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Troubleshoot the Address Book

Applies to: Microsoft Office Outlook 2003

Show My Contacts folder doesn't appear in the Address Book, and the Show this folder as an e-mail address book check box is unavailable.

Make sure the Outlook Address Book is installed by doing the following:

On the Tools menu, click E-mail Accounts.
Under Directory, click View or change existing directories, and then click Next.
If Outlook Address Book is not listed, click Add.
Click Additional Address Books, and then click Next.
Click Outlook Address Book, and then click Next.
Click Finish, and then restart Outlook.

Show I get LDAP Error 81.

See the following: You receive a "can't contact LDAP Directory server (81)" error message when you open the Address Book in Outlook.

Show I can't find a contact in the Address Book.

The Address Book (Address Book: The collection of address books that you can use to store names, e-mail addresses, fax numbers, and distribution lists. The Address Book may contain a Global Address List, an Outlook Address Book, and a Personal Address Book.) can contain several address books. The name you want may be in a different address book. Try selecting a different address book.

Show How?

In the Address Book dialog box, click another address book in the Show Names from the list.
To see contacts (contact: Person, inside or outside of your organization, about whom you can save several types of information, such as street and e-mail addresses, telephone and fax numbers, and Web page URLs.) from your Microsoft Outlook contacts list, in the Show Names from the list, click the name of the contacts folder you want under Outlook Address Book.

A contact must have an entry in the E-mail field or in a Fax field to appear in the Outlook Address Book (Outlook Address Book: An address book that is automatically created from contacts in the Contacts folder. The contacts can be people inside and outside of your organization. When you update your contacts, the Outlook Address Book is updated as well.)/Contacts folder.

Show I keep my contacts in a public folder, but I don't see these contacts in the Address Book.

Your contacts public folder might not be set to appear in the Address Book (Address Book: The collection of address books that you can use to store names, e-mail addresses, fax numbers, and distribution lists. The Address Book may contain a Global Address List, an Outlook Address Book, and a Personal Address Book.). Set it to appear.

Show How?

Right-click the Contacts folder, click Properties on the shortcut menu (shortcut menu: A menu that shows a list of commands relevant to a particular item. To display a shortcut menu, right-click an item or press SHIFT+F10.), and then click the Outlook Address Book tab.
Select the Show this folder as an e-mail address book check box.

Show I added a new name to the Address Book, but it doesn't appear in my Personal Address Book.

Any name you add in the Address Book dialog box is added to your Contacts folder. But entries in the Contacts folder are not added to your Personal Address Book (Personal Address Book: A customizable address book used to store personal e-mail addresses you use frequently. However, Contacts offers more advanced features for this function. Personal Address Book files have a .pab extension and can be copied to disk.) automatically. You must add the contact (contact: Person, inside or outside of your organization, about whom you can save several types of information, such as street and e-mail addresses, telephone and fax numbers, and Web page URLs.) to your Personal Address Book directly by opening the Personal Address Book and then clicking New.

Show When I try to select a contacts folder in the Address Book dialog box, I get a message.

The contacts folder might have been deleted. Or, if the contacts folder is shared, you may no longer have permission to use it.

If this is the case, ask the owner of the folder for permission, and then set up the folder in the Address Book (Address Book: The collection of address books that you can use to store names, e-mail addresses, fax numbers, and distribution lists. The Address Book may contain a Global Address List, an Outlook Address Book, and a Personal Address Book.) again.

If you determine that the contacts folder does not exist or that you cannot get permission to use it, you can remove the folder from the Address Book.

Show How?

On the Tools menu, click E-mail Accounts.
Under Directory, select View or change existing directories or address books, and then click Next.
Click the address book you want to delete.
Click Remove.
Click Finish.

Show It takes a long time to resolve names in my e-mail messages.

It may take quite a long time for the name you typed in the message to be checked against the address book, depending on the size and speed of the directories you are searching. Try any of the following:

Show Exclude an LDAP directory from the list of address books being used to check names

On the Tools menu, click Address Book.
In the Address Book dialog box, click Tools, and then click Options.
In the When sending mail, check names using these address lists in the following order list, click the address book that you want to exclude.
Click Remove.

Show Reduce the amount of time Microsoft Outlook spends searching LDAP directories

On the Tools menu, click E-mail Accounts.
Under Directory, select View or change existing directories or address books, and then click Next.
Click the address book that you want to change, and then click Change.
Click the Search tab, and then, under Server settings, change the value for Search time-out in seconds to a lower number.
Click OK, and then click Finish.

Show Change the order in which address books are checked for names

If you use a particular address book more often than others, you can have it always checked first.

On the Tools menu, click Address Book.
In the Address Book dialog box, click Tools, and then click Options.
In the When sending mail list, click the address book that you want to move.
Click the up arrow next to the When sending mail, check names using these address lists in the following order list. Address books in this list are checked from top to bottom.

Show I want a different address book displayed first in the Show Names from the list in the Address Book dialog box.

On the Tools menu, click Address Book.
In the Address Book dialog box, click Tools, and then click Options.
In the Show this address list first list, click the address book you want to appear first in the Show Names from the list.

If you want a Contacts folder to appear first, you must select the Contacts folder name, not Outlook Address Book.

Show The Find button in the Select Names dialog box has disappeared.

To display the Find dialog box, click Advanced, and then click Find.

Show I can't tell e-mail addresses from fax numbers in my address book or in dialog boxes.

To display more information about names in your address books, resize the dialog box, by clicking the left or right border of the box and then dragging it until the information you want to see is visible.

Troubleshoot the Address Book

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