[dwex]

I'm a Blackberry noob. Just got my 8830 last week, and finally got it activated on my company's BES this morning. I've noticed that if I delete a message from my inbox on either my PC via Outlook or on my 8830, then the message is correspondingly deleted on the other side. However, if I move the message from my Outlook/Exchange Inbox to a local folder in a .pst file (i.e. Outlook offline storage), the message remains in my 8830's Inbox. Even if I do "Reconcile Now", it stays on the 8830.

Any ideas? Thanks.

[jeffmarshall911]

I've been a BB/BES user for over 2 years and I spent quite some time reviewing this. Unless there has been an OS change then I understand that what you describe is "as designed".

If you find out more, I'd love to hear about it.

/Jeff

[dwex]

How incredibly odd. Outlook/Exchange clearly know that the message has been deleted. I wonder if BES is actually looking for the message to move to the Deleted Items folder or something, to figure out the deletion. Why it doesn't get fixed on a reconcile is hard to understand, though - the message is clearly gone from the server.

[penguin3107]

Originally Posted by dwex

I wonder if BES is actually looking for the message to move to the Deleted Items folder or something, to figure out the deletion.

That's correct.
BES doesn't know about things that occur in your PST file. It only looks at server-side activity.

[dwex]

Originally Posted by penguin3107

That's correct.
BES doesn't know about things that occur in your PST file. It only looks at server-side activity.

But it is server-side activity, as far as Exchange is concerned. When I move a message from my online Inbox to an offline (pst) folder, Exchange deletes it from the online Inbox. It just doesn't make a copy to Deleted Items.

I'm not expecting BES to know anything about my .pst folders, just simply expecting it to notice that the message is gone from the online Exchange folder.

[penguin3107]

Originally Posted by dwex

But it is server-side activity, as far as Exchange is concerned. When I move a message from my online Inbox to an offline (pst) folder, Exchange deletes it from the online Inbox. It just doesn't make a copy to Deleted Items.

I'm not expecting BES to know anything about my .pst folders, just simply expecting it to notice that the message is gone from the online Exchange folder.

At most, it's only half server-side activity.
BES is going to look for deletions in your server-side Deleted Items folder.
If the message is not there... then there is no deletion on the handheld.
Like you said... moving an item into your PST file will not put anything in your deleted items on the server side.

Moving an item into your PST file will basically have no effect on the handheld whatsoever. This is how BES works.

[ChefJon]

Originally Posted by dwex

I'm a Blackberry noob. Just got my 8830 last week, and finally got it activated on my company's BES this morning. I've noticed that if I delete a message from my inbox on either my PC via Outlook or on my 8830, then the message is correspondingly deleted on the other side. However, if I move the message from my Outlook/Exchange Inbox to a local folder in a .pst file (i.e. Outlook offline storage), the message remains in my 8830's Inbox. Even if I do "Reconcile Now", it stays on the 8830.

Any ideas? Thanks.

I've been doing BES admin for a couple of years and I can tell you what I tell my users: "It is what it is." However, there is a work around, so to speak. Instead of moving a message to your pst, copy it to your pst and then delete the original. The Blackberry will "see" the deletion and it will be removed from your Blackberry.

This is combersome, I know, but even if you don't do this on a day to day basis, remember this when making rules. I have several rules that move routine messages that I don't need to see when I'm mobile. I have a rule setup in Outlook to move the message and then delete it. In effect I never see those messages on my Blackberry but they are archived on my pc when I do need to refer to them.

[dwex]

Originally Posted by penguin3107

At most, it's only half server-side activity.
BES is going to look for deletions in your server-side Deleted Items folder.
If the message is not there... then there is no deletion on the handheld.
Like you said... moving an item into your PST file will not put anything in your deleted items on the server side.

Moving an item into your PST file will basically have no effect on the handheld whatsoever. This is how BES works.

However, the fact that BES doesn't recognize that the message no longer exists on the server is broken, IMHO. The message is gone from the online store, period. It should be gone from the handheld.

[dwex]

Originally Posted by ChefJon

I've been doing BES admin for a couple of years and I can tell you what I tell my users: "It is what it is." However, there is a work around, so to speak. Instead of moving a message to your pst, copy it to your pst and then delete the original. The Blackberry will "see" the deletion and it will be removed from your Blackberry.

This is combersome, I know, but even if you don't do this on a day to day basis, remember this when making rules. I have several rules that move routine messages that I don't need to see when I'm mobile. I have a rule setup in Outlook to move the message and then delete it. In effect I never see those messages on my Blackberry but they are archived on my pc when I do need to refer to them.

I'll give that a shot, thanks. I don't do anything rules-based at this point; I manually archive stuff that I need to retain (our Exchange mailboxes are only 50MB per user, so stuff has to get archived or deleted pretty quickly.

