Question : Outlook to remote Exchange not displaying Public Folders

Hey guys,

We currently have Microsoft Exchange (patched to SP2) running on a Windows 2003 SBS server. This is being used by one of our clients for their email and calendars via OWA 2003. The server itself is running fine. One problem which unfortunately all users are experiencing is related to the printing of calendars. There doesn't appear to be any solutions for this, just workarounds one of which being to install an Outlook client on one user's machine and allow them to print calendars from here as opposed to OWA on behalf of other users. The customer already owns a small number of client licenses for Outlook 2007, which were to be used elsewhere. I have since installed Outlook 2007 onto a user's machine and attempted to connect it to the remote Exchange server. Initially I thought the connection itself had been successful - I could send and receive email as the user, using Outlook 2007 as opposed to OWA.

On closer inspection however, it seems that I cannot view the Public Folders that we currently have configured on the server - all of which are accessible via OWA. I have changed the view to Folder List but the upper tree which is normally entitled "Public Folders" is just not visible. In addition to this, Outlook makes no attempt to contact the Exchange server for the global address book, meaning that when composing a new email I am unable to choose a user from the list of available staff at the company. It appears to be operating at a very basic level, providing rudimentary email facilities (send and receive).

I am not an Exchange expert by any means so am unsure as to whether this is a misconfiguration on the Exchange server itself or whether this is simply how Exchange operates when an Outlook client is not connected to it locally. I have tried configuring the same user in Outlook 2007 on the Exchange server and immediately have access to public folders and the global address book. Are these simply not available to use if Outlook is operating outside of the local Exchange server or do I need to make changes to the server itself? I have read numerous articles on having to open ports in order for an Outlook client to talk properly with a remote Exchange server but have yet to find anything within these that would lead me to believe this is the problem.

Would anyone have any ideas as to what might be causing this? I must admit I was probably slightly naive to think that connecting an Outlook client to a remote Exchange server would be hassle free :-) You live and learn.

Any help would be greatly appreciated guys, thanks in advance!

Answer : Outlook to remote Exchange not displaying Public Folders

Authentication mismatch usually.
Basic on the virtual directory and NTLM configured in Outlook or Integrated (aka NTLM) on the virtual directory and basic in Outlook.

-M