Configuration guide: Outlook - Stability and Compliance

For many companies, Microsoft Outlook has become an essential tool for communication and collaboration between employees and third parties. It is imperative, therefore, that IT teams are able to monitor the status of this application across the organization in terms of performance, stability, adoption, and network connectivity.

Prerequisites

To get started with this library pack, please ensure all related content is installed and configured appropriately. This page guides which content is included and how to configure it.

Please keep in mind this is just a guide and represents suggested configurations. You can customize and edit content as you see fit based on your specific environment.

Included content and dependencies

Type	Name	Description	Dependencies
Live dashboards	Outlook - Stability and compliance	Provides visibility over key performance, adoption, and compliance data points from the Outlook landscape
Remote actions	Get Outlook Storage Info	Obtains the number of PST and OST files a user has connected to Outlook, and their overall size.	Required to populate specific dashboard widgets.
	Get Outlook Plugins	Retrieves the installed Microsoft Office Outlook COM Add-ins sorted by status and name.	Required to populate specific dashboard widgets.
	Get Outlook add-in diagnostics	Provides a deeper view into Outlook add-in performance and Outlook stability	Required to populate specific dashboard widgets.
	Set Outlook Plugins	Enables or disables each Microsoft Office Outlook COM add-in specified in the parameters.
	Repair Outlook OST problems	Repairs Outlook problems with OST file by deleting it and restarting Outlook.
Remote action campaigns	Restart Outlook - Invoke	Notifies the user that Outlook needs to restart to apply changes.	Required to include self-help with the "Repair Outlook OST problems" remote action.
	Set Outlook plugins - Invoke	Notifies the user that Outlook must be closed.	Required to include a notification with the "Set Outlook plugins" remote action.

Configuring Outlook - Stability and ComplianceTo use this library pack effectively, the content must be installed and configured appropriately

The content must be installed and configured appropriately to effectively use this library pack. Below are some suggested steps to properly install and configure the content before use.

Step 1 - Install library pack content

Go to the Nexthink Library and install all required content.

Step 2 - Configure remote action(s)

Navigate to the manage remote action administration page to review and edit your remote actions.

We recommend the following configurations for these remote actions:

Name	Trigger	Schedule query	Parameters to edit
Get Outlook plugins	Scheduled, weekly	Code devices | where operating_system.platform == windows and operating_system.name !in [ "*server*"]
Get Outlook storage info	Scheduled, weekly
Get Outlook add-in diagnostics	Scheduled, weekly		See dedicated section below
Set Outlook plugins	Manual, can be triggered on multiple devices		Remove or change campaign ID if needed Decide if you want to add or remove add-ins Input plug-in names to add or remove
Repair Outlook OST problems	Manual, can be triggered on multiple devices		Remove or change campaign ID if needed

Get Outlook add-in diagnostics configuration

For some organizations, the presence and function of specific Outlook add-ins is critical for effective employee productivity, whether it is to control access to a specific resource, or allow the signing of specific content.

To effectively track the operation of these business critical add-ins a new remote action has been provided as part of this pack, “Get Outlook add-in diagnostics” that can monitor up to seven pre-defined add-ins to provide the following information:

• The add-in version

• The time taken to start

• The number of add-in crashes within the last 24 hours

• Whether the add-in is disabled

• If disabled, a description of why the add-in was disabled

To configure this remote action, please follow these steps.

1. Run the remote action “Get Outlook plug-ins” on all relevant Windows devices and use the output to identify the add-ins that you would like to track on those devices

2. Edit the remote action “Get Outlook add-in diagnostics”

3. For each of the seven add-in parameters, enter the add-in name that you want to track.\

   
4. Schedule the remote action to run on all required Windows devices daily

Step 3 - Edit campaigns

Navigate to the manage campaigns administration page to review and edit your campaigns.

For each installed campaign, please ensure to:

• Customize the sender name and image.

• Review and adjust questions.

• Publish the campaign when you are ready to use it.

We recommend the following configurations for these campaigns:

Name	Trigger	Priority
Restart Outlook - Invoke	Remote action	Not urgent
Set Outlook plugins - Invoke	Remote action	Not urgent

Usage

To know more about how this dashboard should be used, please refer to the Usage Guide:

Usage guide: Outlook - Stability and Compliance