Change location of Outlook 365 profiles location?

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Level 7

24,131 points

Change location of Outlook 365 profiles location?

I just upgraded from Office 2011 to Office 365. In the process I discovered that Microsoft changed the Outlook Identities to Profiles and, worse, changed the location of Outlook's data folders from ~/Documents/Microsoft User Data to ~/Library/Group Containers/UBF8T346G9.Office/Outlook/Outlook 15 Profiles - which is of, course, on my Mac system HD. I don't want my data there. I have a separate HD for data.

In the past, with Outlook 2011, the default Outlook data location was ~/Documents/Microsoft User Data and by using a symbolic link at that location I was able to store all my Outlook data on my data HD.

Will something similar work for Outlook 365 (aka Outlook 2016)? In other words, if I put a symbolic link to a folder named /Outlook 15 Profiles on my data HD at ~/Library/Group Containers/UBF8T346G9.Office/Outlook/Outlook 15 Profiles on my system HD will I effect the same situation I had with Outlook 2011?

I've done some research so far and haven't found any definitive answer.

ps. I know that even if this works, I'm still going to have to import all my Outlook 2011 messages into Outlook 365 because MS also failed to provide an automatic way for 365 to pick up existing Outlook data.

iMac Line (2012 and Later)

Posted on Jan 11, 2019 7:05 PM

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Answer 1

BDAqua

Level 10

250,253 points

Jan 11, 2019 7:44 PM in response to MartinR

Symlinks should work, but not hard links anymore... & the switch of locations is MacOS fault/requirement, not MS's.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8373306

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Answer 2

MartinR Author

Level 7

24,131 points

Jan 11, 2019 9:03 PM in response to BDAqua

Thanks! That's very interesting information.

I also realized that my description of what I did with Outlook 2011 wasn't correct. In reality all it took was an alias between the default location ~/Documents/Microsoft User Data and a similarly named folder on my data HD. It was only when I moved my Apple Mail folder from ~/Library/Mail to my data HD that I had to build a symbolic link for Apple Mail; I think a symlink was necessary because the original (default) location for Apple Mail data was in the ~/Library folder. (I use Outlook & Apple Mail with different email services for a number of reasons.)

Now all I have to do is figure out the correct symlink for Outlook 365! Wish me luck. If it fails, I'm just going to move all my mail over to Apple Mail (and, yes, I probably should have done that years ago).

I accept that Apple had what it considered good engineering reasons for mail data locations to change to ~Library... - but I really don't want my user data being stored in ~Library for two reasons - 1) cluttering up my system HD and 2) being held in a hidden location.

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Answer 3

BDAqua

Level 10

250,253 points

Jan 11, 2019 9:07 PM in response to MartinR

I can understand.

Alternatively, you could access the User Library folder by selecting "Go" from the Finder menu bar and hold down the "Option" key on your keyboard. This will make the User Library folder accessible directly from the "Go" drop down menu.

Additionally, one can access the User Library folder directly through using the Terminal:Access Spotlight Search by clicking the magnifying glass in the upper right corner of your screen (right side of menu bar)
Type "Terminal"
Once the Terminal window appears, type "open library"
This will open the User Library directly in a Finder window for you!
To permanently show all hidden files:Open Terminal found in Finder > Applications > Utilities
In Terminal, paste the following: defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles YES
Press return
Hold the ‘Option/alt’ key, then right click on the Finder icon in the dock and click Relaunch.

Relaunch Finder by right clicking the Finder Icon whilst holding the ‘Option/alt’ key

This will show all hidden files. To hide them again, follow the same steps but replace the Terminal command with:

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles NO

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Answer 4

MartinR Author

Level 7

24,131 points

Jan 13, 2019 8:32 PM in response to BDAqua

Thanks for the info. I had actually already set my ~/Library to be visible for other reasons.

After considering everything, I ended up deciding to completely remove Office 365 and reinstall Office Mac 2011. It works fine under High Sierra and meets my needs. (And doing so got rid of the annoying "Word could not fire event" error message that started appearing about a year ago after upgrading from Sierra to High Sierra.) I know Office Mac 2011 is 32 bit and it won't run on some future release of macOS, but that day is a long way off for me.

That also gives me time to play with Outlook 365 on another Mac and test how to relocate its data folders without interfering with my primary computer and day-to-day ops.

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Answer 5

MartinR Author

Level 7

24,131 points

Jan 27, 2019 5:24 PM in response to BDAqua

Everything is working fine with Office 2011 Mac on 10.13.6. The reinstall was quick and it even automatically picked up my license file, which remained on my system after I had deleted Office 2011.

On the other hand, after following all the instructions for removing Office 365, there were two Office 365 folders left in ~/Library/Group Containers:

/UBF8T346G9.ms
/UBF8T346G9.OfficeOneDriveSyncIntegration

Neither was mentioned in ANY of the official MS instructions for removing Office 365. I left them alone, figuring it was harmless to let them remain, but I do think they should probably go also.

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