Can't open or save an attachment in Outlook 2003?

Published Fri, Aug 24 2007 20:54 | steveb

Client of mine uses the Fax Server in Small Business Server 2003 and has all faxes come into a "fax" user account.  One of the users today was telling me how she was unable to open any of the FAX.TIF attachments anymore and has had other co-workers save them as PDF files and send them to her.  Thanks to Live Search... yes, I launched Live Search, not Google, and actually found the answer, can you believe it?  Miracles never cease!  ;-)  Before I was side tracked there by that bit of trivia, I was saying that Live Search pointed me over to the TechNet Forums, yet another amazement for me since I hang out in the newsgroups much more than MS Web forums, well at least up until now.

Check out the thread at http://forums.microsoft.com/TechNet/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=1482593&SiteID=17 and you'll have the answer if you have been reveiving an error along the lines of:

"Can't create file: Right-click the folder you want to create the file in, and then click Properties on the shortcut menu to check your permissions for the folder".

The error I was getting today was "Can't create file: FAX.TIF. Right-click the folder you want to create the file in, and then click Properties on the shortcut menu to check your permissions for the folder".  The forum post is dealing with PDF files so it looks like anything could be an issue.  The fax.tif is interesting because this office has used the fax server with email since SBS 2000 and I have never ran across one of the users getting this error.

Here is the answer in case the forum disapears on us (not sure of what the retention rate of the MS forums are or will be - I'll ask around.  In the meantime:

24 Apr 2007, 1:16 PM UTC
bmdvt90  Posts 3	Answer Re: Can't open or save a pdf attachment in outlook 2003 Was this post helpful ?
	Similar to the previous post, I resolved by doing the following:     1. Open REGEDIT.EXE and go to Edit -> Find... In the Find dialog box type "OutlookSecureTempFolder" without the quotes and locate that registry key.     2. That key will contain the actual folder location, and will look like:        C:\Documents and Settings\%USER_NAME%\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\OLK#\ (where # is a random letter or number)     3. Copy the location of that folder.     4. Click on Start -> Run... and paste the folder location from step #4 then click OK.     5. Windows Explorer will open that folder. Please, delete all files present.     6. Restart Microsoft Outlook and you should be able to open your attachments.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What's even cooler, is that "Netfelix" created a batch file to remove the temp files from user's profiles who are running into this a lot.  Below is what he posted: I've created a batchfile for my users that have run into this problem

del "c:\documents and settings\%username%\local settings\temporary internet files\(OLK folder name)\*.pdf" The OLK foldername can be found in the registry, as stated before, by searching for "OutlookSecureTempFolder"

This was a great way to end the day finding a great and accurate answer, seeing that there is hope after all for Live Search, and that the TechNet Forums had the answer in there while the KB articles were a bit lacking in that they kept referring to long file names.

Filed under: SBS 2003, Outlook

Comments

# dcj2 said on September 27, 2007 9:13 AM:

Been seeing lots of references to this problem while trying to solve it myself. The root cause seems to be file attachments with the same name (eg. if the user always receives messages with attachements named FAX.TIF). The first copy gets written to the OLK folder as "FAX.TIF". The next message stores it as "FAX (1).TIF". The counter increments each time up to "FAX (99).TIF". Once it hits 99, it can't create anymore, so you get the "Cannot create file" message. Yes, just pruging the cache will address the problem, I just thought I'd share some insight into exactly what's happening.

# Vick said on May 7, 2008 8:54 AM:

You are the best. Very helpful.

Thank You!

# locc said on May 16, 2008 12:57 PM:

Is this problem a windows or outlook problem?  Is outlook supposed to remove the file automatically?

# ephraim said on May 29, 2008 12:25 AM:

Thanks for this thread, it really works

# Fraser said on May 29, 2008 9:17 AM:

tryed this and it worked for me too.

# copa said on June 9, 2008 11:46 PM:

thank you very much

# PAGAN said on July 10, 2008 1:04 PM:

AWESOME !

# Scottie said on August 4, 2008 2:00 PM:

Awe---Some.....  Thanks for taking the time to publish the fix

# Mikzey said on August 7, 2008 12:03 PM:

Fantastic post - and I can add to it...

Our symptoms - 1 PDF attachment (could have been any file) refused to open for user A on a PC, but opened fine for user B on same PC.  This particular PDF was a form which was reguarly filled in, saved and sent by various people to this one recipient.

I checked out the Outlook temp folder mentioned above and noticed that exactly 99 iterations of that file were stored there, i.e. the files called:

anyname.pdf

anyname (2).pdf

anyname (3).pdf

all the way to...

anyname (99).pdf

(strangely, no 'anyname (1).pdf')

99 seemed a rather significant number... so I deleted 1x instance and tried to open the file again.

File opened fine...

But guess what happened when I tried to open another email with an attachment of the same name.... yep, got the 'permissions' error.

So I think the story is this: Outlook 2003 can only launch an attachment named 'whatever.whatever' a max of 99 times, because on the 100th attempt it gets confused over file naming (as it has no mechanism to delete the existing temporary files, it needs to be able to name the 100th one 'whatever (100).whatever' - but can't).

