Mac Outlook Support Utilities Released

[MacSysAdmin]

[https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/office_for_mac_support_team_blog/2017/08/10/mac-outlook-support-utilities/](link URL)

Microsoft has released some useful utilities for Mac Outlook 2016.

OutlookSearchRepair: This utility will repair search results for Microsoft Outlook.

Why use it: Search results within Outlook show nothing or return older items only such as when you are looking for an email you know you have and might already be looking at it but it doesn't show up in the search result.

OutlookResetPreferences: This utility will reset all Outlook Preferences back to defaults.

Why use it: This utility resets customizations you've made to Outlook from the Outlook menu > Preferences... It also stores settings of the Outlook window size and position. This utility shouldn't be needed often but we made it just in case. The Outlook Preferences file does not contain all the app's preferences and reseting Outlook Preferences will not remove email or account settings.

SetDefaultMailApp: This utility allows you to easily make Microsoft Outlook the default mail application.

Why use it: You want Outlook to open a new email whenever you click on a mailto: link in an email or website. Clicking on a mailto: link opens the default email application and Outlook is not the default mail application until you set it.

ResetRecentAddresses: This utility allows you to reset recent addresses Outlook stores. This will delete recent addresses at once instead of one at a time by clicking the X next to an address suggestion when addressing an email. To use:

Why use it: Whenever you compose an email and add people on the To:, Cc:, or Bcc: line, Outlook will suggest names as you type characters. The list of names Outlook uses is a combination of contacts, company directory, and recent contacts. Recent contacts appear with an "X" next to each name. You can click the "X" to remove the contact from the Recent Address List. This utility will clean out all recent addresses at one time instead of having to click the "X" next to each name.

[AVmcclint]

Very nice! I extracted the applescript out of the Reset Recent Addresses utility and put it in Self Service as a standalone script. It worked well. The GUI on all these utilities need some work. For single-purpose apps, they should quit when the window is closed. The Reset Recent Addresses app doesn't give any indication that it's doing anything when you click the button. Luckily the applescript running in Self Service works without any confusing interface issues.

[waqas_khan]

Thank you for sharing. These will definitely be handy in self service.

[EdLuo]

Anyone have a way to transform OutlookSearchRepair into a one click Self Service menu?

[ThijsX]

@EdLuo Hi,

Yes i did, i created an package where the OutlookSearchRepair.app will be dropped into /private/tmp/OutlookSearchRepair/OutlookSearchRepair.app and as post the script within the package below will run

#!/bin/sh

## Written by Thijs Xhaflaire.
## Purpose for running OutlookSearchRepair via SelfService.

# Shutting down Outlook before proceeding on with the repair utillity.
echo "Shutting down Outlook"
pid=$(ps axo pid,command | grep "Microsoft Outlook" | awk '{print $1}')

echo "Pid is: "$pid

if [ "$pid" ]
    then
        echo "Outlook is Running"
        echo "Closing Outlook"
            osascript -e 'quit app "Microsoft Outlook"'
        echo "Outlook closed"
    else
        echo "Outlook not running"
    fi

sleep 05

# open Outlook Search Repair application from Microsoft
echo "Opening Outlook Search Repair"
open -a /private/tmp/OutlookSearchRepair/OutlookSearchRepair.app

echo "Repair Utillity started"
exit 0

[FastGM3]

I modified your script to do the same thing for the SetMyDefaultMailApp! Works great.

Thanks.

[achristoforatos]

@FastGM3 Possible to share that script to make it something that can be sent out through a policy? Would love to make outlook the default in our org.

[FastGM3]

I used the MS Office utility "SetMyDefaultMail.app" to prompt users to choose their default mail app. I first place this app in a tmp folder (/Library/SJUSD/SetDefaultMail.app) during prestage DEP or Imaging process. From this point you could have it open at startup to prompt your users or the way I've done it is created a policy and just put it in Self-Service for users to launch the app whenever they're ready to set their default. Here's the script;

#!/bin/sh

## Written by Thijs Xhaflaire.
## Modified by Chuck Taylor to run SetDefaultMail via SelfService
## Purpose for running SetDefaultMail via SelfService.

# Shutting down Outlook before proceeding on with the SetDefaultMail utillity.
echo "Shutting down Outlook"
pid=$(ps axo pid,command | grep "Microsoft Outlook" | awk '{print $1}')

echo "Pid is: "$pid

if [ "$pid" ]
    then
        echo "Outlook is Running"
        echo "Closing Outlook"
            osascript -e 'quit app "Microsoft Outlook"'
        echo "Outlook closed"
    else
        echo "Outlook not running"
    fi

sleep 05

# open "SetDefaultMail" application from Microsoft
echo "Opening Set Default Mail"
open -a /Library/SJUSD/SetDefaultMail.app

#echo "Set Default Mail"
exit 0

[achristoforatos]

@FastGM3 Oh! So the user still has to choose, it is not automatically choosing outlook?

[FastGM3]

Yes, since we support the Mail and Outlook app our district allows the users to decide which app they want to use as their default mail application. Sorry, I didn't mean to imply we configure the default for them. We just provide them an easy way to choose for themselves.

[spalmer]

https://macadmins.software/tools/ has MailToOutlook to set Outlook as the default. This was created by @pbowden from Microsoft to work with Jamf Pro.

[achristoforatos]

@spalmer Are you saying this will run and make outlook the default without prompting the user?

[spalmer]

@achristoforatos Yes. The PKG installs a small binary to /private/tmp that is called using the following postinstall script:

#!/bin/sh

CONSOLE=$(/usr/bin/python -c 'from SystemConfiguration import SCDynamicStoreCopyConsoleUser; import sys; username = (SCDynamicStoreCopyConsoleUser(None, None, None) or [None])[0]; username = [username,""][username in [u"loginwindow", None, u""]]; sys.stdout.write(username + "
");')
#echo "Console user is $CONSOLE"

APPLICATION="/private/tmp/MailToOutlook"
#echo "Application path is $APPLICATION"

if [ "$CONSOLE" == "root" ] || [ "$CONSOLE" == "" ]; then
        echo "No user logged in"

    echo "Deleting $APPLICATION …"
    /bin/rm -rf "$APPLICATION"

    exit 1
else
    echo "Running $APPLICATION as user $CONSOLE …"
    sudo -u $CONSOLE "$APPLICATION"

    echo "Deleting $APPLICATION …"
    /bin/rm -rf "$APPLICATION"

    exit 0
fi

This runs for the current user only and the user must be logged in.

[peak_sleep]

This is a handy little PKG. Is it possible to get more information on exactly what the MailToOutlook utility does? Is it basically just this script that you have provided for reference?

Thank you. 

[achristoforatos]

@spalmer I'm assuming the pkg was made with composer? And installs the setdefaultmail app in that private/tmp folder?

[achristoforatos]

@spalmer Sorry. Forget that last post. Was looking at the wrong download.

[achristoforatos]

@spalmer Last message I promise! Thank you! Awesome! It worked!!!

[pbowden]

@achristoforatos Great!

[vanschip-gerard]

I love the ResetRecentAddresses app but was wondering how to run it through Jamf like the SetDefaultMailApp pkg.

[ericbenfer]

As the name of the pkg suggests “MailToOtlook.pkg” sets Outlook as the default mail app. Unfortunately it does not set it as the default calendar app.
Anyone have any suggestions for that?