Hello all,

After running latest version of Office Configuration Analyzer Tool against my Office 2013 installation, I noticed that there is Warning related to processing of receipts and responses in my Inbox folder. Issue description states that there is a sniffer lock being held by OS that I reformatted years ago (2007). KB article that I am pointed to states that sniffer lock can be cleared by running Outlook with /cleansniff switch, but it doesn't seem to work in my case.

Is there any other way to clear sniffer lock?

Best regards, MiToZ

Hi MiToZ:

This switch /cleansniff is to >reset the sniffer lock value to the computer on which the switch is used<. That means it will make sniffer lock to refer your computer name.

To isolated this issue, do you mind if I ask several questions:

1. As you mentioned this issue occurred after you ran Office Configuration Analyzer Tool(Office CAT), was there any issue of your Office application that need to use this tool?

2. Besides running Office CAT was there any other changes?

3. Do you have delegate set up or your are delegate on behalf of anyone else?

4. If the answer to question 2 is NO, do you have Outlook configured on multiple PCs?

5. What is your mail account? Exchange/IMAP/POP3?

6. In which folder this message appeared? could you share me the detailed path and message?

7. Was there any information logged in Events log?

Thank you.

• Edited by Chloe WangMicrosoft employee, Moderator 22 hours 50 minutes ago

Hello Chloe Wang,

Thank you for your reply. It seems you misunderstood me, or it was me that wasn't clear enough.

Here are my answers to those questions:

1. Issue did not occur after running Office Configuration Analyzer Tool, but we would not know there is an issue unless we ran OffCAT.

2. After answering First question, I find that answering this question is kind of irrelevant, but no, lately there were no changes made.

3. There are no delegates on this mailbox, and there never where. I am not delegate on behalf of anyone else.

4. Outlook is not configured on multiple PC's.

5. Exchange

6. Folder? ... We are talking about message inside OffCAT

7. We are talking about message inside OffCAT

In case I wasn't clear enough, problem is that by using /cleansniff I cannot release sniffer lock for that mailbox from machine that doesn't exist for like 7 years(!).

Best regards, MiToZ

• Edited by MiToZ 22 hours 19 minutes ago

Hi MiToZ:

This switch /cleansniff is to >reset the sniffer lock value to the computer on which the switch is used<. That means it will make sniffer lock to refer your computer name.

To isolated this issue, do you mind if I ask several questions:

1. As you mentioned this issue occurred after you ran Office Configuration Analyzer Tool(Office CAT), was there any issue of your Office application that need to use this tool?

2. Besides running Office CAT was there any other changes?

3. Do you have delegate set up or your are delegate on behalf of anyone else?

4. If the answer to question 2 is NO, do you have Outlook configured on multiple PCs?

5. What is your mail account? Exchange/IMAP/POP3?

6. In which folder this message appeared? could you share me the detailed path and message?

7. Was there any information logged in Events log?

Thank you.

• Edited by Chloe WangMicrosoft employee, Moderator Monday, July 13, 2015 8:38 AM

Hello Chloe Wang,

Thank you for your reply. It seems you misunderstood me, or it was me that wasn't clear enough.

Here are my answers to those questions:

1. Issue did not occur after running Office Configuration Analyzer Tool, but we would not know there is an issue unless we ran OffCAT.

2. After answering First question, I find that answering this question is kind of irrelevant, but no, lately there were no changes made.

3. There are no delegates on this mailbox, and there never where. I am not delegate on behalf of anyone else.

4. Outlook is not configured on multiple PC's.

5. Exchange

6. Folder? ... We are talking about message inside OffCAT

7. We are talking about message inside OffCAT

In case I wasn't clear enough, problem is that by using /cleansniff I cannot release sniffer lock for that mailbox from machine that doesn't exist for like 7 years(!).

Best regards, MiToZ

• Edited by MiToZ Monday, July 13, 2015 9:10 AM

Thanks MiToZ for your clarification.

Based on your description:

1. You were not having any issue of using Outlook.

2. After running OffCAT, you found that there were a sniffer lock for your mailbox from one machine that you reformated 7 years ago.(Sorry I misread this part in your first post).

3. Run /cleansniff didn't reset the sniffer lock.

If I misunderstood anything, please let me know.

Was the information in OffCAT like tihs:"The 'Sniffer Lock' is owned by another machine:<machinename>. If Inbox items (Read Receipts, voting responses, or meeting invites/responses) are not getting processed automatically by Outlook, click the 'Click here ...' link for details on the sniffer lock."

Was these appeared in OffCAT as information like below picture showed? If so, I doesnt need to be concerned.

However, I suspect it is caused by old calendar entries. I havent found any sufficient information yet.

BTW, do you have PST files imported which contain calendar entries back then?

I will keep checking and keep you posted, thank you.  

Helloo Chloe Wang,

You understood everything perfectly :) I do not use PST's anymore, but I did use them in the past, and I did import the one PST that I had to my mailbox. I imported it like year ago.

Please keep this thread open, and if you get any more information on this, please let me know.

Best regards.