Fascinating huh?

But what a dumb error message... if this is still the case in O 2007, they need to fix it.

HTH

# Waleed Elbatat said on September 23, 2008 8:46 AM:

Thanks Mikzey & dcj2 for explaination

# Heero Yui said on November 6, 2008 8:55 AM:

thanks for the great workaround mate. experts exchange has a say on it too but i dont want to give me money for a simple answer (i also dont have money! (^_^) lol!) *** experts-exchange

# Cannot save the attachment. Can’t create file in Outlook. | Shogan.tech said on February 12, 2009 4:14 AM:

Pingback from  Cannot save the attachment. Can’t create file in Outlook. | Shogan.tech

# Can't create file when opening attachments in Microsoft Outlook 2003 | Greg Ellison said on February 26, 2009 5:51 AM:

Pingback from  Can't create file when opening attachments in Microsoft Outlook 2003  | Greg Ellison

# TJ said on February 27, 2009 11:14 AM:

WORK AMAZING THANKS FOR THE FIX

# Roger said on March 5, 2009 4:20 PM:

An easy way to view all the secret OLK folders is to revisit your C drive as a “network share”:

Start, Run: \\yourcomputername\c$

Then simply browse to your temporarily internet folder…

\Documents and Settings\%userprofile%\local settings\temporary internet files\

Now you can view and open any OLK## folders and delete the contents as needed. Turns out Windows forgets to protect the OLK folder if you approach it as a network share. BTW this works across the network to other computers you have admin rights to.

# steveb said on March 5, 2009 5:10 PM:

Thanks Roger for the administrative share idea!

Steve

# Prabhakar said on June 19, 2009 8:46 AM:

This works for me

# AndrewT said on July 9, 2009 2:33 AM:

Good fix

# Frik Brits said on August 5, 2009 6:12 AM:

This also happens if the "My Documnets" drive was changed by ur IT department to drive D: or so.

What u do then is just update the drive letter in that registry variable, restart Outllok and voila u can do what u want with ur attachments again.

# Dave said on August 5, 2009 11:45 AM:

How is it that this fix works for everyone but me? I have changed the location Outlook uses for the "SecureTemp..." folder. I have verified the user has "full control" permissions to the original temporary folder (Temp~Inter~...) and gave the user "full control" of the new location I setup in the registry. And about 2-3 hours after I made the change, the user said it started happening again.

In that amount of time, the user had only opened 3-4 attachments with the same name, so it's not the #99 rule either.

Any thoughts ?

# Ajit Dalvi said on August 11, 2009 7:29 AM:

Thank you very much

# Enrique said on August 12, 2009 9:42 AM:

Thank you very much - Made me look like a Star on the Desktop team ;)

# Travis said on August 20, 2009 12:57 PM:

Thank you for posting this problem and the solution.  It was greatly appreciated

# Jed said on August 31, 2009 5:23 PM:

Awesome. Perfect solution.

# Alison said on September 10, 2009 2:00 PM:

That worked perfectly!  You do have to empty the entire folder, not just the fax.tifs.  I'm just wondering how many times I'm going to have to do this for the user?

# Daniel said on October 14, 2009 6:58 PM:

Worked like a CHARM!

Thanks for the informations

# Heba said on October 15, 2009 2:38 AM:

Thanks, you save me, the error was at my boss laptop and it works fine.

# Eric said on October 22, 2009 4:11 PM:

This works.  Thanks.   Though it is rare to see, it is possible to see it again.  Is there a patch/fix from MS for this issue?

# steveb said on October 22, 2009 4:31 PM:

Hi Eric,

Not that I am aware of.

Steve

# Chip said on October 23, 2009 8:21 AM:

works great. easy awnser and easy solution Tx

# Hagi said on October 26, 2009 1:26 AM:

Thank you so much for posting that helpful tip steve. It help me this morning with one of my clients.

# Kunal said on November 17, 2009 7:31 AM:

Thank you very much. This is great help for me.

# Shadow_Death said on November 24, 2009 10:33 AM:

Tnx men your the great

# Odowman said on December 2, 2009 3:04 PM:

Thank you sooooo much for the insight!.. you put an end to days of frustration.

# Paul S said on December 17, 2009 5:53 PM:

Awesome! Thanks!

# helpme said on January 8, 2010 6:08 AM:

argh every site has this fix but it wont work for me!  any ideas on other fixes?

# Jimbo said on January 14, 2010 2:58 PM:

Awesome,.. worked for me also,.. same attachment reached 99 :(

# Bags said on January 25, 2010 2:29 PM:

I am having the problem in Office2007. I found that when he is looking at the email with the split plane view, he can double click the attachment and it opens. When he double clicks the email into it's own window, then the attachment will not  open. I have changed the reg key to a new folder with no luck.

# karen said on January 26, 2010 8:15 AM:

Great fix!!! Thank you -- this worked for me too.

# Badruddin said on February 3, 2010 9:46 PM:

Really a great solution

# Bob S said on February 11, 2010 1:02 PM:

This solution has worked for me up until the last few days. I have routinely just gone and removed all items from tht temp folder and it worked. Now I remove those items and it is no longer solves the problem. I am still unable to open the documents which have the same name.

