In OE, it looks like my address book is toast. I can retrieve email,
and view messages in the preview pane, but I cannot do the following:

1) Cannot reply to any message - I recieve the following error: "There
was an error opening this message. An error has occurred.".

2) Cannot open a message in its own window, although the preview still
works fine. The same error is displayed.

3) Cannot forward a message. Same error.

5) Cannot compose a new message. Same error.

5) Cannot open the address book. Error message is: "Unable to open the
Address Book. The Address Book may not be installed properly."

Here's the background:

- I have Office 2000 installed, but only recently (a month ago)
installed Outlook. OE is still the default email client and I don't
use Outlook on a day-to-day basis.

- I was recently attempting to import a .PST file from another account,
without much luck.

Now how do I fix this? The old address book isn't important - I just
need to be able to use OE again.

Since you installed Office, it's likely it has taken over as the default for
Contacts. So:

Do you have this Registry key?... (Start/Run, type: regedit)

HKEY_CURRENT_USER
\Software
\Microsoft
\WAB
\WAB4

If not, STOP; If so, is there a DWORD named UseOutlook (NB: no space) and is
its value set to 1 (one)?

If not, STOP; If so, Address Book is configured to share contacts with
Outlook, even if you don't use it (can happen with the install of Office).
Change the value to 0 (zero), Address Book should be available to you and
all should be well. (If that DWORD is not present, don't create it, and
don't alter any other DWORD values.)
--
Jim Pickering, MVP, Outlook Express
https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/pr...8-1171988A62D6
Please deliver feedback to the newsgroup, so that others can be helped.
Thanks.


<jim.mcatee@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1133559518.178843.56230@g49g2000cwa.googlegro ups.com...
> In OE, it looks like my address book is toast. I can retrieve email,
> and view messages in the preview pane, but I cannot do the following:
>
> 1) Cannot reply to any message - I recieve the following error: "There
> was an error opening this message. An error has occurred.".
>
> 2) Cannot open a message in its own window, although the preview still
> works fine. The same error is displayed.
>
> 3) Cannot forward a message. Same error.
>
> 5) Cannot compose a new message. Same error.
>
> 5) Cannot open the address book. Error message is: "Unable to open the
> Address Book. The Address Book may not be installed properly."
>
> Here's the background:
>
> - I have Office 2000 installed, but only recently (a month ago)
> installed Outlook. OE is still the default email client and I don't
> use Outlook on a day-to-day basis.
>
> - I was recently attempting to import a .PST file from another account,
> without much luck.
>
> Now how do I fix this? The old address book isn't important - I just
> need to be able to use OE again.
>

Thanks. Yes, the entry was set to 1. I reset it to 0, but the problem
remains exactly as before, including the "Unable to open the Address
Book. The Address Book may not be installed properly." error message
when I try to open the address book.

In HKLU\Software\Microsoft\WAV\WAB4 are the following:

FirstRun =1
OlkContactRefresh =0
OlkFolderRefresh =0
UseOutlook =0

In HKLU\Software\Microsoft\WAV\WAB4\Wab File Name:

(Default) =C:\Documents and Settings\jim\Application
Data\Microsoft\Address Book\jim.wab

I was able to run wab.exe in the OE program directory. The address
book was empty, so I added one contact. Going back into OE, I still
have the same problems.

Did you reboot after making the registry changes? If not, try it.

The name and location of the Address Book is stored in the Registry so this
key is where you would look for "jim.wab" w/o quotes:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\WAB\WAB4\Wab File Name

Find your "jim.wab" file and double click it to see if it will open. If it
will not, then it's most likely corrupted and you will have to create a new
one. You can create a new, empty one by clicking Start/Run and type: WAB
/new , giving the file a name and location to be stored at. Then modify the
registry to indicate the correct path to the new wab file.

Also, see this link for more info about the Windows Address Book:
http://www.insideoe.com/files/wab.htm
--
Jim Pickering, MVP, Outlook Express
https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/pr...8-1171988A62D6
Please deliver feedback to the newsgroup, so that others can be helped.
Thanks.


"JJ" <jim.mcatee@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1133563582.042462.53770@g44g2000cwa.googlegro ups.com...
> Thanks. Yes, the entry was set to 1. I reset it to 0, but the problem
> remains exactly as before, including the "Unable to open the Address
> Book. The Address Book may not be installed properly." error message
> when I try to open the address book.
>
> In HKLU\Software\Microsoft\WAV\WAB4 are the following:
>
> FirstRun =1
> OlkContactRefresh =0
> OlkFolderRefresh =0
> UseOutlook =0
>
> In HKLU\Software\Microsoft\WAV\WAB4\Wab File Name:
>
> (Default) =C:\Documents and Settings\jim\Application
> Data\Microsoft\Address Book\jim.wab
>
> I was able to run wab.exe in the OE program directory. The address
> book was empty, so I added one contact. Going back into OE, I still
> have the same problems.
>

Rebooting did the trick. Thanks.