Outlook.com now has IMAP

http://blogs.office.com/b/microsoft-outlook/archive/2013/09/12/outlook-com-now-with-imap.aspx

by graublau • 13 years ago

145 102 13 years ago

blogs.office.com

busterc• 13 years ago

Learn how to setup Outlook.com for custom domain free email hosting http://www.blogsynthesis.com/setup-microsoft-outlook-custom-... as posted here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6375844

rschmitty2• 13 years ago

Does anyone know if this would allow you to use outlook.com with Outlook (on the desktop) and send mail from your domain without the "on behalf of" message?

Previously if you used outlook.com with Outlook for desktop you had to use the Hotmail connector. Sending emails to others they would see from you@outlook.com on behalf of you@yourdomain.com

flog• 13 years ago

Yeah, I'm using my person domain with Outlook.com since Google started charging for Apps. It's working quite well, good enough for a single user at least... My only hang up had been lack of imap, but now we're all good!

harrytuttle5• 13 years ago

Actually on behalf of is correct. If you know about DKIM and SPF then you'll work out what an arse pain all this is.

fekberg• 13 years ago

Yes, you can do that. If you login to your outlook.com account, go into settings then "Your email accounts". Here you can add send only accounts with custom SMTP just as with gmail this removes on behalf of. I've setup my desktop outlook client to use my Outlook.com address but when the message is sent by Outlook.com it uses my own domain and no "On Behalf Of".

Hope that helps..

rschmitty2• 13 years ago

Thanks! completely forgot that was my problem with the old Hotmail connector, you couldnt set a specific SMTP

Derp :)

Pxtl3• 13 years ago

I can't keep track of all the MS rebranding - is Outlook.com the same as Mail.Live.com, which used to be Hotmail.com?

(random aside about Microsoft's rebranding - if you want to get to the photo gallery associated with your Live.com account, you have to go to SkyDrive, because if you search for Live Photo you get the Windows 7/8 desktop application)

cbhl2• 13 years ago

Yes.

sitharus3• 13 years ago

The Microsoft services are becoming a very tempting alternative to Google Apps.

Mostly I'm getting sick of Google randomly dropping services I use and re-designing every 3 months.

I was looking at fastmail.fm for my mail hosting, but now I'll have to check out outlook.com as well.

larrik2• 13 years ago

Whenever I think Microsoft's online offerings look good, I remember this article:

http://wmpoweruser.com/watch-what-you-store-on-skydriveyou-m...

Of course, the NSA revelations make it hardly matter anyway.

devx• 13 years ago

You don't need to go that far back in time:

Microsoft helped the NSA to circumvent its encryption to address concerns that the agency would be unable to intercept web chats on the new Outlook.com portal;

The agency already had pre-encryption stage access to email on Outlook.com, including Hotmail;

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/11/microsoft-nsa-c...

Pxtl3• 13 years ago

... thanks for the heads up. I was actually starting to like SkyDrive after I got a free winphone and started using the MS ecosystem.

Now, knowing that MS is prone to shutting down the whole account for perceived infractions? I have family photos that aren't backed up anywhere else there. That's not cool.

Honestly, even if this policy was reserved for kiddy-porn and crack-dealers, the "boom your stuff is gone no review no discussion" approach to it means the possibility of a false-positive is scary.

sitharus3• 13 years ago

At least that reduces my options back to one again! I hadn't seen that before, thanks.

napoleond• 13 years ago

Use PGP. With your existing email address, and without the fuss: https://parley.co (I'm one of the people building it, and now that outlook.com supports IMAP, we support outlook.com ;)

obituary_latte3• 13 years ago

I haven't used Google Apps beyond a little testing, but our small shop did move to outlook.com (office365) about a year ago. Main selling points were archiving/litigation hold, included licenses for Office, and the familiarity of clients with the Microsoft name.

The experience has been as I expected it would be: quite painful. We have not gone an entire month without service disruption. There have been problems with the service getting blacklisted. Support is, well, Microsoft support -- untimely, disconnected, uncaring, and when phones are involved very difficult to understand.