# Rich Snow said on February 26, 2010 9:03 AM:

Just a note that this still happens with OL2007.

The delete files trick still works too, but the temporary folder is now a level lower under content.outlook, i.e. c:\Documents and Settings\%username%\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\Content.Outlook\C2YV0H3R

# JerseyShore said on May 25, 2010 11:52 AM:

Excellent! Worked like a charm...I was opening documents for my co-worker for 6 months bc of this same problem. I finally got fed up and found this...whatta relief.

Thanks!

# sandra d said on July 16, 2010 12:33 PM:

excellent how to ... worked flawlessly the first time ... thanks for the help! ...

# Jester said on September 8, 2010 9:38 AM:

Superstar :)

many thanks

# Ahron said on November 14, 2010 10:32 AM:

I used this solution the second time already, thanks for your help!

# Easwar said on December 9, 2010 3:38 AM:

Deleting a temporary files will work for this solution

# Arthur S. said on January 12, 2011 7:22 AM:

You saved my day, great app, fixed the problem of not being ableo to open certain attachment.

# Slagtand said on March 1, 2011 7:51 AM:

Tried folder-rights, save mail adressee-check, saving the attachement. Nothing helped, or seems possible.

Using Outlook 2003 SP3.

However: THE SOLUTION was FOUND in this BLOG

T H A NX

# Colin said on May 25, 2011 8:11 AM:

Worked perfectly.

Thanks  for the help.

# PRB said on June 9, 2011 12:34 PM:

Great fix, thanks a million. Saved me a call into our corporate help(less) desk.

# Eansor said on June 22, 2011 1:57 PM:

Jeez, sometimes the hardest problems have the simplest solutions.  Thanks for this.  I looked at this problem from every angle for some time before I stumbled upon this solution.  I guess you just have to search for the right words.  It worked like a charm.  Who'd a thought?

# Nathan McDOnald said on June 24, 2011 2:42 AM:

Absolute Super-star!

Thanks for the help!

# Saeed said on July 14, 2011 2:13 AM:

Simply Great !

For me deleteting the temp files didnt work either, so I went to the Registry Editor, then in "OutlookSecureTempFolder", in "Value Data" field:

I had replaced the "C:\Documents and Settings\USER_NAME\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\OLK#" thingie by another location on my drive, closed outlook and re opened it.... and it worked perfectly !

Now I can continue my work :)

# HP said on July 29, 2011 3:45 AM:

worked fine for me, thanks

# Kerry said on August 12, 2011 1:04 AM:

Ohmygoodness - THANK YOU SO MUCH!!

# JM said on October 9, 2011 7:22 PM:

i was having the issue where the none of the zip files would open in Outlook 2010 with Win 7 64 bit. Cleaning of the temp file really helped. I wonder why cleaing up the cache files using IE would not clean this?

# vmukhar said on November 9, 2011 4:13 AM:

thanks a lot!

# Mansoor said on November 17, 2011 4:59 PM:

Thanks mate, It works

# Mike Awad said on December 2, 2011 1:38 AM:

In my case, the attachment that Outlook couldn't open always had the same filename: voice-message.wav (since Vonage e-mails me each voicemail message).  Once I went to that OLKE8C9 temp folder and deleted those 98 files -- "voice-message (2).wav" through "voice-message (99).wav" -- everything started working fine again!

# Evans said on December 14, 2011 2:48 AM:

Wow! Worked the 1st time

# Kobus said on February 8, 2012 12:02 PM:

Thanks a lot saved me loads of time

# farhat said on February 15, 2012 1:12 AM:

thanx a lot alot

you fix my problem

# Dinesh said on February 23, 2012 1:07 PM:

Hi this solution is working for other attachments like word,exel, pdf and all. But .Zip are not able to open.

Please assist if u have any solution for this.

email id: Kamathdinesh@sify.com

# Shilpi said on February 28, 2012 5:32 PM:

WOW worked for me as well. Thank you so much

# Amit Kumar Sharma said on March 1, 2012 1:21 AM:

Thanksxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

this x would not end for your helping post.

Thank you!!!!!!!!!!

sharma.aks.amit @ gmail.com

# Ratan Roy said on March 24, 2012 10:52 PM:

Thanks. Awesome solution. It called Tips & tricks.

# Daud said on April 5, 2012 4:40 AM:

THANK YOU SO MUCH....

IT RESOLVED MY PROBLEM.....

God Bless You Dear

# Rick said on April 27, 2012 7:48 AM:

This solution was awesome!  Thanks for sharing it!

# Mark said on June 1, 2012 9:32 AM:

Worked for me - Thank you.

# Murray said on July 24, 2012 4:40 PM:

Another option is to open another email that has an attachment , open that attachment and do a properties.  Copy the location info less filename into windows explorer .  (for win 7 , outlook 2007)

eg C:\Users\name\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.Outlook\VSBWKBWH\

The either locate the offending 99 versions and delete or just delete all the content in this cached area .

Leave a Comment

Name:
Website:

Remember Me?

Enter the numbers above: