What Demands Migration from Apple Mail to Outlook for Mac 2011

Apple’s Mac OS X is known as the best computer operating system today, which runs only on the computer hardware manufactured by the company itself. In fact, the high-level performance Mac OS X offers is beyond comparison with all other computer operating systems available in the marketplace. Apple Mail is one of the top most features in Mac OS X, allowing users to set up and access their email messages as well as other mailbox items right from the desktop.

This desktop email client on Mac OS X is named ‘Mail’, and is also available for Apple’s very own the amazing iPhone. The Mail was actually designed and developed by NeXT, and was named NeXTMail, which later on was acquired by Apple Inc., and added to Mac OS X as the default email client.

Apple’s Mail can efficiently transfer email messages from one mailbox to another, based on SMTP, IMAP, and POP3 protocols, thereby letting the users to set up their Exchange, Gmail, Yahoo Mail, AOL Mail, or MobileMe account for email exchange over the Internet.

Common Issues with Apple Mail

Many people are nowadays upgrading to Outlook for Mac 2011, a Microsoft Email Client for Mac OS X. Well, the reasons behind why people are upgrading to Outlook could by many in number, and may vary from one user to another. However, if some common reasons are there, they must be the problems users have been facing with Apple’ Mail for a long time. Out of them, some common issues with Apple Mail are discussed in the below section of this post.

Email Not Received

While on Apple Mail – Mail.app on Mac OS X, users sometimes find themselves not receiving email messages. However, there is no such issue with webmail and email set up in mobile. Well, the situation undoubtedly highlights that there must be some issue with the Mail client itself. If such an issue is there, it can be resolved very easily on Mac OS X. Follow the below mentioned steps in this regard:

1. Launch Apple Mail.
2. On the Mail menu bar, click ‘Mailbox’ menu and choose ‘Take All Accounts Offline’ in the context menu.
3. Now, wait for at least 10 seconds, and then click ‘Take All Accounts Online’ in the same menu.

With this step performed, users should start receiving all pending email messages.

Unable to Send and Receive Emails

This is another and one of the common issues ever faced with Apple Mail. In case users are unable to send and receive emails, even though the Internet connectivity, email setup, and other settings are done correctly, the issue might be the email protocol (i.e. SMTP) is not syncing, and users must follow these steps to fix it:

1. In case the Apple Mail is open, close it immediately.
2. Go to the ‘/Users/your_profile/Library/Mail/IMAP-account_concerned/’ location
3. Now delete ‘.OfflineCache’ folder, which is hidden by default.
4. After that, launch Mail again

With the aforementioned steps, emails send/receive flow must resume, thereby fixing the issues. It if does not, take help from respective professionals.

Fail to Send Emails

Issues while sending emails may come across due to a number of reasons. However, until the right issue is traced, users cannot resume their email service. Well, trying the following steps might help fixing the issue:

1. Close Apple Mail either by executing ‘Q’ command or by clicking ‘Quit’ with the Mail selected.
2. Now, click the ‘Stamp’ icon in the dock bar to re-launch the Mail.
3. To make sure, if the Mail settings are correct, try this.
4. Check both Mail Incoming and Outgoing settings.

With the correct Mail setting, there should be not issue with Email Incoming and Outgoing services. If there is, some technical issue must be there.

Features in Outlook for Mac 2011

Well, Outlook for Mac 2011 is the leading email client from Microsoft, which comes in Office for Mac 2011. Outlook for Mac 2011 lets the users merge all mailbox items with their personal as well as professional tasks right into the Mac mailbox, wherein emails, notes, contacts, tasks, notes, calendar, and more are integrated. In addition, a number of key features in Outlook for Mac 2011 are listed as follows:

• Outlook on Mac OS X integrates all email messages with a common subject line and sender’s address in a chat-like thread, which maintains free space in the mailbox.
• Migration of Outlook mailbox from Windows to Mac is easy. Simply import the .PST file into Outlook for Mac 2011 and access the emails and other mailbox items.
• Outlook for Mac 2011 can be integrated with a number of operating system, including Mac OS X and Windows, thereby maintaining the consistency of the experiences on each platform.

Besides, there are a number of more features in Outlook for Mac 2011, which draw Apple Mail users towards it. Mentioned below are the steps that must be followed in order to migrate from Apple Mail to Outlook for Mac 2011:

Import Apple Mail messages, rules, accounts, and signatures in Outlook for Mac 2011

1. With the Apple Mail.app closed, launch Outlook.
2. Click ‘File’ menu and choose ‘Import’ in the context menu.
3. In the Import wizard, choose ‘Information from Another Application’ and click ‘Next’.
4. Select ‘Apple Mail’ and click ‘Next’.
5. Select ‘Messages’, ‘Accounts’, ‘Rules’, and ‘Signature’, and then click ‘Next’.
6. Click ‘Finish’.

Important: Outlook for Mac 2011 fails to import Exchange mailbox from Apple Mail.

Import iCal events into Outlook for Mac 2011

1. Open ‘iCal’ and click ‘File’ menu.
2. In the context menu, choose ‘Export’, and then again choose ‘Export’.
3. In the dialog box that opens, type in a name for the Calendar file.
4. Choose a location to save the Calendar data file, and then click ‘Export’.
5. In the navigation pane of Outlook, click ‘Calendar’.
6. Navigate to the Calendar data file, and then drag it to the Outlook’s Calendar grid area.

Important: Outlook for Mac 2011 can import iCal data in .ics file format only, and fail to import .icbu file that is an iCal Archive.

Import Apple Address Book Contacts into Outlook for Mac 2011

1. Launch Apple Address Book
2. Highlight all Contacts that are to be imported into Outlook
3. Drag all selected Contacts to the desktop, which are saved as a .vcf file
4. Launch Outlook and click Contacts in the bottom section of the navigation pane
5. No, drag the .vcf file from the desktop to the Contacts area at the right

Important: The Contact groups after importing into Outlook become Categories

After importing the Apple Mail items into Outlook for Mac 2011, users can directly access them on the new platform. Outlook for Mac 2011 is a smart email client with a number of advanced features, and is used at both personal (at homes) and professional levels (in corporate). The vital feature of Outlook is its data file that it stores locally (i.e. a copy of the mailbox), though the original mailbox data is stored on server.

Outlook for Mac 2011 stores mailbox items in an OLM file, and it can import the PST file (i.e. Outlook data file created on Windows platform) as well. To have a backup copy of Outlook mailbox, simply copy the OLM file to a secure location, and use it with Outlook for Mac 2011 installed on any Mac.