Anecdotal, sure, but according to the various forum/community postings I've come across trying to resolve various issues, not uncommon.

Caveat emptor.

edit: turns out what I was talking about (office365) and what the OP is talking about (outlook.com) aren't the same thing. Apologies.

sitharus3• 13 years ago

My work also uses office365, but I don't recall too many problems with it. There were some migration troubles, but not as bad as our previous setup.

However, we do have 500+ employees and are a large business for the country we're located in, so probably have a bit of weight when it comes to getting support.

harrytuttle5• 13 years ago

Office 365 support has been ok to us so far (unlike partner support which is shit). Had a couple of hours here and there down but compared to the cost of self-hosting exchange, it's pretty damn good.

footpath2• 13 years ago

I thought that the mail hosting package that comes with Office 365 is called Exchange Online? It uses Outlook Web App for webmail access and is a totally different thing from the free Outlook.com.

criley23• 13 years ago

For what it's worth, we use Google Apps for Business at my workplace and our experience has been every bit as bad as yours with Outlook.

Amusingly, our Google services were once again down this morning, making it the second disruption we've had in the month of September.

And let's not even begin to discuss the abysmal multiple account support Google has, especially surrounding their mandatory-to-join G+ nonsense.

There is no decent support. Period. Google shits on support. We all know Google has a well known disdain for support. GAE is no exception. If you cannot find help in old Google Group pages, you will not get help...

Also, here's a kicker:

Google does it's best to enforce Google+ accounts on Enterprise Accounts.

So our employees are all but forced into a PUBLIC social network for our PRIVATE accounts, and because of how much mandatory integration there is with G+, we lose a lot of Google Apps functionality without having G+ accounts. We can't even use Hangouts without a Google+ account, a requirement I found disgusting and offensive.

It sucks to hear that Office365 isn't any better because I have been nothing but let down and disgusted with Google Apps for Business.

djim• 13 years ago

These IMAP integrations, like TripIt & Slice, have been a part of Gmail for a long time now (since Gmail has supported IMAP for years). This is Microsoft playing catch-up. But yea, I hear you..

cheez• 13 years ago

fastmail is great. Their UI is so easy to use when you need to use it (I use IMAP).

pathikrit• 13 years ago

I opened my pathikritbhowmick@msn.com email address in 1997. They then rebranded it to hotmail.com, then to live.com, then to windowslive.com, then back to live.com and then to outlook.com. I still sign-on to my email using my @msn.com...

Pxtl3• 13 years ago

Whoever succeeds Ballmer is going to have to take a long hard look at their strategic marketing team. Seriously, MS has ADD or something.

jaredmcateer• 13 years ago

I suspect it's not ADD, it's reactionary decisions made from lack of or improperly interpreted data.

panacea• 13 years ago

@mac.com @me.com @icloud.com

da_n• 13 years ago

-- Sent from my MacBook Pro

ejdyksen• 13 years ago

Interestingly, it looks like they used their AMA on Reddit specifically to announce this [1].

Kind of a neat idea.

    1) Implement a long-requested feature.
    2) Do AMA on Reddit and wait for inevitable "when are we getting {feature}?"
    3) Answer with "right now!"

[1] http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1m926j/we_are_the_outl...

coob• 13 years ago

All of their service partners (unroll.me/context.io etc) replying with comments announcing their new support for Outlook looks like quite the bit of pre-planned marketing work.

vowelless• 13 years ago

As others on that page have noted, it is a little suspicious that /u/falconer didn't post anything for 2 years before posting the question about IMAP.

Does indeed look at like a marketing ploy. Nothing wrong with that.

arbitrage• 13 years ago

ooooh, is it time to play internet detective? 'cause reddit has such a stellar history guessing the real motives of people.

with the absence of any other information at all, this user must certainly be a shill. the logic checks out.

eli• 13 years ago

It's not hard for me to imagine a person normally not interested in Reddit, but who feels very strongly about non-proprietary email systems.

rcb• 13 years ago

Nearly a year ago I posted a positive comment on HN about Windows 8, and was then accused (by TWO individuals) of astroturfing.

