Outlook 2010 autocomplete

[GRoston]

All,

For Outlook 2010 running under Windows 7

According to some reading (and local machine searching), Outlook 2010 no longer uses .NK2 to store autocomplete email address. From what I have read, these are stored in a folder called Suggested Contacts. I just reinstalled Windows (will explain why later this week) and would really like to bring over the list of suggested contacts. Anyone have any ideas how to do this?

 

[tw33k]

All,

For Outlook 2010 running under Windows 7

According to some reading (and local machine searching), Outlook 2010 no longer uses .NK2 to store autocomplete email address. From what I have read, these are stored in a folder called Suggested Contacts. I just reinstalled Windows (will explain why later this week) and would really like to bring over the list of suggested contacts. Anyone have any ideas how to do this?

Your .NK2 file will be imported into suggested contacts when you upgrade to Outlook 2010.

edit: I just realised that you have reinstalled Windows. Have you also reinstalled Office 2007 yet?

 

[GRoston]

tw33k:

You are correct! I assumed that something had to be done because there was nothing showing in the Suggested Contacts folder. However, when I started typing an email address, it did autocomplete.

 

[SlayerZA]

Easy way to get AutoComplete to work in Outlook 2010:
1. Create new Email Message
2. Add ALL your contacts in the To: box
3. Close and discard the new Email Message.

Test:
1. Create new EMail Message
2. Type any letter of known email addresses in your Contacts list...see, tokd you so!.

 

[jakars11]

@SlayerZA,
Your solution works fine until you close Outlook. When you reopen..doesn't work anymore. Any idea how to make the changes stick?

 

[artsilva]

To have the autocomplete working its magic :
Create a new email.
Select all your contacts (from TO
-- the trick: Disconnect your Internet connection..
Send the email
(because you don't have internet access, the email is going to sit on the Outgoing folder)
Close Outlook
Open Outlook
delete the email that was sitting on the Outgoing folder
Close outlook
Get the internet connection active again
Back to Outlook and Voila!!! The autocomplete is working for all your contacts

 

[itdcven]

@artsilva
Great.

i have applied the suggestion on 3 of the laptops running outlook 2010 and they have been fine for the past 3 days.

Thank you.

 

[pepe1782]

My issue is that the auto complete cache seems to be clearing itself everytime I shutdown Outlook. The trick where you add all contacts to an email to repopulate the auto complete works fine until I shutdown/restart Outlook - then I'm back to having no names coming up in autocomplete.

Outlook 2010 / Exchange Server (not sure which version)
Win7 Pro 32bit

Any idea on how to prevent Outlook from emptying/resetting the cache for autocomplete every time it restarts?

 

[pepe1782]

Thanks, Takenaback.

1. "Then I downloaded NK2Edit and that rectified the problem." That step isn't very specific - what do I need to do after I download it? I'm using Outlook 2010 on Win7 32/Pro with an Exchange account. I searched my computer for an NK2 file but there were none.

2. I tried running scanpst.exe (Prog Files\Microsoft Office\Office14), but all it did was ask me to find the file I wanted to scan. What is the file I want to scan? I tried making it scan my Stream_Autocomplete file, but it wouldn't scan it. I got an error that said "The Microsoft Outlook Inbox repair tool does not recognize the file".

 

[pepe1782]

Update:

Disregard my past post, I figured out how to use NK2 Edit to work for me to FIX THE PROBLEM! Here's a detailed rundown of how I did it:


The "official" suggested fix from Microsoft (see #3 in Failed Attempts) didn't work for me, but after more research I found a way to solve the problem. It's a lot of work, and it drives me nuts that I have to spend about two days to research and fix a problem that shouldn't exist in the first place, but I've spend a lot of time typing up a description of what I did. Hopefully this will be of use to other people who are having trouble!

The first section of this post covers the things I tried to fix the problem that didn't work. The second (middle) section covers a detailed process to follow that did work (for me). The final section includes some additional tips. I'm running Windows 7 Pro, 32bit, Outlook 2010.

