Exchange: Cannot connect after deleting items from Outbox folder

1

eM Client has a hazard symbol alongside my Hotmail account in its left-side Mail pane.  Says there is a problem connecting to the server.  When I look in Tools -> Operations -> Error, that says an item could not be moved from the Outbox to Trash folder.  I deleted old items still sitting in my Outbox that I did not want sent.

Outbox should ALWAYS be a local folder.  The server-side account won’t have one.  Outbox is a holding store for pending outgoing messages from the client.  eM Client shows an Outbox folder under the Hotmail account, and that is inaccurate.  There is no folder defined in my account called Outbox.  That’s why eM Client pukes when it tries to [pseudo]delete items from the Outbox folder (which actually moves them into the Trash folder).  

I exited eM Client to see if it would get back in sync with itself.  That is, items deleted in any Outbox folder should be removed from a local folder within just eM Client for holding a pending outgoing message until sending has finished (the client issues a DATA command with the message, ends with a line with the period character as the first and only character in that line, and the server responds with OK meaning it got the message).  Nope, the Outbox folder (incorrectly placed within the Hotmail account’s folder tree) is empty, but eM Client still puts a hazard icon next to the account, and still issues an error seen in Tools -> Operations -> Errors.

Why would eM Client show an Outbox folder under ANY account regardless of type (Exchange or SMTP)?  That doesn’t make sense.  That folder is for pending messages the client will send or is sending.  There is no equivalent server-side folder.  If the webclient for the e-mail service shows an Outbox folder, that is for use only by the webclient to hold messages ready to send.  Clients and webclients should not be sharing their pending outbound message store (Outbox folder).  Well, that’s true for POP and IMAP accounts.  In this case, I had to delete the default IMAP account that eM Client’s wizard created for Hotmail and manually create a new Hotmail where I specified it was an Exchange account.  Perhaps for Exchange, the server does share the Outbox folder for multiple Exchange-enabled clients connecting to the same account.  If true, eM Client has a defect in its Exchange support where it cannot move items out of an Exchange account’s Outbox into the Trash folder.

The Mail for Windows 10 app (a UWP/WinRT app) doesn’t show an Outbox folder, and it uses Exchange (ActiveSync) to connect to my Hotmail account.  There is no Outbox folder shown when using the webmail client to my Hotmail account.  So, there is not Outbox folder to view using other e-mail clients to check what is in there after my attempted deletion in eM Client.  Even eM Client’s Outbox folder is empty after the deletion, but it continue to whine about “Attempt to connect to Hotmail failed” and the error log says:

Moving item(s) from folder ‘Hotmail/Outbox’ to folder ‘Hotmail/Trash/’ failed due to the following error:
The move of copy operation failed.

I already enabled the “Show local folders” option in eM Client, but every local folder, including the Outbox folder, is empty.

How do I fix eM Client to recover from its supposed failure to move items out of its Outbox into the Trash folder and stop reporting the same Exchange error?  Ignoring the old errors doesn’t stop new errors from showing on in the next mail poll nor remove the hazard icon next to the Hotmail account.

2

I just sent a test message from my Gmail account to my Hotmail account.  While the client on my smartphone noticed a new message in my Hotmail account, eM Client never updated to notify or show the new test message had already arrived.

So, while eM Client is showing the hazard icon next to the Hotmail account, it continue to refuse to connect to that Exchange account to get new e-mails.  This makes eM Client useless for that account.  Sure, I could keep deleting the account and manually creating the Exchange account, but that is an unacceptable workaround.

3

That icon means there is a connection problem. That means it cannot connect to the server. That means it will not download messages.

I have yet to find an email client that can download message when it cannot connect to the server. :wink:

4

And yet a different e-mail client (Mail for Win10) can connect just fine.  The problem is not that my host cannot get a network connection to the Exchange server.  The problem is that eM Client has gotten into a state where it refuses to connect because of some corruption in its folder management.  I deleted items in the Outbox folder.  eM Client now errors on trying to move/copy the deleted items into the Trash folder.  Well, eM Client wouldn’t reporting that error unless it already connected to the server but received an error code for something that was inappropriate or invalid (against the current state of the mailbox).

