Help Center
< All Topics
Print
Updated

Introduction

As part of the migration to Microsoft Teams, email was be moved from an existing Toltech-based Microsoft Exchange email server into the Office 365 Cloud. Advantages include:

  • Reliable, always available cloud-based email, with simpler administration.
  • One login account – all users can use their single Microsoft 365 identity to fully access both email and Teams. Currently users can access Teams but that user is treated as an external user, giving them a more limited Teams experience.
  • Better integration between Teams and Outlook, e.g. channel discussions can more easily published as an email trail in Outlook
  • No need to use Citrix – meaning that users do not have to keep transferring files between their own desktop and the Citrix desktop, or vice-versa. Citrix does give access to Microsoft Office, but the Microsoft subscription that we have (Microsoft Office 365 Premium Business for non-profit organisations) provides free Office licences for the first ten users, whilst additional licences can be purchased for a small monthly fee per user (£.80 per user per month in Oct 2021)

In order to ensure a smooth transition to the cloud-based email solution, all existing Citrix-based Outlook content needed be exported to files which can then be re-imported into the new non-Citrix based Outlook. This document provides instructions on how this was done in case mailboxes need to be transferred in the future.

Instructions

Export of Outlook Items

To export data, follow the instructions below:

  • From within the Citrix-based Outlook session, select File…Open & Export, then click Import/Export.  
  • In the Import and Export Wizard dialog, select the Export to a File option and click Next.
  • In the Export to a File dialog, select Outlook Data File (.pst) and click Next.
  • In the Export Outlook Data File dialog, select the folders that need to be exported. Select the whole mailbox – this is safest as, whilst the resulting may be large, it ensures nothing in the mailbox is lost (and subsets of this file can be selectively re-imported as part of the import process, documented below). Make sure that the Select all Sub Folders option is checked.
  • Select the Inbox folder and click Next. Specify a name for the exported file – it is suggested that a filename of the form FirstNameLastName_FolderName be used, e.g. for John Smith exporting the whole mailbox, the name would be JohnSmith_Mailbox.pst
  • Click Finish. The user will be prompted to protect the file with a password, which is optional. If no password is required, leave the password prompts blank and just click Ok.
Data will be saved to the file. Repeat the above for other folders, e.g. the Sent Items and Contacts folders, remembering to change the name of the file to which data will be saved.

Import of Outlook Items

There are two options to consider:

  1. Opening the saved file so it appears as a separate Outlook folder.
  2. Importing the data into the inbox.

Whichever is used is a matter of personal preference. Option 1 may be preferred to segregate the new email for the historical email and avoid clutter. Important contacts and other emails can then be selectively dragged from the opened folder into the user’s own mailbox. Option 2 imports items into the users existing mailbox.

For option 1, follow these instructions:

  • From the user’s own desktop, confirm that the exported .pst files can be found in C:\Users\Public\Public Documents or to C:\Users\{​​​​myUsername}​​​​\Documents.
  • From within the Outlook 365 session, select File…Open & Export, then click Open Outlook Data File. 
  • Specify the name of the.pst file to open and click Open.
  • There should be a new section in the pane on the left hand side, with a title of Outlook Data File.  Expand this to peruse the contents of the newly opened file.

For option 2, follow these instructions:

  • From the user’s own desktop, confirm that the exported .pst files can be found in C:\Users\Public\Public Documents or to C:\Users\{​​​​myUsername}​​​​\Documents.
  • From within the Outlook 365 session, select File…Open & Export, then click Import/Export. 
  • In the Import a File dialog, select Outlook Data File (.pst) and click Next.
  • In the Import and Export Wizard dialog, select the Import from another program or file option and click Next. In the Import Outlook Data File dialog, specify the name of the.pst file to import. In the options, specify Do not import duplicates. Click Next.
  • The user will now be prompted to specify which folder to import from, By default, the whole mailbox can be imported. However, if the exported file is huge there is a possibility that it contains a lot of clutter. In this case it may be more appropriate to just selectively import the Inbox, Calendar, Sent Items and Contacts folders. Only one folder can be imported at a time (i.e. it is not possible to select both Inbox and Contacts), so the steps will need to be repeated for each folder.
  • Having chosen a folder to import, click Finish. The imported items should appear in the Outlook 365 session.

Note: when replying to any imported message, the origin email address will be the new one, i.e. that of the Outlook session into which data has been imported