DAV Is leaving Hotmail as of 1 Sept 2009

[kaptitsky]

Dear Windows Live Hotmail Customer,


You are receiving this note because you have used Microsoft Office Outlook, Outlook Express, or Entourage to view your Windows Live Hotmail®. Microsoft is changing the way these programs access Hotmail e-mail which will require you to take action.

To continue to receive e-mail from your Hotmail account, please select one of the alternative solutions below before September 1, 2009. After this day, new e-mail can only be delivered to your mail programs through the following alternative solutions.

If you use Microsoft Office Outlook to view Hotmail, you can download free Office Outlook Connector to continue accessing your Windows Live Hotmail within Outlook 2003 or 2007. If you're using Outlook 2002, you will need to change the settings on your program to access your Hotmail. Click here to learn more.

If you use Outlook Express to view Hotmail, you can choose to download free Windows Live Mail (recommended) or change the settings on your program to access your Hotmail within Outlook Express. Click here to learn more about your options.

If you use Entourage to view Hotmail, you can change the settings in your program to view your e-mail. Click here to learn more.

Don't know what you're using to view Hotmail? Have more questions? View the FAQ page or visit the Community Forum.

Why is this happening? Outlook, Outlook Express, and Entourage use a legacy communications method (known as the DAV protocol) to access Hotmail. Because the DAV protocol is not optimally suited for programs to access large inboxes such as Hotmail which now provides users ever-growing storage*, new alternatives have been built. Last year, customers asked us to postpone plans to retire the DAV protocol until more options were available. Now that these options (including the POP3 protocol) are available, we are ready to retire the DAV protocol.

Thank you for using Windows Live Hotmail.

0123456789

[David]

I received a similar message today on my WM5 smartphone. The setup of the account (on my phone) was automatic, via the included client. If I set this up as a POP account, it will no longer be possible for me to view (and move messages to) other folders - so, this will be a bit of a downgrade.

[CyberSmurf]

To be honest, I hadn't realized it was still there.
I do agree with David that IMAP would be a better replacement for those still using HTTP.

[chrisretusn]

Yes it's definitely a down grade. Especially if you use Outlook Express, Entourage or an older version of Outlook.

Outlook Express users can install Window Live Mail a replacement for the Outlook Express e-mail client. Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 or Outlook 2003 users can install the Microsoft Office Outlook Connector and maintain the functionality of WebDAV, using DeltaSync Microsoft's propriety replacement for WebDAV.

All other users are SOL. They will have to switch to POP. Unfortunately Window Live Hotmail does not support IMAP. Why should they, they have DeltaSync for there current products

This does not effect users that only access Hotmail via the web.

[DrStrabismus]

I think you're all being unduly negative.

They've switched from one proprietary protocol to another, but they've also added pop support, which opens up access to a wider range of clients through a standards-based protocol. And people retrieving Hotmail into Fastmail, Tuffmail etc, can carry on doing it.

All in all, I think they've behaved abnormally well.

[kaptitsky]

Yes, I guess that there are two ways to look at it.

MS is being much better than they used to be; standards based access and all, even if POP3 is now 13 years old (the standard came out in 1996).

On the other hand, there are so many things MS could do, like the same thing Gmail and AOL did, implementing both POP3 and IMAP4. Heck, they could even make a Thunderbird extension for DeltaSynch.

Is MS acting abnormally well?

Well, considering their history, how could they have acted worse?

[chrisretusn]

Originally Posted by DrStrabismus

I think you're all being unduly negative.

They've switched from one proprietary protocol to another, but they've also added pop support, which opens up access to a wider range of clients through a standards-based protocol. And people retrieving Hotmail into Fastmail, Tuffmail etc, can carry on doing it.

All in all, I think they've behaved abnormally well.

Perhaps, but for Mac users there is no alternative but to switch to POP. For Outlook 2002 and older, it's upgrade or drop to POP. Not fun if you are used to the advantages of WebDAV.

You are correct that it does open it up all clients that support secure POP3/SMTP protocol. If fact that is how I use it with my e-mail client. I used to POP my accounts with FreePOPs, which is the modus operandi for some of those services you mentioned. Now I can drop FreePOPs as it is no longer needed. For me this move was great as I prefer POP3 for all of my accounts anyway and now I have that for all of them.

[war17]

Windows Live Mail has delta sync, which allows us to see all the Hotmail folders.

I also use the email client for Yahoo mail. It has only POP3, but delta sync allows me to sync with all the folders.

[kaptitsky]

Originally Posted by war17

I also use the email client for Yahoo mail. It has only POP3, but delta sync allows me to sync with all the folders.