[penguin3107]

Originally Posted by dwex

However, the fact that BES doesn't recognize that the message no longer exists on the server is broken, IMHO. The message is gone from the online store, period. It should be gone from the handheld.

Well, you're entitled to your opinion.
If you think RIM should change this behavior, then I guess the best course of action would be to suggest a change here:

[JRSCCivic98]

Originally Posted by dwex

However, the fact that BES doesn't recognize that the message no longer exists on the server is broken, IMHO. The message is gone from the online store, period. It should be gone from the handheld.

With all due respect. There is a difference in the way the Exchange server handles the store when a message is "deleted" and when a message is "moved". It's not that BES looks for the message to get moved from the Inbox to the Deleted Items which causes it to think it got deleted, it's the actual store viewing the message as "deleted tagged". If it's tagged as a moved message then BES won't delete it from the BB.

The Exchange Information Store filesystem is not the same as FAT or NTFS in regards to "moves and deletions" of items. On the FAT and NTFS file systems the files when you move a file it's copied first and then deleted from the original location (if EIS worked the same way then BES would most likely delete the email from the BB). I'm only mentioning this because your logic on "why BES should see it as deleted when I move it" closely resembles this file system logic so I'm assuming that you're coming from this idea. If not, then don't worry about the explanation.

[dwex]

Originally Posted by JRSCCivic98

With all due respect. There is a difference in the way the Exchange server handles the store when a message is "deleted" and when a message is "moved". It's not that BES looks for the message to get moved from the Inbox to the Deleted Items which causes it to think it got deleted, it's the actual store viewing the message as "deleted tagged". If it's tagged as a moved message then BES won't delete it from the BB.

The Exchange Information Store filesystem is not the same as FAT or NTFS in regards to "moves and deletions" of items. On the FAT and NTFS file systems the files when you move a file it's copied first and then deleted from the original location (if EIS worked the same way then BES would most likely delete the email from the BB). I'm only mentioning this because your logic on "why BES should see it as deleted when I move it" closely resembles this file system logic so I'm assuming that you're coming from this idea. If not, then don't worry about the explanation.

I'm not talking about moving an item between Exchange folders. I'm talking about moving it from the Exchange datastore to a local file datastore.

So you're saying that if I move an email message from my Exchange Inbox to a folder in a .pst file, it's being stored by Exchange as moved-but-still-here-but-invisible, as opposed to actually being removed from the Exchange datastore? I don't believe that. When I move something from my Exchange Inbox to a folder in my .pst, the Exchange datastore deletes the item - this is demonstrated by the fact that my server data file size goes down by the corresponding amount. I know this because I am continually forced to manage my 50MB Exchange datastore quota by moving stuff out, and routinely have people sending me stuff with 5MB+ attachments, so I see it going up and down all the time.

So how is it reasonable for BES to not see the message as "gone" in this context? I accept the fact that this is in fact how it is operating, and not a bug, per se, so I will send in a suggestion to the address above, because it sure feels like a bug to me.

[galen_of_avalon]

Originally Posted by dwex

I'm not talking about moving an item between Exchange folders. I'm talking about moving it from the Exchange datastore to a local file datastore.

So you're saying that if I move an email message from my Exchange Inbox to a folder in a .pst file, it's being stored by Exchange as moved-but-still-here-but-invisible, as opposed to actually being removed from the Exchange datastore? I don't believe that. When I move something from my Exchange Inbox to a folder in my .pst, the Exchange datastore deletes the item - this is demonstrated by the fact that my server data file size goes down by the corresponding amount. I know this because I am continually forced to manage my 50MB Exchange datastore quota by moving stuff out, and routinely have people sending me stuff with 5MB+ attachments, so I see it going up and down all the time.

So how is it reasonable for BES to not see the message as "gone" in this context? I accept the fact that this is in fact how it is operating, and not a bug, per se, so I will send in a suggestion to the address above, because it sure feels like a bug to me.

I'm not certain how Exchange flags the message, but I'm guessing it's different than if it was moved to the deleted items folder. BES, for some reason, reads that folder. From what I've read, older versions of BES (prior to 4.1) have a bug that keeps a message on the device if you do a shift-delete directly from the inbox. The message is never flagged as deleted, so BES doesn't know what to do with it. I've heard that this is fixed in the newest version. I'd guess you're seeing a similar problem.

By the way, does the icon on the device change for that message? I know if you move a message to a folder it will then display on the device with a little folder icon instead of the envelope (this may vary depending on your version of the BB software, theme, and such). If it shows with the folder icon, you could just choose to hide filed messages.

