CRM4 Outlook Client – Issues and Fixes
The picture above is the first “computer bug” found in 1945. As a piece of techno-folklore, this was a literal bug!
In the past several months since the release of the CRM 4.0, we’ve had the usual stream of customer issues come in through our support channel. No software is bug free and even with all the rigorous testing that we do, there are things that get overlooked.
CRM for Outlook is a product surface that gets a lot of end-user exposure and we hear loud and clear when our customers are hitting issues. Our support and engineering teams regularly work together to address these post-ship bugs and release hotfixes which focus on customer satisfaction with maximum impact. Though we have more fixes in the pipeline, I wanted to take a few minutes and acknowledge that we hear your pain and pass on info for fixes to common problems that exist today.
Note: The hotfix package for KB950088 is a cumulative hotfix which resolve all the issues below.
1. Outlook hangs during initialization (progress toolbar displays “Loading…” and never finishes)
This must-have fix is likely the most common perf/stability issue out there, especially on Outlook 2007. This fix resolves the issue. A current workaround exists by turning off the To Do bar.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/952724
2. With E-mail Auto Promotion Enabled, Outlook may not close cleanly/properly.
This fix addresses a memory allocation issue that can occur somewhat unpredictably. If your users are using e-mail auto promotion, I encourage you to deploy this hotfix.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/948121
3. Contacts with birthdays earlier than 1/1/1970 causes Outlook to crash
This was caused by an API change by one of our dependencies.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/948045
4. Items in Shared Calendars will report Sync Issues
We do not support Shared Calendars in CRM 4.0, we encountered a couple of cases where some code was getting executed against a shared calendar and causing problems.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/949086
5. Cannot Promote an E-mail where the name of the attached file contains a ‘&’ symbol.
If the attachment to an e-mail contains the ‘&’ symbol, it will fail to track in CRM.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/949719
6. Selecting Dismiss on Outlook Calendar reminder for Service Activity causes record to change Status Reason back to default value for that record.
Selecting Dismiss on Outlook Calendar reminder for Service Activity causes record to change Status Reason back to default value for that record
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/950475 (not yet published)
7. OWA Sent Emails Get Stuck in Outlook Draft Folder When Outlook Is Open And CRMADDIN is Enabled
When you have both Outlook and OWA open, and you have the Microsoft Dynamics CRM client for Microsoft Office Outlook installed, and you send an email form OWA, the email will be stopped in the Draft folder instead of being sent. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/950088
8. Microsoft Outlook stops responding when you open, close, reply to, or forward e-mail messages in the Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 client for Outlook
When you normally use Outlook client in Microsoft CRM 4,0 to answer and replying to email, it happens from time to time that the OUTLOOK process crashes, outlook is restarting. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/954800
9. CRM Outlook client and/or Desktop Client hangs in presence of other Outlook add-ins
Outlook hangs and doesn't allow any interaction when BCM or other Addins are present http://support.microsoft.com/kb/952046 (Not yet Published)
10. Phone call activity due time is changed after the activity is snoozed or dismissed.
The scheduled due time of an activity is unexpectedly changed to "12:00 AM" after you specify a snooze time or you dismiss the activity in a reminder in the Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 client for Outlook - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/956720
Smiti Shah