The hazard triangle icon merely says eM Client might have a problem connecting or the settings are wrong.  The settings were working just before I deleted the items listed in its Outbox folder.  As noted, the error log notes the problem is with however eM Client is trying to issue commands to the Exchange server to delete items.

With MS Outlook, I can enable logging to see if the client first manages to establish a mail session with the server and then what further commands the client issues and what status the server returns.  I checked in eM Client and it has logging for Exchange Web Services.  I’ve enabled it, but it will take awhile of investigating the log to determine if I can determine what is going on in the log.

5

According to the Web Services log in eM Client, I got the following logfile:

Path: C:\Users\leeho\AppData\Roaming\eM Client\Logs
File: 2019-09-17_05-26-08 Hotmail Exchange Web Services.log

eM Client has no problem connecting to the server.  In fact, it even retrieves the folder IDs (rather long strings) from the Exchange mailbox.  It can’t do that until after a mail session has been established, and that means eM Client did connect to the Exchange server.

There’s a lot of log entries to go through.  Not only does the client access the Exchange mailbox but also the calendar and contacts in the Exchange account.  Where the log appears to indicate an error in how eM Client is attempting to access the Outbox folder (which, as far as I know, should only be a local folder, not attempting to access a pending outbound message store on the server) is from the output of (I removed the datestamp prefix in each line since it isn’t relevant):

<trace tag="EwsResponse" tid="18" time="2019-09-17 10:26:09Z" version="7.2.36694.0"><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">  <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">  <envelope xmlns:s="&lt;a alt=" href="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/">" name="" rel="nofollow" target="" title="Link httpschemasxmlsoaporgsoapenvelope" type="" value=""&gt;http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/"&gt;;<br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">

 <header><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">      <serverversioninfo majorversion="15" minorversion="20" majorbuildnumber="2263" minorbuildnumber="26" version="V2018_01_08" xmlns:h="&lt;a alt=" href="http://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/types" name="" rel="nofollow" target="" title="Link httpschemasmicrosoftcomexchangeservices2006types" type="" value="">http://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/types"; xmlns:xsd="<a alt="" href="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" name="" rel="nofollow" target="" title="" type="" value="">http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"</a>; xmlns:xsi="<a alt="" href="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" name="" rel="nofollow" target="" title="Link httpwwww3org2001XMLSchema-instance" type="" value="">http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"</a>; /&gt;<br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">    </serverversioninfo></header><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">    <body>
<br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">      <moveitemresponse xmlns:m="&lt;a alt=" href="http://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/messages" name="" rel="nofollow" target="" title="Link httpschemasmicrosoftcomexchangeservices2006messages" type="" value="">http://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/messages"; xmlns:xsd="<a alt="" href="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" name="" rel="nofollow" target="" title="" type="" value="">http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"</a>; xmlns:xsi="<a alt="" href="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" name="" rel="nofollow" target="" title="Link httpwwww3org2001XMLSchema-instance" type="" value="">http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"</a>; xmlns:t="<a alt="" href="http://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/types">" name="" rel="nofollow" target="" title="" type="" value=""&gt;http://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/types"&gt;</a>;<br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">        <responsemessages><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">          <moveitemresponsemessage responseclass="Error"><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">            <messagetext>The move or copy operation failed.</messagetext><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">            <responsecode>ErrorMoveCopyFailed</responsecode><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">            <descriptivelinkkey>0</descriptivelinkkey><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">            <items></items><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">          </moveitemresponsemessage><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">        </responsemessages><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">      </moveitemresponse><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">    </body>
<br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">  </envelope><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value=""></trace>
Exception: MailClient.Storage.Application.OperationException: Moving item(s) from folder 'Hotmail/Outbox/' to folder 'Hotmail/Trash/' failed due to the following error: The move or copy operation failed. ---\> Microsoft.Exchange.WebServices.Data.ServiceResponseException: The move or copy operation failed.