The anti-M$ hate & paranoia that HN seems to have inherited from /. seems so beyond antiquated in this day and age.

On topic: This is great news. Congratulations to MS.

johnchristopher4• 13 years ago

I have a user account on the ubuntu forums that I haven't used in 6 or 7 years. Some weeks ago I posted a question about a specific software upgrade problem in the forums and realized I had never posted there. So there goes my one post for a ~9 years-old account.

Of course, as usual and as expected, I found out the answer 2 minutes after posting my question.

edit: it's 9 years-old account.

notatoad• 13 years ago

Of course it's a marketing ploy, that's what r/iama is. it doesn't have to be a conspiracy as well. as the microsoft guy says, "it wouldn't be an ama without an IMAP question." if falconer hadn't asked it, somebody else would have.

ryanburk• 13 years ago

if you look at this ama as well as past ama's the hotmail / outlook team have done, you'll see you don't need to plant someone to ask "hey M$, why u no ship IMAP??!?!". it was the #1 question / request the team had from this audience.

rsynnott2• 13 years ago

Does indeed look at like a marketing ploy. Nothing wrong with that.

Marketing via astroturfing (fake public engagement) is at best unethical, and often illegal.

sepbot• 13 years ago

That is very interesting. For anyone who might care they have done AMAs in the past.

There might more, but it is hard to tell with the poor search implementation on reddit.com.

Seems that their original stance on IMAP was and I quote "we’ve made the decision and we’re sticking to it" [1], while a year later this was changed to "... we’ll support IMAP for Outlook sometime down the line" [2].

[1] http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/xgjrw/we_are_the_team_...

[2] http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/ej32l/we_are_the_hotma...

Aldo_MX• 13 years ago

Microsoft criticizes how Google scans your mail to provide you with targeted ads, yet they are promoting the following service which is arguably similar:

Sift makes it easier than ever to find the products you're already interested in. It uses existing shopping content in your Outlook.com account to discover your favorite stores and products, then creates a personalized shopping experience.

isaacb• 13 years ago

The only difference is that they brand it as a feature rather than something you have to put up with in exchange for a free service.

HelloMcFly• 13 years ago

I feel there is a very important difference between Google automatically scanning all of my emails, and Microsoft pointing out that a third-party service allows you to choose to have your inbox scanned now functions with Outlook.com.

mc322• 13 years ago

IIRC, MS scan "to:" "from:" and "subject:" but not "content" whereas Google, they claim, does scan content.

samspenc• 13 years ago

"With today's announcement, we now have a richer email experience across devices and apps, including those not using EAS, such as Mac Mail and Thunderbird on a Mac."

LOL, they made sure to avoid mentioning Mail on Android...

adrianlmm• 13 years ago

Freaking awesome, thank you MS.

zokier• 13 years ago

Wait, one of the biggest mail providers (that did a relaunch not so long time ago) did not have IMAP until now?!

jessaustin• 13 years ago

They're on the bleeding edge now!

broodbucket• 13 years ago

The technology just wasn't there yet.

pjc50• 13 years ago

Not having IMAP was presumably part of a lockin strategy. I think they may now have realised that it's possible to lock yourself on the wrong side of a door.

rheide• 13 years ago

So far Microsoft is doing everything right with Outlook. If I didn't already have a gmail address I would easily prefer Outlook over gmail.

outside1234• 13 years ago

you can redirect it to Outlook. :)

randomhunt• 13 years ago

Sorry for butting in but I've recently done this, the new Gmail compose "experience" was the final straw.

I'm happy - the only thing that is a bit weird is I'll sometimes get spam mails duplicated arriving at my outlook.com address. Never with "normal" mails only the obvious spam.

Does anyone know of an easy way to extract all my mails from Gmail? I'd like to dump them in the filesystem and then kill my Google account.

anonymfus• 13 years ago

Still "password can't be longer than 16 characters".

mvip• 13 years ago

Yay! We have now finally been able to add support for Hotmail in YippieMove[1]. It has been one of the most popular feature requests since we launched back in '08.

[1] http://www.yippiemove.com

talles• 13 years ago

Finally.

footpath2• 13 years ago

Looks like it's still not possible to send from alias addresses with the provided SMTP server.

