Volume of Sync EMails

[eohrnberger]

I've installed OLFolderSync on two computers using two seperate email accounts. I've configured the calendar, contacts, Notes and Tasks to synchronize on both computers.

All appears to be working well. I can see updates being collected and sent, as well as being received and applied in both directions.

However, I am noticing that the number of emails that are generated by this configuration appears to be huge. I changed a few calendar items on one computer, perhaps 5 or so, and it generated some 311 emails. Right now the Outlook target of these changes is not connecting to the mail server (on purpose) so I can see them in the web email collecting and queueing up.

Is this what you would expected? Perhaps I've done something wrong?

[Sven]

OLFolderSync will synchronize all items from the selected folder, not only the changed ones.

Sven

[eohrnberger]

So changing, adding or deleting a single item, and all of the items in the folder are sent from the source to the synchroniztion partners?

Is there anyway to limit the transmission to only the changed, added or deleted item(s)?

What does the 'Run bassicsynchronization' checkbox do? Is this an initial and complete sync of the folder? If so, couldn't forward deltas be applied to keep the two foders in sync? (Just a thought).

[Sven]

After the basic-synchronization is ready, it will only sync updated/deleted/added items. But on the first time there will be a synchronization of all elements. If you click onto basicsync, you can start the basicsync again. But if you have problems with the synchronization, it could be that you have more changes on the folder from them you nothing know (for example another add-in). You can check the changes in the folder, if you click View=>per categorie and then sort by changeDate.

sorry for my english
Sven

[eohrnberger]

Sven, thanks for the information. It's helpful in understanding how this software works.

The concept is really great, and it's really easy to use. Now that I understand better how it works, I can adjust my usage to make the best use of it.

No worries about the English

[eohrnberger]

Sven,
In my Outlook I have both request delivery confirmation and request read confirmation turned on for every email that I send.

The emails that OLFolderSync, should probably turn these requests off, as the email is basically to myself.

I have a macro that reports spam emails to SpamCop.net, and in the VBA code, I've turned this off with:

Code: Select all

newMsg.ReadReceiptRequested = False
newMsg.OriginatorDeliveryReportRequested = False

Perhaps this would be a future feature for consideration?

Best wishes,
Erik.

[Sven]

Yes, i will try to set this "off" for these mails in the next version.

[eohrnberger]

Sven,
If there a tool that I can use to decode what data is being sent back and forth in the emails?

The reason that I ask is that I changed 7 contacts and 4 task items and got something like 803 update email messages sent to the subscriber.

Another question that I have related to configuration. I have an Exchange account at work with which I use Outlook using the 'Cached Exchange Mode', and a POP3 account at home with which I use Outlook. Right now, I have the same set of folders configured in each Outlook with OLFolderSync, each pointing to the other.

If there a chance that I'm getting an update message that is bouncing back and forth? What I mean is that I update a contact at work, it sends a message for an update to home, which applied it, which changes the contact and sends an update message to work again, and so on.

I really, really want to make this work and work well, because I'be seen searching for a long time for a tool like this, but if I update a few items, and it generates 800 emails, well, I can't continue to do this. The email administrator at work is going to kick me off fo the Exchange server, due to too many emails.

[eohrnberger]

Sven,
OK I found the utility where you can watch the log file. I turned that on, and made many changes to the contacts (I turned Journalling on for like 136 of them), and Oh boy! are there a lot of changes going on. I particularly notice lines like this:

11:24 -> ------------- found changed exchangemessage i=136 / 136 --------------

It seems like each of those changes is generating it's own email message, this would be the case for an email with the subject ">-OLFolderSync-< 11/24/2008 11:30:39 AM". In the case of a Basic Sync, or background Sync, the email message has the subject of "OLFS$BASICSYNCPACKET:11/24/2008 11:30:02 AM". But still, there seem to be a large number of emails going back and forth.

Do you suppose that it would make sense to combine all multiple changes into a single larger email, like one per sync folder? I believe that this would possibly solve the issue with the large number of emails being sent back and forth, and considering how small the individual Outlook items are, I don't think that the email would get much bigger than 1 MB or less, so that should be OK.

Perhaps a consideration for the future version?

[Sven]

At this time it*s so that if you are in basicsync mode, the OLFolderSync collects about 30 mails togheter as a Basicsyncmail. If you are in normal mode the OLFolderSync visits the outbox and counts the syncmails. if there are more then 10, it will pack the mails togheter. But in your case it is may be so that you have configured the outlook so that it should send mails directly after they have ben created. If you need a solution now, you may be change to send/receive all 10 minutes.

But if you have this many changes without doing something or you are not in basic sync, there should be something else wrong. But what ? I don't know at this time.