Despite that eM Client’s Outbox folder is now empty after performing a delete of items it listed there, eM Client is still trying to get the Exchange server to move items that either do not exist or for a folder that eM Client shouldn’t be attempting to access.  eM Client has already established a mail session and then attempts a MoveItem request, but the server doesn’t like what eM Client is trying to do.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/client-developer/web-service-reference/moveitem-operation

While I was correct that a local e-mail client should be using its own local Outbox folder for pending outbound messages, Exchange does have an Outbox.  I’ve read where users on different workstations using Outlook connecting to Exchange will see the same items listed in the Outbox for the same Exchange account.  That is, multiple instances of Outlook on different hosts but connecting to the same Exchange account would see the same items in the Outbox folder in that Exchange account.  When I looked at the Web Services Log created by eM Client, yep, one of the folders queried by the client from the server was named Outbox.

<create><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">  <folder><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">    <folderid id="AQMkADAwATZiZmYAZC05NzRkLTE5ZmMtMDACLTAwCgAuAAADg7PVbiqy5kyCrFB1075jIwEA/qlX0PFNT08AgWUuXCiSRmMAAAIBCwAAAA==" changekey="AQAAABYAAAD+qVfQ8U1PT4FlLlwokkZjAAK9d4/K"></folderid><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">    <parentfolderid id="AQMkADAwATZiZmYAZC05NzRkLTE5ZmMtMDACLTAwCgAuAAADg7PVbiqy5kyCrFB1075jIwEA/qlX0PFNT08AgWUuXCiSRmMAAAIBCAAAAA==" changekey="AQAAAA=="></parentfolderid><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">    <folderclass>IPF.Note</folderclass><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">    <displayname>Outbox</displayname><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">    <distinguishedfolderid>outbox</distinguishedfolderid><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value="">  </folder><br alt="" name="" rel="" target="" title="" type="" value=""></create>

While Exchange has an Outbox folder in a mailbox doesn’t mean the Exchange setup for Hotmail/Outlook.com allows clients access to that folder.  The Mail app for Win10 (a UWP/WinRT app instead of a Win32 program) doesn’t even show an Outbox folder, and neither does their webmail client.  Hotmail/Outlook.com use ActiveSync for accessing Exchange.  From the log, sure looks like eM Client is attempting an operation that the Exchange server (as configured for use with Hotmail/Outlook.com) that is illegal.  Alas, eM Client seems stuck on attempting to repeatedly issue the same MoveItem command when it loads.  It’s gotten into a state that locks it out from any further access to the Exchange account.  That makes eM Client unacceptable for use as a local Exchange client.

6

Remove the Exchange account from eM Client, then add it again.

7

Noted in the last sentence of my opening message: “Sure, I could keep deleting the account and manually creating the Exchange account, but that is an unacceptable workaround.”  The solution resolves the problem until eM Client gets screwed up again.  This Exchange account was defined in eM Client for less than one day, and already it got screwed up.  

Define a new account?  I just did 12 hours ago.  I had noticed the eM Client did not create an Exchange account when I entered my Hotmail e-mail address.  Its automated setup created an IMAP account.  So, I deleted the IMAP account and manually selected to create an Exchange account.  That was about 12 hours ago.  That’s a pretty short lifetime to have it get locked up (with repeated attempts at the same invalid Exchange operation).

I was hoping there was some way to kick eM Client in its plugged buck to get rid of the pending MoveItem command for the Outbox in an Exchange account.  Doesn’t look like there is a reset to null any pending ops on startup, like clearing some queue, or forcing a clear on the Outbox folder to keep it from attempting MoveItem on items that are invisible when looking inside the folder.

8

Is there a question in there?

9

Okay, looks like you decide to cop an attitude.  So, tit for tat, was there a helpful statement in yours?  Don’t know why you’ve turned sour.