Outlook.com allows users to have up to 10 different alias email addresses, and the users can send emails using any of those alias addresses provided that they are sending from the desktop website of Outlook.com or the Windows 8 Mail app. However, users can only send from one of their alias addresses if users set up their Outlook.com account on any other mail client, whether using POP, IMAP, or EAS. That includes the official Outlook.com app for Android[1] and the desktop Outlook 2013 client[2], plus Thunderbird and other desktop mail clients[3].

I do hope that this issue gets addressed in the near future.

[1] http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windowslive/forum/mail-sy...

[2] http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/office/forum/office_2013_...

[3] http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windowslive/forum/mail-em...

philfreo• 13 years ago

It didn't before? Well in that case I can report that Close.io <http://close.io/> now supports full 2 way email integration with Outlook.com.

sergiosgc2• 13 years ago

Amazing how they paint EAS as a better protocol than the "older" IMAP. EAS is a beast of a protocol. Just go to the protocol page at Microsoft[1] to get scared. The list of sub protocols and data formats is terrifying! This, compared to a protocol for which the basic session can be taught in five minutes tells a lot about the quality of both protocols.

Simplicity follows good engineering. EAS is way more complex than necessary.

[1] http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc425499%28v=EXCHG.%...

guardian5x• 13 years ago

Of course its more complex. EAS includes a lot more than the IMAP protocol, e.g. Contacts, Calendar, Tasks, Documents support.

sergiosgc2• 13 years ago

Can you point me to an online sample session, equivalent to this: http://coewww.rutgers.edu/www1/linuxclass2010/lessons/Email/...

My point stands. EAS is not just extensive it is needlessly complex.

mattmanser• 13 years ago

I've actually used IMAP.

It's horrible for many, many reasons. It is really quite an insane protocol. Mainly because it was ambiguous about so many key commands, what order they should be run in, the side effects, etc.. I picked up an app someone had written which originally only unsupported Outlook 2003(?), Outlook 2007 behaved differently to that, which behaved differently to Thunderbird, which behaved differently to Lotus Notes. Outlook 2007 even was even using a short to store ID, which I believe wasn't a unique ID and could change between sessions, so you had to search again for the message if you'd been disconnected. All because the protocol was just 'yeah, do something like this'.

There's a reason why IMAP was so ropey in many mail clients.

I have no idea about EAS, but let's not pretend IMAP is good.

skeoh• 13 years ago

Reposting the configuration settings:

    Incoming IMAP
        Server: imap-mail.outlook.com
        Server port: 993
        Encryption: SSL
    Outgoing SMTP
        Server: smtp-mail.outlook.com
        Server port: 587
        Encryption:  TLS

For anyone on Android having trouble setting up the outgoing SMTP settings on their mail account like I was: set the security type to STARTTLS instead of SSL/TLS.

robmueller• 13 years ago

I really wish companies would get SSL vs TLS vs STARTTLS right. I wrote about this on our blog a while back and ended up turning it into a help page because people still seem to get confused.

https://www.fastmail.fm/help/technology_ssl_vs_tls_starttls....

corford• 13 years ago

Would be nice if they could spread some of this new found IMAP love to Outlook proper. Last time I checked, support for it is still fairly half hearted :(

a__remie• 13 years ago

finally, welcome in the 21st century.

josteink• 13 years ago

You could certainly say that was about time.

On the flip side, I always thought they held back on IMAP-support for political reasons. If whatever political momentum which stalled this obviously missing feature is gone from Microsoft, that's probably a good thing which may have more positive effects down the road.

johnchristopher4• 13 years ago

Funny how rebranding goes. When I use Apple Mail auto-detect (on snow leopard) account function it gives me some live.com IMAP parameters.

izietto• 13 years ago

The news is it didn't have it before :P

Sami_Lehtinen• 13 years ago

I wish they would also have starttls support. I also don't wan't smtp or imap support at all. I want only smtps and imaps support. By not supporting insecure protocols at all, you can avoid huge possibility of insecure misconfiguration.

Outlook.com now has IMAP

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