===================================
SECTION 1 - FAILED ATTEMPTS
===================================

After two days worth of research regarding Outlook clearing its auto-complete cache at shutdown, here's what I've learned in a nutshell:

1. The problem file appears to be in C:\Users\USERFOLDER\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook\RoamCache, and they're called Stream_Autocomplete###.dat. I would assume that at any time there should only be one of these stream_AC files, but at times I've seen two of them. Not sure why.

2. Multiple suggestions I've read include running a scanpst.exe file, which is located in C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office14. The tool asks for a file to scan (to try to fix) - and I didn't know what file to select. I tried selecting the stream_autocomplete file, but the tool didn't know what to do with that type of file.

3. Another suggestion involved renaming the RoamCache folder. I tried this, and it didn't work. I renamed it to RoamCache2, and when I started Outlook back up it automatically just created a new RoamCache folder. This did not fix the problem, all it did was leave me with two RoamCache folders.

4. Another suggestion involved downloading MicrosoftFixit50584.MSI directly from Microsoft (do a Google search for it if you want to find the file). This is one of those "Automatic Fix It" programs. It's designed to take an NK2 file from a pre-2010 version of Outlook, and importa that file into Outlook 2010 for you. However, this tool on its own did nothing for me because I never had an NK2 file to begin with. Also, you'll see farther down that this tool shouldn't be necessary anyway since NK2 Edit software can convert NK2 files into DAT files for you.

5. The most common fix I found for this problem was to simply create a new message, then add ALL contacts in the To: (or CC/BCC) fields of the email. Then you can save the email as a draft, and when you open a new message your auto-complete list is back. This did work, but only temporarily. As soon as I would shutdown and restart Outlook, the auto-complete list was completely gone again.

===================================
SECTION 2 - SUCCESS
===================================

The suggestion that DID work for me involved downloading software called NK2 EDIT. I believe Outlook versions prior to 2010 used a data file with the NK2 extension to store auto-complete cache info. OL 2010 does not use this type of file, it uses the Stream_Autocomplete###.dat file instead. NK2 EDIT software (free) works with BOTH TYPES of files and can easily convert either type to the other.

Before attempting to fix the problem, I first made sure my contacts were updated - this is important if you want to have a good list of auto-complete contacts. IT IS IMPORTANT TO NOTE that the auto-complete contacts that appear when typing in addresses ARE NOT POPULATED AUTOMATICALLY BY OUTLOOK FROM YOUR CONTACTS/ADDRESS BOOK(S). Outlook is supposed to automatically create auto-complete addressed based on who you send emails to - not simply by whether or not they exist in your addressbook. Here is a run down of how I fixed the problem using NK2 Edit:

1. Open the address book for Outlook and organize and cleanup all contacts in all address books. Make sure that anyone you want to appear in the auto-complete is IN THE ADDRESS BOOK.
2. Close Outlook and open NK2 Edit. Open/Start a NEW NK2 file.
3. Go to Action > Add Records from Address Book
4. Select all of the contacts that you want to appear in the auto-complete list. This shouldn't necessarily be all of your contacts! (For example, if you have five contacts named John, but four of them you haven't emailed in a few years and the other one you email every day -- you should probably only add the one that you email every day. Otherwise, every time you start to type his name in the To: field, you'll have to select the right John out of a list of five.)
5. Once the list is complete, SAVE the list as an NK2 file with a name that makes sense for future reference, such as "Outlook 2010 Auto-Complete Cache File, created in NK2Edit, 2011.11.17". This file will serve as a backup in case the cache file ever becomes corrupted again.
6. Now for getting this file to play nicely with Outlook! First make sure Outlook is NOT running. Then, go to: File > Save As. Browse to the C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook\RoamCache folder and OVERWRITE the existing Stream_Autocomplete###.DAT file. To do this you'll have to use the drop-down box under the file name box to change the file type from NK2 to DAT.
7. Close NK2 Edit, and open Outlook. Verify that the auto-complete list now matches the list you created in NK2 Edit by typing a few email address into a new email message.

