Outlook and incremental backups

[Randyh]

(I have several unrelated questions which I am posting separately. Here is #3.) I am on trial for Retrospect Workgroup on a large, fast ME machine and have a client on an older XP machine and an iMac.

 

 

 

I use Outlook 2002 and not Exchange server to read, save and reply to email on all three machines. My daily, incremental backups are meant to mainly capture outlook as that is what changes the most (other files are added / edited but usually not as much as outlook). Eudora and other email programs use the directory / file system to keep email broken up, thus making incremental backups of email worthwhile. Unfortunately Outlook keeps everything in a constantly growing, single database file (including the attachments unfortunately). The file modified date is changed by Outlook just by opening the database (opening outlook with the mail "folder" visible). My questions are as follows:

 

 

 

a) Given you appear to have a special exchange server "code" that looks into the exchange database, is there a similar feature for outlook files?

 

 

 

Outlook seems to keep the folder file "locked" which seems to prevent Retrospect from backing it up. Is there a way to bypass this as my outlook is always open and running in the background (email is checked from my multiple mail services every ten minutes)?

[AmyJ]

In reply to:

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a) Given you appear to have a special exchange server "code" that looks into the exchange database, is there a similar feature for outlook files?

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No. Once the file has changed, we backup the entire file again.

 

 

 

In reply to:

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Outlook seems to keep the folder file "locked" which seems to prevent Retrospect from backing it up. Is there a way to bypass this as my outlook is always open and running in the background (email is checked from my multiple mail services every ten minutes)?

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In the Retrospect Program folder, you will find an Event Handler for Outlook. Once configured according to the instructions in the Users Guide, Retrospect will shut down Outlook, and backup the file. There is not a way to backup the Outlook file while it is open.