If you ever run into a situation where the Outlook client is freezing during one of the Synchronization processes, here is a work around that will at least allow you to regain control of Outlook long enough to modify the settings.
If you carefully examine the following Windows Registry key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\MSCRMClient
You will find the settings that control the CRM Outlook client. Here is a key of interest:
RunOutlookSyncOnStartup
Possible Values: 1 and 0
Outlook Client Option: Synchronize the items in my Outlook folders at startup
This setting is normally 1 which will instruct the Outlook Client to begin synchronization efforts immediately after Outlook is started. If you have issues with the synchronization process, you will probably see Outlook hang and/or become unresponsive.
Set this setting to 0 allow Outlook to start so you can regain control of the synchronization process or at least look to see what they use has decided to download and hopefully determine the issue causing the hang.
Additional Information:
There are a few other interesting registry settings in this section that are normally controlled through the CRM Outlook Clients Options page, but which you may need to modify to stop synchronization attempts while you are troubleshooting.
RunOutlookScheduledSync
Possible Values: 1 and 0
Outlook Client Option: Synchronize the CRM items in my Outlook folders every
Set this setting to 0 if you do not wish the CRM Client to perform the synchronize process at the interval specified on the CRM Options page. Set it to 1, if you do want to synchronize Contacts.
SyncContact
Possible Values: 1 and 0
Outlook Client Option: Contacts
This setting controls whether or not Contacts will be synchronized at all.
Set this setting to 0 to not synchronize Contacts and 1, is you want to synchronize Contacts.
SyncCalItem
Possible Values: 1 and 0
Outlook Client Option: Appointments I'm attending
This setting controls whether or not Appointments will be synchronized at all.
Set this setting to 0 to not synchronize Appointments and 1, is you want to synchronize Appointments.
SyncTask
Possible Values: 1 and 0
Outlook Client Option: My tasks
This setting controls whether or not Tasks will be synchronized at all.
Set this setting to 0 to not synchronize Tasks and 1, is you want to synchronize Tasks.
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Mitch,
These are the keys we need.
We want to change the sync settings for all users BEFORE they launch Outlook.
Here's our problem: The 3 sync keys: SyncCalItem, SyncContact and SyncTask don't seem to 'take' when done via the registry.(we want to set those 3 keys to 0 before they start Outlook)
However, we are able to modify the RunOutlookSyncOnStartup key and it does take right away.
We did notice that the key type for RunOutlookSyncOnStartup is different than the other 3.
Those keys are set properly when done via Outlook client.
Any idea why this happens?
Thanks for your help,
Richard
Richard,
It turns out that there is actually some information stored within the CRM database itself which is only updated by the outlook client itself. Changing the registry key doesn't actually produce the same result.
There is also no information or practices which will allow us to change this database information either.
Mitch