I have always made the assumption that DeltaSync is required on the server, and that Yahoo does not support DeltaSync access to their mail servers; in fact, they cannot have DeltaSync becase DeltaSync is a proprietary protocol to Microsoft.

It would be great to know how to get access to folders on the Yahoo mail server, especially for Yahoo.com accounts, but for any Yahoo international accounts too.

I have only been able to get local folders for POP3 accounts, not server folders.

Can you tell us how to configure Windows Live Mail to synchronize local folders with a mail Yahoo server?

Thanks!

[war17]

Maybe delta sync is not the correct term. When I configured Yahoo mail in Windows Live Mail, I let WLM auto configured for me. Looks like it configured POP3/SMTP servers, and all the Yahoo folders shows in the client, as a set of Yahoo folders. I can see Junk folder, and after hitting the Sync for Yahoo account, I see the Junk mail. And I can delete emails from Junk folder.

Windows Live Mail is the version that you can download to Windows XP and Vista, not the version that comes with Vista.

[kaptitsky]

Yes, I have the same client.

When I try to configure a Yahoo.com account, it tells me I must have Yahoo Mail Plus, and gives me a URL to buy it.

When I try to configure an international Yahoo account (Yahoo.ca) it sends me to the POP3 config screen where I manually have to fill in the server names.

It then sets up the mailbox -- the lack of a shared in-box for accounts is a big challenge with Windows Mail Live (WLM) -- and does set up a "Junk e-mail" folder.

However it does not mirror the "Spam" folder in Yahoo, which was empty, even as WLM categorized much of my incoming mail as junk.

In short, WLM seems to treat Yahoo the same as any other POP3 provider, with no synchronization.

Is this the same as you see? If you create a folder in WLM is it mirrored when you go to Yahoo Webmail? Are "all the folders" synchronized?

[war17]

Originally Posted by kaptitsky

Yes, I have the same client.

When I try to configure a Yahoo.com account, it tells me I must have Yahoo Mail Plus, and gives me a URL to buy it.

I see the URL, but I continue and Yahoo sets up the account automatically, assuming I have Yahoo Mail Plus. (POP3 access is free now).

When I try to configure an international Yahoo account (Yahoo.ca) it sends me to the POP3 config screen where I manually have to fill in the server names.

International account is set up automatically also. I have Yahoo China. Standard server pop.mail.yahoo.com works in Yahoo China account.

It then sets up the mailbox -- the lack of a shared in-box for accounts is a big challenge with Windows Mail Live (WLM) -- and does set up a "Junk e-mail" folder.

However it does not mirror the "Spam" folder in Yahoo, which was empty, even as WLM categorized much of my incoming mail as junk.

I just checked my webmail, there is a spam mail in Junk folder. Then II checked WLM. The spam appears in Junk folder there. it seems all Junk emails are in Inbox, then move to Junk folder when application opens. So this is a type of synching, at least for Junk folder.

In short, WLM seems to treat Yahoo the same as any other POP3 provider, with no synchronization.

Is this the same as you see? If you create a folder in WLM is it mirrored when you go to Yahoo Webmail? Are "all the folders" synchronized?

I tried uploading an email from another account in WLM to Inbox of Yahoo. That email is not mirrored in webmail. So there is no sync back to server.

[kaptitsky]

Originally Posted by war17

I tried uploading an email from another account in WLM to Inbox of Yahoo. That email is not mirrored in webmail. So there is no sync back to server.

So, Windows Live Mail does not synch all folders on Yahoo, but rather just treats Yahoo as any other POP3 account.

And, as I noted in another thread, Yahoo has not enabled POP3 for all Yahoo.com accounts; I know it isn't enabled in mine. Maybe it's coming, but not yet, and there has not been any announcement.

[beq]

Originally Posted by war17

I just checked my webmail, there is a spam mail in Junk folder. Then II checked WLM. The spam appears in Junk folder there. it seems all Junk emails are in Inbox, then move to Junk folder when application opens. So this is a type of synching, at least for Junk folder.

I'm guessing you have your Yahoo Mail (Plus/Business) account set to POP download all messages including spam, and WLM is able to automatically recognize the spam and file them in its own Junk folder (either by noticing a [Bulk] prefix on the Subject line, or noticing the Yahoo SpamGuard headers in the message, or just by catching the same spam via the program's own antispam algorithms).

For real Yahoo IMAP, you'll have to use the Zimbra Desktop client or one of the supported mobile phone clients such as on the iPhone. Or wait until other mail clients (hopefully) add unofficial Yahoo IMAP support as well (perhaps YippieMove will contribute its findings to the open-source public).

[d4rkn1ght]

WebDAV is officially dead. I don't get what's the deal with them supporting IMAP.