===================================
SECTION 3 - FUTURE TIPS
===================================

Going forward, a few tips:
1. As you make changes to the auto-complete list, remember to save updated copies of the NK2 (or DAT) file that you update using NK2Edit (see step #5 above in Section 2).
2. In Outlook, once an auto-complete name pops up, it has a black X to the right of it. Clicking the X will remove that name from the auto-complete cache, but not from your contacts. However, the only way I'm aware of to add it BACK to the auto-complete list is to manually add it back to the NK2 file using the NK2Edit software.
3. To keep your auto-complete list useful, you might want to enable the option for Outlook to automatically create contacts by putting them in the "Suggested Contacts" address book. (Outlook 2010 > File > Options > Contacts > Check the box for "Automatically create Outlook contacts...." > Click OK. Then, as often as you like, you can run NK2Edit and ADD the contacts from Suggested Contacts to your existing NK2/DAT file.

==============
==============

I hope this helps some people. At the very least, I hope it helps others to understand the problem better. If you have any additional tips/comments/questions feel free to comment here and I'll do my best to write back!

 

[scottybarr1980]

@artsilva I could kiss you right now for the autofill email thing

Thanks for helping with that, you have no idea how long I took to figure this out and I have been a technician for 4 years.

 

[tbone310]

I thought I would contribute my notes to this forum and hope it helps.

what worked for me.

1. I used a tool called spambully to extract all the addreses in the sent items folder. this added the emails to the white list which was exportable.

2. clear the auto complete list. your "auto_stream" file should be gone.

3. restart outlook

4. add the emaill addresses to a new email, set the delivery delay to a future date and send.

5. wait until you have seen the "Auto_Stream" rebuilt before restarting outlook.

There seems to be a limit on how much data "auto_complete" can store. 1000-1100 or so. thats why I used the Spambully tool to only get the most recently sent email addresses.

Microsoft doesnt really have a solution for this other than empty the auto fill and re-add email addresses. They did us a tool MFC??? something or another. but that did help much.

I was asked to try this by MS Support.....
• File |Options | Mail |uncheck “Automatic name checking” and
“Use Auto-Complete List to suggest names when typing in the To, Cç and Bcc lines “and hit the “Empty Auto-Complete List button and restart outlook

• Again go to File |Options | Mail |checked “Automatic name checking” and
“Use Auto-Complete List to suggest names when typing in the To, Cç and Bcc lines “and restarted outlook

Repeated the same procedure 2 more times in the same sequence
Then go to the Address book select all the Email
Send the email to all those address using delay delivery and rebuilt the Autocomplete


Other notes to micosoft support................

If you empty the auto complete, the steam file will disappear. When you add email addresses back in, you must leave outlook open so the file can rebuild. If you close outlook before this is rebuilt and visible the file will never create.

I cannot determine the actual number of email addresses that auto complete can store but there is a limit. I can add 1057, wait for the file to rebuild, then add another 1000, it will only store a portion (maybe 900) of the newly added email addresses and it will delete/overwrite (maybe 251) from the previous loading.

The file size (auto stream) seems to be anywhere from 1052k and 1083k. I cannot find a relationship between file size, email address length and total number of addresses.

I hope this helps. There really should be a tool to rebuild this function. There are many, many users whom rely on the auto complete functionality.

 

[ktirvine]

@artsilva - thank you so much. This worked for me

 

[1fzj80]

If you have your old "stream_autocomplete.xxx.dat" file from a backup or working system, you can use this file to migrate onto a new system.

I got a new computer and had the old files in the RaomCache directory as mentioned above. I installed Win7 x64 with Office 2010 on the new system. I exported the email, calandar, contacts, etc. via .pst file on the old system and imported this file on the new system. Now everything is up and running but without any autocomplete entries.

I sent one email and shut down Outlook. This creates the "stream_autocomplete.xxx.dat" file in the RoamCache directory.

1. Now, rename this newly created file in the new computer by replacing "dat" to "old".
2. Copy into this RoamCache directory your 'stream_autocomplete..." file from your backup copy or old computer.
3. Copy the hex digits in the file you just named "old" and paste these digits into the backup file with the extension ".dat". make sure to keep the same naming format.
4. Open Outlook and now you have your autocomplete function with your previous contacts.