Outlook EAS - Only folders

Problem reported by mark - 6/24/2021 at 11:53 PM

Resolved

I updated to Version: 7845 (Jun 24, 2021). Outlook 365 is syncing with EAS. Since this version in Outlook there are only folders but no mails.

I deleted the account in outlook and created it new. But it is the same error. Only folders but no mails with EAS since this new version 7845

17 Replies

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Gabriele Maoret - SERSIS Replied

6/25/2021 at 3:36 AM

My advice is to use MAPI/EWS with Outlook 2016/2019/365.

It works really a lot better and you don't have to waste an EAS license.

EAS is more suitable to Smartphones.

Gabriele Maoret - Head of SysAdmins at SERSIS Currently manages 6 SmarterMail installations (1 in the cloud for SERSIS which provides services to a few hundred third-party email domains + 5 on-premise for customers who prefer to have their mail server in-house)

Sébastien Riccio Replied

6/25/2021 at 6:56 AM

Well Gabriel, at the same time EAS in outlook works flawlessly with an opensource product like sOGO...

So it's not really an client issue but a server issue.

I'm glad that for once we've not updated right away. It would have been a nightmare having customer report new EAS issues than they already have.

Sébastien Riccio System & Network Admin https://swisscenter.com

Gabriele Maoret - SERSIS Replied

6/25/2021 at 7:37 AM

Hi Sébastien, indeed you are right!!

mine was just a tip to bypass the problem (and maybe to make everything work better)...

Maybe it's because we don't like desktop Outlooks working in EAS and we use only MAPI for that

Employee Replied

6/25/2021 at 12:27 PM

Employee Post

Mark, can you open a support ticket, ensure your EAS logs are set to Detailed, then pass those logs along in the ticket? Thank you. Also, can you list the users that are experiencing this issue in the ticket?

Jay Dubb Replied

6/27/2021 at 5:29 PM

I'm tagging on with a "same here" post. Outlook 2016 (NOT the 365 version) syncing with EAS. Different domains, different users, different machines. Worked fine until the 7845 update. Problem is the same as the original post. Mobile devices work OK. In Outlook, the folder structure syncs, but ALL emails are missing.

Our admin is opening a ticket and sending logs.

mark Replied

6/28/2021 at 10:24 PM

This is the answer from my support ticket:

I am sorry to hear that you are seeing issues with EAS ( ActiveSync ) not syncing any content to your Outlook application.

Unfortunately, EAS is incompatible with Outlook on the desktop. I'm afraid we can no longer support EAS issues related to Outlook on desktop, as Microsoft has ended support for EAS connections to Outlook altogether. You can learn more about Microsoft's deprecation of EAS in Outlook and information on our supported client/protocol connections here:

We do apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. Moving forward we can only support technologies built for their intended and specific purposes. This includes:

EAS for mobile synchronization on iOS and Android as well as the Windows Mail, People, and Calendar apps that ship with Windows 10.
MAPI/EWS for desktop synchronization:
- MAPI for Outlook for Windows.
- EWS for Outlook for Mac, as well as other clients such as eM Client and the native macOS applications for Mail, Contacts, Calendars, Reminders and Notes.
CalDAV, CardDAV, IMAP, and POP3 for virtually all mobile and desktop clients

For users who currently utilize Outlook for Windows, we would encourage a MAPI connection instead. A 30 day trial of the MAPI/EWS add-on can be started in your Licensing settings. If these errors persist on the MAPI connection, we can certainly troubleshoot these problems and get the information in front of our development team for review.

Gabriele Maoret - SERSIS Replied

6/28/2021 at 11:36 PM

From the page at https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2859522/outlook-does-not-support-connections-to-exchange-by-using-activesync.

To me it seems that Microsoft DO SUPPORT EAS in Desktop Outlook if it's connected to server that are not Microsoft Exchange.

So Microsoft has dropped EAS support in Desktop Outlook ONLY IF it's connecting to MS Exchange, but the EAS support it's OK if it's connecting to other servers that aren't MS Exchange.

SmarterMail, clearly, it's not MS Exchange, so Microsoft DO SUPPORT EAS in this case.

Maybe it's SmarterTools that DO NOT support Desktop Outlook with EAS (and this is a perfectly legitimate choice).

In my opinion SmarterTools must be clearer and not blame Microsoft if Desktop Outlook in EAS does not work with SmarterMail (because clearly it is not true that it's Microsoft fault, just read the page that they have linked themselves).

It should probably say "WE (not Microsoft) have decided not to support Desktop Otlook with EAS for connecting with SmarterMail.".

This is a legitimate choice and we cant' blame SmarterToools if they say that.

Thomas Lange Replied

6/29/2021 at 12:43 AM

Hi Robert,

why are you asking Mark for EAS logs and then support just answers "Outlook/Desktop and EAS-protocol" not supported anymore? At least you should have mentioned in your first community-comment that Outlook/Desktop and EAS is not officially supported anymore - but SmarterTools support will take a look and check if there is any workaround for at least basic-support/protocol-usuage.

Due to the fact that at least basic-email and calendar-features were working in pevious SmarterMail builds you should make kind of "legacy / prior-EAS-protocol-version" to support EAS in conjunction with Outlook/Desktop - at least with some "limitations" in functionality. We are running SmarterMail build 7817 and Outlook 2016/Desktop works with EAS-protocol. We did not update to 7845 yet, because it is a really fresh, public stable relase - we do not trust and avoid updating to early (and no SmarterMail downgrade possible in case of issues).

We are using Outlook/Desktop with EAS at some Office/Outlook 2016 (VLSC) installations
and some other employees are on Office 2019 (VLCS) using MAPI-protocol - but in my eyes your MAPI is still in a "beta/testing stage". For production-usuage I would suggest eMClient and EWS-protocol - but some of our employees need the Microsoft Office/Outlook and desktop installations.

Please re-think how you can help Mark, Jay and probably some more SmarterMail users with EAS-protocol and Outlook/Desktop.

Sébastien Riccio Replied

6/29/2021 at 1:40 AM

Yes Gabriele,

We have many Outlook Desktop users that are using flawlessly EAS to connect to some "Mailcow" servers we have (it uses SOGOs built-in implementation of activesync).

Sadly, we only have trouble with EAS desktop when it is used by our customers hosted on SmarterMail.

Kind regards.

Sébastien Riccio System & Network Admin https://swisscenter.com

Rui Silva Replied

6/29/2021 at 5:02 AM

This really annoying because users can always say that works fine before update and there is nothing on release notes that this will happen after the update.

Karl Jones Replied

6/29/2021 at 3:08 PM

I have seen that issue with large mailboxes and also mailboxes with a huge list of folders and sub folders. I am glad i read this thread before i updated to the current release because i have many users on Outlook 2016 EAS and the problem i have is i can't get MAPI to connect via Outlook 2016 in the local domain but it works via EWS from outside the domain. Unless i can fix the MAPI problem looks like i'm stuck on this build from now on.