XCLN: Names of Mailbox Folders Appear in Different Languages

Names of standard folders in an Exchange mailbox, such as the Inbox, Sent Items, Public Folders, and so on, appear in different languages when seen from the client program.

Most of the standard folders seen from the client are stored on the server, but they are initially created and named by the first client to access the corresponding mailbox after it is created. Thus, if the first client you use to access a new mailbox is a French client, standard folders like the Inbox or Sent Items are given French names. After a folder is named, it retains that name unless you explicitly change it from the client. So if a client in a different language subsequently is used to access the mailbox, these standard folders still retain names in the language used by the client that created them. This does not affect functionality, but it may be somewhat confusing in appearance.

Additionally, some folders are on the server (for example, all of the server mailbox folders). Others may be in a local .pst file, and still others are "virtual" folders that have no real existence (such as the Public Folders folder, which simply serves as a tree node for the public- folder tree of the organization). The server folders have names in the language of the client that first created them. Similarly, the .pst folders have names in the language of the client that created them (which may have been a different client from the one that created the server folders). Finally, the virtual folders always have names in the language of the client that is currently displaying them (because they have no existence independent of the client program). The net result is that you may see standard folders with names in a variety of languages, if clients in different languages have been used to access the mailbox or any .psts.

Again, none of this affects functionality, and you may change the names of the folders at any time. The problem is only aesthetic.

The names of the folders can be changed at any time, at your discretion, from your client program.

Some clients (for example, Outlook 2000 or older) do not allow the names of certain standard folders (for example, the Inbox) to be changed, but this is a client restriction and not an intrinsic limitation of Exchange. In these cases, you must use a different client (such as the older Exchange client) to modify the folder names.

Outlook 2002 clients can run a command line switch to rename the default folders to the language of the client. To do this, click Start, click Run, and then type Outlook.exe /resetfoldernames. Outlook will start normally and the default folder names will be in the language of the client.

With Outlook 2002 and the CIW or CMW you might want to reset folder names for all users when you deploy Outlook to synchronize users' folder names to the User Interface Language of their version of Outlook. This could be useful, for example, if a corporate-wide process has initialized new mailboxes before new users have started Outlook for the first time. In this case, the mailboxes will end up with default folders in the language of the server. (Note that users can, instead, specify the /resetfoldernames option on the Outlook.exe command line to synchronize the folder names on their computer.)

To reset folder names when deploying Outlook, perform the following steps:

1. In the Custom Installation Wizard, go to the Add/Remove Registry Entries page.
2. Click Add to add a registry entry for ResetFolderNames.
3. On the Add/Modify Registry Entry page, select or type the following:
   
   
   1. Under Root:, click to select HKEY_CURRENT_USER.
   2. Under Data type:, click to select Dword.
   3. In the Key: field, type Software/Microsoft/Office/10.0/Outlook/Setup.
   4. In the Value name: field, type ResetFolderNames.
   5. In the Value data: field, type 1.
   Any non-zero value will cause Outlook to synchronize the user's folder names to the User Interface Language of Outlook.
4. Click OK to save the entry.

STATUS

This behavior is by design.

If you are administering a multilingual user community, you may want to suggest to users that they use a client in their preferred language to access their mailbox for the first time, so that the folders are created in the language they prefer. Note that only the language of the client matters; the settings of the OS and the server are not important.

In the case of mixed wide-character (DBCS/Unicode) clients and other clients, folders named in a wide-character client may have names that look like garbage characters when seen from other clients that do not support wide-character strings. This has no effect on functionality, but it can mislead users into thinking that the system is "broken." Wide-character names display correctly only with clients and operating systems that can handle wide-character strings (such as Japanese or Chinese versions of such products).

NOTE: References to the client software in this article are generic and refer to any program that can create or modify folders. This includes not only traditional e-mail client programs but also administrative migration or support utilities that access stores to perform various functions unrelated to normal sending and receiving of e-mail. These latter programs often create folders also, and when they do, generally they create the folders in the language of the program. This is an important consideration when using utilities like ExMerge (BackOffice Resource Kit III). The language version of these utilities should be carefully chosen when they are used by administrators.