Information Strategy and Technology Services
Over time you will likely want to move some of your Outlook items to a separate location because you no longer need them, but don’t want to delete them. For example, perhaps you want to keep a copy of all of the messages in your Sent Items folder so you can refer to them later if needed, but you don’t want them to stay in Sent Items. In these situations you can use Outlook’s AutoArchive feature to move out those old items.
The Outlook AutoArchive feature archives data automatically according to settings you configure for each folder or all your folders. You might want to archive every day if you receive new data that you don’t want to take the chance of losing overnight. Or you might want to set AutoArchive to run once a week.
To set up a folder to automatically archive using the default AutoArchive settings, follow these steps:
By default, Outlook starts AutoArchive every 14 days and archives your data in the selected folder to the Archive.pst personal folders file.
You can also specify custom AutoArchive settings for a folder. Open the properties for the folder, click the AutoArchive tab, and choose the Archive This Folder Using These Settings option. Then, specify settings on the AutoArchive tab as desired for the folder.
Outlook provides several ways to configure and manage your data-archiving settings. For example, suppose that you want Outlook to run AutoArchive every day, but you want to be prompted before it starts. You can configure AutoArchive to do just that. In addition, you might want to delete old items after a specific date (say, after a message sits in the Inbox for six months). This section shows you how to configure AutoArchive to handle many of your archiving needs.
To set AutoArchive options, choose Tools, Options, click the Other tab, and click Auto- Archive to open the AutoArchive dialog box. The following sections explain the options you’ll find in the AutoArchive dialog box.
Outlook allows you to run AutoArchive on a per-day cycle. For example, if you want to run it each day, set it to run every 1 day. To archive every other day, set AutoArchive to run every 2 days, and so on.
To set the length of time between AutoArchive sessions, set the Run AutoArchive Every n Days option - (Screenshot) to the number of days you want between archiving sessions. The number you enter must be between 1 and 60.
You can have Outlook display a message before it starts an AutoArchive session. The message includes a Cancel button to let you cancel the AutoArchive for that day. To activate this option, select the Prompt Before AutoArchive Runs check box in the AutoArchive dialog box.
In your message folders, AutoArchive can delete messages if they are older than a specified amount of time. To set this option, select the Delete Expired Items check box. Also make sure that the Archive Or Delete Old Items check box is selected.
In the Default Folder Settings For Archiving area, set the amount of time you want to pass before AutoArchive automatically deletes e-mail messages. The default is six months, but you can set this to as high as 60 months or as low as one day.
If you want AutoArchive to archive or delete old Outlook items, select the Archive Or Delete Old Items check box. Then set the amount of time that should elapse before old items are archived or deleted. Again, the default is six months, but you can set it to as high as 60 months or as low as one day.
If you want Outlook to display your archive folder in the folder list, select the Show Archive Folder In Folder List check box. You might want to select this check box if you think you’d like to be able to see which items have been archived. Also, you might find that some items are removed from your working folders (such as Inbox or Calendar) before you want them removed. By showing the archive folder in the folder list, you can quickly and easily move items back to a working folder.
In the Default Folder Settings For Archiving area, you can set the number of days that should pass before e-mail messages or other items are archived or deleted (see the previous two sections).
In addition, this area includes options for the way old items are handled. With the Move Old Items To option, you can specify a PST file to which Outlook should move archived items. Click Browse to identify a different location and the PST file in which you want to store archives.
On the other hand, if you want to delete archived items, select Permanently Delete Old Items and Outlook will delete items during the AutoArchive sessions. This option is probably not a good choice if you want to retain information for long periods of time.
If you want these AutoArchive settings to apply to all your folders, click Apply These Settings To All Folders Now. Any settings you establish for individual folders (see the next section) are not overridden by the default settings in the AutoArchive dialog box.
When you configure AutoArchive settings, you can use the default settings just described, or you can specify options for individual folders.
To take the latter approach, open the Properties dialog box for the folder, click the Auto- Archive tab, and click Archive This Folder Using These Settings. Then set the following options:
You can archive data not only automatically but also manually—for example, before leaving on vacation or when you need to move your files to a new machine.
To archive data manually, perform these steps:
Outlook begins archiving your data. If the folder contains a large amount of data, archiving might take several minutes (or hours, depending on the speed of your computer and other factors). You can watch the status of the archiving by looking at the right side of Outlook’s status bar. When the process has finished, the Archive.pst file (or whichever archive file you specified in step 6) will contain the data Outlook just archived.
Suppose you’ve worked on a project for six months and you’ve been diligent about archiving messages and other items from the project. You come into work one day and find that your system has crashed and Outlook has lost all your data. You need the archived data to get back all your lost information and continue working. How do you get it back?
You can restore data from an archive file in two ways: drag items from a PST file to a folder, or import a PST file.
The following steps show you how to drag data from a PST file:
To restore items by importing a PST file, follow these steps:
Outlook displays a window showing you the progress of the import process. The archive folder appears in the folder list (if the folder list is open), but it is removed when the operation is completed.
