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Outlook not synchronising after deploying EES


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ESMC7 / EES7 / W7/10 / Office 2016 / Office 365.

Have just installed EES7 using All-in-one installer from ESMC for a new customer. Installations seem to go without issue. Agents connected to ESMC server, EES updated successfully and completed initial scans.

However customer has called me back saying Outlook has not updated since prior to installing EES. Outlook is reporting 'Connected to Microsoft Exchange' and stuck on 'Updating Inbox'. If I go into Send/Receive menu and hit 'Update Folder', it seems to be stuck on 'Updating Hierarchy'. None of the settings have changed in Outlook (other than ESET add-in active) and can access their webmail no problem. Have tried restarting Outlook, also restarting the computer completely, same issue.

I had a similar problem with another new customer a few weeks ago with a couple of their computers as well. Eventually it started synchronising again after several hours.

It seems ESET is doing something in Outlook that seems to have paused or stopped synchronising with Exchange Online.

Any ideas?

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Couldn't it be that there are thousands of emails directly in the inbox folder? At any rate, I'd suggest contacting customer care since diagnostic logs from the Outlook plug-in will be needed for further troubleshooting.

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Possibly there are a lot of emails in the Inbox. The mailbox was previously fully synchronised, and turns out was still receiving emails shortly after the install, but then about an hour later (not sure of exact timing) was stuck as above. Same issue on multiple computers.

When first installing EES, does ESET do a full scan of Outlook? Does this change any attributes on emails or folders in Outlook?

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After installing ESET, the plug-in adds a special flag to all messages in the inbox folder (not subfolders) which may take some time if there are thousands of messages. Had the user been using an older version of Endpoint with integration to Outlook enabled prior to installing Endpoint v7?

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No, prior they were using TM. Couple more questions to understand what's happening. Pretty sure this user (like most lol) has thousands of emails in the Inbox.

Is there any setting to disable setting this flag when installing ESET for existing emails?

Would this flag be an attribute that would then synchronise back to Exchange Online?

If the user has their email configured in Outlook on multiple computers, would this then require syncing this attribute from Exchange Online back to Outlook on the second computer also?

Is this behaviour new in v7? (vs EES6 - I haven't noticed this before, only with these last two customers, both EES7)

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41 minutes ago, Marcos said:

After installing ESET, the plug-in adds a special flag to all messages in the inbox folder (not subfolders) which may take some time if there are thousands of messages. Had the user been using an older version of Endpoint with integration to Outlook enabled prior to installing Endpoint v7?

Had that been case, would it make any difference? I ask because we use v5 and plan do upgrade to v7, with users having large inboxes.

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5 minutes ago, bbahes said:

with users having large inboxes.

It's a never ending battle getting users to manage their Inboxes :(

Worst is when they file read emails by deleting them, permanently storing them in the Deleted Items!

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So is there any way to disable this behaviour upon installing EES?

Would selecting the following policy make any difference;

ESET EES Policy / Web and Email / Email Client Protection - Disable checking upon inbox content change

When deploying EES to new customers, it's not practical to be;

a) going through everyone's Outlook folders to confirm they don't have thousands of emails in their Inbox, or

b) explaining to the new customer that Outlook will be unusable for several hours because ESET needs to scan and change attributes that will then need to synchronise with Exchange Online (probably 80% of customers) and there is no way to turn this off, so you'll just have to use webmail while you wait.

It's not a good first impression for a new product (regardless of the virtue of scanning the Inbox).

It would be better to be able to schedule a task to scan the entire Outlook data file at a more convenient time after hours.

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Or would not enabling (disabling) all the options under ESET EES Policy / Web and Email / Email Client Protection /Alerts and Notifications.

And not enabling 'Add text to email subject' under Antispam Protection.

Would these settings remove this behaviour?

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9 hours ago, ShaneDT said:

So is there any way to disable this behaviour upon installing EES?

Would selecting the following policy make any difference;

ESET EES Policy / Web and Email / Email Client Protection - Disable checking upon inbox content change

When deploying EES to new customers, it's not practical to be;

a) going through everyone's Outlook folders to confirm they don't have thousands of emails in their Inbox, or

b) explaining to the new customer that Outlook will be unusable for several hours because ESET needs to scan and change attributes that will then need to synchronise with Exchange Online (probably 80% of customers) and there is no way to turn this off, so you'll just have to use webmail while you wait.

It's not a good first impression for a new product (regardless of the virtue of scanning the Inbox).

It would be better to be able to schedule a task to scan the entire Outlook data file at a more convenient time after hours.

This helped us on v5. Please do test this and if possible report back.

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Unfortunately not so simple to test. I need a client with thousands of emails in their Inbox to install a fresh instance of EES.

And if it doesn't work the client can't use Outlook for several hours...

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2 minutes ago, bbahes said:

image.png

For some strange reason, editor did not post entire message.

I also added that you post feature request on https://forum.eset.com/topic/14271-future-changes-to-eset-remote-administrator/

 

I would only add to your request for scheduled scan, option to scan PST/OST when PC is in idle state.

Edited by bbahes
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2 minutes ago, bbahes said:

I would only add to your request for scheduled scan, option to scan PST/OST when PC is in idle state.

TBH I doubt it would be possible to create a task for a scheduled scan of a users mailbox in Outlook. You wouldn't be able to scan the pst/ost directly without risking corruption, so it would need to be done through Outlook, which would require Outlook to be running.

Maybe an option could be included on the ESET add-in for Outlook, adding a 'Scan entire mailbox' option. User could then run this manually leaving Outlook open overnight. Fairly simple recommendation for a new install.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Any chance I can get a reply on this please? It would be nice to know what the above settings actually do and whether either may help.

Also if ESET is considering a change as suggested above that would mitigate this issue in the future.

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I would recommend contacting customer care and creating a support ticket so that the issue is properly tracked and investigated. They should provide you with a logging version of the Outlook plug-in and subsequently pass the logs to developers for perusal.

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