Office 2016 - Outlook AutoDiscover.xml

Recently one of my client have upgraded their Microsoft Office from 2013 to 2016 version and have encountered problems in creating an Outlook profile for their new employee(s).

What I have discovered is that Outlook 2016 no longer provide the "Outlook Anywhere" features whereby all Outlook accounts must be connected to Exchange server directly for .ost synchronization thus the feature is no longer available.

According to Microsoft the reason behind the changes is having .ost directly connected to Exchange server is for more stability & reliability... yeah rite. To me it seems more to forcing customers to upgrade their Exchange server for the new functions & features.

Anyway, luckily I am not the first one to encounter this problems any there are many solutions out there, but this is one particular solution that have worked for me.

And here are the steps :-

1. First you will need to create an "autodiscover.xml" file with the following contents. You can do this by using notepad.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> -<Autodiscover xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/autodiscover/responseschema/2006"> -<Response xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/autodiscover/outlook/responseschema/2006a"> -<Account> <AccountType>email</AccountType> <Action>redirectUrl</Action> <RedirectUrl>https://autodiscover.[FQDN]/autodiscover/autodiscover.xml</RedirectUrl> </Account> </Response> </Autodiscover>

Note : Change the [FQDN] to your domain name (eg. domain.com or domain.com.my)

 

2. Next is to modify the registry so that Outlook 2016 is aware of the "autodiscover,xml" file and its path.

 

3. Open --> regedit --> Browse to --> HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\AutoDiscover.

Note : Create "AutoDiscover" key if not available.

 

4. Create --> String Value = [FQDN].

Note : Change the [FQDN] to your domain name (eg. domain.com or domain.com.my)

 

5. Then modify the value of the "String Value" = [Path to "autodiscover.xml" file], for example (C:\AutoDiscover\autodiscover.xml)

 

6. Below is the example of the registry, you may use this to import the registry but remember to modify it accordingly before importing.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00   [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\outlook\AutoDiscover] "[FQDN]"="[Path]\\autodiscover.xml"

 

7. Now you can open Outlook 2016 and use its wizard to configure user's account accordingly, Outlook should be able to locate your Exchange server now and will prompt for username and password.

 

8. At certain times, Outlook will prompt for username & password twice or thrice or sometimes more (depends whether your Exchange's autodiscover is published correctly or not), and sometimes it may prompt for certificate installations.

 

9. This is normal as your Exchange is trying to authenticate you by using both MAPI & HTTPS protocol and certificate (if any). Thus the multiple prompts for username & password.

 

Some user(s) have claimed that this also works with Office 365 environment, but I have to test it out and unsure of the outcome. But for my customer's environment this just works perfectly.

 

!!! HAPPY COMPUTNG !!!