[BES admin]

This is by design:

The BES server "monitors" folders in your mailbox for moves.

if a message is moved to the deleted items folder, this is the indication to the BES that the message is deleted and should be removed from the blackberry. However, if you remove it directly from your mailbox to a .pst file, the BES never saw the message go to the deleted items folder (the trigger it is waiting for to delete the message from the Blackberry) and doesn't see it in any other synched folder, so it has no idea where the message went. Likewise, if you delete a message in Outlook and immediately empty your deleted items folder, or shift+del to perminantly delete a message without going to the deleted itmes folder first, the affect is the same, the BES doesn't "see" the message in the deleted itmes folder, doesn't see it where it last new of it being, and therefore leaves it alone because it has no idea where it went.

This is a known "issue" and with BES 4.1 came the policy option which addressed this "issue." the policy, when set, basically says not only should the BES delete messages from the balckberry as it normally does, but if BES "looses track" of a message, as in the above cases, then the BES should delete the message from the BlackBerry, assuming it was deleted, or removed from the mailbox. The default for this option is NOT enabled, in my mind for good reason, and in our environment, is left NOT enabled.

I wouldn't consider this behavior "broken" it just IS the way it works. Makes sense to me, and at least one other person.

[BBpain]

Originally Posted by BES admin

This is by design:

The BES server "monitors" folders in your mailbox for moves.

if a message is moved to the deleted items folder, this is the indication to the BES that the message is deleted and should be removed from the blackberry. However, if you remove it directly from your mailbox to a .pst file, the BES never saw the message go to the deleted items folder (the trigger it is waiting for to delete the message from the Blackberry) and doesn't see it in any other synched folder, so it has no idea where the message went. Likewise, if you delete a message in Outlook and immediately empty your deleted items folder, or shift+del to perminantly delete a message without going to the deleted itmes folder first, the affect is the same, the BES doesn't "see" the message in the deleted itmes folder, doesn't see it where it last new of it being, and therefore leaves it alone because it has no idea where it went.

This is a known "issue" and with BES 4.1 came the policy option which addressed this "issue." the policy, when set, basically says not only should the BES delete messages from the balckberry as it normally does, but if BES "looses track" of a message, as in the above cases, then the BES should delete the message from the BlackBerry, assuming it was deleted, or removed from the mailbox. The default for this option is NOT enabled, in my mind for good reason, and in our environment, is left NOT enabled.

I wouldn't consider this behavior "broken" it just IS the way it works. Makes sense to me, and at least one other person.

I guess something on our BES server is setup for when I move an email to my PST it also deletes it from my BB. I sent my self an email from outlook, I received it on my BB. I moved the email to my PST which also removed it from my BB. Worked for me.

[eander315]

Have you tried turning on Hard Deletes on the BES?

[dwex]

OK. I will contact our BES administrators and see what I can find out.

[Diomedes]

Originally Posted by dwex

OK. I will contact our BES administrators and see what I can find out.

Hello, do this procedure bellow!!!




Reconcile permanently-deleted messages

In the BlackBerry Manager, in the left pane, click a BlackBerry Enterprise Server.
Click Edit Properties.
Click Messaging.
In the Messaging Options section, click Hard Deletes Reconciliation.
In the drop-down list, click True.
Click OK.
On the computer on which the BlackBerry Dispatcher is installed, in the Windows Services, restart the BlackBerry Dispatcher.

[mdanese]

The behavior of the BB doesn't make sense. I was using a Motorola Q before this and it worked exactly as you would expect. It simply kept the handheld synchronized to the exchange server (and by definition, my Outlook).

That is what is expected, at least by newer users. I really hate managing my BB as well as Outlook. I should be able to manage 1 and the other should keep up.

I realize that this is a BB issue, but I wanted to make sure it was clear that this was a completely reasonable question, and that BB is the one at fault, not the original poster.

[JG in SB]

Originally Posted by dwex

But it is server-side activity, as far as Exchange is concerned. When I move a message from my online Inbox to an offline (pst) folder, Exchange deletes it from the online Inbox. It just doesn't make a copy to Deleted Items.

I'm not expecting BES to know anything about my .pst folders, just simply expecting it to notice that the message is gone from the online Exchange folder.

Therein lies your problem. The BES only knows that you have deleted something from an Exchange Server folder if it sees that item in the Deleted Items folder on the Exchange Server. Unless you delete something in Exchange, and allow it to sit in the Deleted Items folder until the BES has synced up, then it will not get deleted off your BlackBerry. This is not how I would have designed the software to work...I would do it the way that you expected it to work, by looking at what is in actual folders and syncing up that stuff. But RIM did it this way.

Mybe you can write an outlook rule that will make a copy of anything you place in one of your PST folders in your Exchange Deleted Items folder. I don;t know if that is possible, and it certainly is not elegant, but it would do the job.