one, all my emails show up with timestamps "Day DD/MM/YYYY h:mm AM/PM", whereas in the new one it changes from "hh:mm" to "Day hh:mm" to "Day DD/MM" to "DD/MM/YYYY" as the messages get older, and there doesn't seem to be any way to override this and get a consistent display format. For my workflow it's handy to see both the date and time on all my messages, and there's no compelling reason to switch to the new one, so I don't.

I did have to fire up the new one the other day - my manager asked us all to set our calendars to show which days we are working from home vs office, which seems to be only available in the new version. Of course the beauty of having both is that I could fire up the new one for five minutes to do that, and then go back to using the old one for actual work :)

[UIUXStudio1]

Microsoft has been going a little nutty with its version nomenclature and it’s getting confusing. Scott Hanselman’s wit about “Zero Sugar” and “Caffeine Free” on “The Hanselman Show” is funny, but the frustration, for users, inside and outside Redmond, is real.

And the sudden switch to the new Outlook, which has slowly been replacing the Classic version, harkens back to past mishaps (Windows 8, anyone?) Without COM add-in support and the like, enterprises have to look for workarounds, and that isn't the best way to go.

As opposed to constant renaming, Microsoft needs to deliver a consistent, user-friendly experience that doesn’t make users wonder which version to pick.