Cannot turn on Description Sync about outlookgooglecalendarsync

[fnaleitao]

Yes, for some reason i can't explain, even with manual setup Outlook identifies a msn.com web POP mail account as exchange... Oh well...

[phw198]

Hi @fnaleitao - If you hover over the disabled checkbox, it should tell you that your organisation has blocked access, so certain features are disabled in OGCS.

[fnaleitao]

Hi @fnaleitao - If you hover over the disabled checkbox, it should tell you that your organisation has blocked access, so certain features are disabled in OGCS.

Thanks. But this is a local machine, not in a network or domain. It may be some Win 11 feature/setting that is preventing it or the antivirus but I'm lost here. Where should I start? What's usually preventing this?

[phw198]

It might be a local machine, but the logs show that when Outlook starts, it is trying to communicate with an account that is hosted on Microsoft Exchange - which is very normally managed by corporate IT. But because you are in disconnected mode, OGCS is unable to determine the username associated, which then causes OGCS to restrict its features available.

From your logs:

2024-06-25 12:02:38,007 DEBUG  1 OutlookGoogleCalendarSync.Outlook.OutlookNew [31] -  Setting up Outlook connection.
2024-06-25 12:02:38,018 INFO  1 OutlookGoogleCalendarSync.Outlook.OutlookNew [50] -  Exchange server version: 15.20.7409.37
2024-06-25 12:02:38,018 INFO  1 OutlookGoogleCalendarSync.Outlook.OutlookNew [52] -  Exchange connection mode: olCachedDisconnected
2024-06-25 12:02:38,044 ERROR  1 OutlookGoogleCalendarSync.Exception [29] -  System.Runtime.InteropServices.COMException: We can't complete this because we can't contact the server right now. Please try again later.
2024-06-25 12:03:28,324 WARN  1 OutlookGoogleCalendarSync.Outlook.OutlookNew [255] -  OGCS is unable to obtain CurrentUser from Outlook.
2024-06-25 12:03:31,230 INFO  1 OutlookGoogleCalendarSync.SettingsStore.Calendar [287] -    GAL Blocked: True

However, it looks like you then have OGCS configured to sync with an alternative mailbox which is not on Exchange:-

2024-06-25 12:03:28,324 DEBUG  1 OutlookGoogleCalendarSync.Outlook.OutlookNew [67] -  Get the folders configured in Outlook
2024-06-25 12:03:28,340 DEBUG  1 OutlookGoogleCalendarSync.Outlook.OutlookNew [297] -  Finding Alternative Mailbox calendar folders
2024-06-25 12:03:28,340 DEBUG  1 OutlookGoogleCalendarSync.Outlook.OutlookNew [309] -  Scanning mailbox 'WBT Outlook' for calendars.
2024-06-25 12:03:29,974 DEBUG  1 OutlookGoogleCalendarSync.Outlook.OutlookNew [406] -  Default Calendar folder: Calendar
2024-06-25 12:03:29,987 DEBUG  1 OutlookGoogleCalendarSync.Outlook.OutlookNew [407] -  Folder type: olNotExchange

So, are you able to set Outlook to start with the WBT Outlook mailbox as the default, instead of the unavailable Exchange mailbox? That might provide a workaround for you.

But, I agree, OGCS is coming to the wrong assumption that corporate policy has blocked access on your Exchange mailbox, and then incorrectly restricting functionality on your non-Exchange mailbox. I'll need to have a think about how to resolve that...

[fnaleitao]

Hi,
Thanks, that worked. I was starting outlook with the right account but there was a outlook.com account setup that was wrongly classified as exchange, not very important so I deleted it and it worked. Now I added it again and it seems to be working with several restarts of both apps and the description is still being passed. But at least now I know who is the culprit if this happens again. Thanks for your help!

[phw198]

Ah that's great. I'm rather glad it was a misconfiguration on your side with the account not actually being an Exchange account - I think that means I don't need to worry too much about OGCS incorrectly thinking the account had limited access, when in fact there was no access at all 😉