XPost: microsoft.public.outlook.outlook, microsoft.public.outlook.usage
Ant <
ant@zimage.comANT> wrote:
Even exiting and relaunching https://www.usc.edu/office365's Outlook.com
in updated Chrome web browser, to retry, doesn't fix it in this 13"
MacBook Pro (Intel; 2020; macOS Ventura v13.6.4). Does anyone have this problem too right now? Is there a fix? It's quite annoying.
Thank you for reading and hopefully answering soon.
I read your message in the microsoft.public.outlook.general newsgroup
which historically discusses the local e-mail client, a component of the
MS Office/365 product suite or the standalone Outlook program.
Microsoft has done a fine job conflating their services and various
clients by using the "Outlook" name on all of them. So, I'm not sure if
you are asking about the local Outlook client, or their webmail client.
You mention using a web browser, so presumably you are asking about
their webmail client.
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook_com/forum/all/outlookoutlookcom-forum-updated/e50de19f-6d6c-4b74-b261-b4302cbe1fc8
Yep, more conflating different services and programs under one product
name. Actually it was the choice of the forums owner, but they're just following Microsoft's lead (the latest of which is to rename the Mail
client in Windows to Outlook). You might find more users of outlook.com
in the Answers forum.
Microsoft's webmail client got exceedingly slow in the last few months,
maybe longer since I rarey use it. Takes about 5 minutes before the GUI finally gets painted, and the webmail client becomes usable. It was a
sudden change: fast before, and then a crawl after. After the GUI
finally gets done painting (not easy to tell when), the GUI seems
responsive after that. While I'm logging in as a hotmail.com user,
Microsoft is using the same servers for hotmail.com as they use for
outlook.com and live.com. At first, it takes about 30 seconds for their
GUI to stabilize. It is sometime after the toolbar buttons finally show
up and the header row gets painted (From, Subject, Received). Even
then, clicking on the gear icon to get at Settings is delayed by a few
seconds. Responsiveness of their webmail client is nothing quick like
it used to be. Pity Microsoft doesn't add an option for a much simpler
webmail client; i.e., without all the glitz and fancy smancy crap.
I use uBlock Origin for ad, tracking, privacy, and element blocking, but Microsoft's webmail client is still slow to stabilize when I disable any blocking when using their webmail client at outlook.com. I allow
Microsoft resources, but block ad and tracking resources. Even when
everything is allowed (no blocking), and loading Firefox clean (no
locally data reused), their webmail client still takes a long time to stabilize. At the lower left corner is a status bar, and it shows
transferring data & accessing resources and sending requests for about
2-1/2 minutes. The last one "Sending request to csp.microsoft.com" take
a very long time, but there are many CSP reports sent during the webmail client's stabilization.
https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Dashboard:-Settings#block-csp-reports
CSP reporting is the site controlling what resources the client is
allowed access for a given page.
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/Content-Security-Policy
Despite Microsoft still using CSP, it got deprecated.
https://vulncat.fortify.com/en/detail?id=desc.dynamic.xtended_preview.html5_deprecated_content_security_policy
Although I disabled all blocking at outlook.com, CSP reporting was still blocked in uBlock Origin. With both blocking and CSP blocking disabled
for outlook.com, the delay until their webmail client stabilized was
sometimes much shorter (about half as long), but there was still a
delay, and sometimes the delay was just as long as before (2.5 minutes).
Even with uBO disabled, Firefox exited (to purge all locally cached
data), and Firefox reloaded to outlook.com, it could still take 2.5
minutes (with tons of "tranferring data from res.cdn.office.net" status messages) before their webmail client stabilized. Just because you see
[part of] their webmail client doesn't mean it is yet ready. Their
webmail client has become very slow to get ready for full functionality.
In their webmail client, I disabled keyboard shortcuts. That means
having to use GUI elements to perform what they keys would do. When I
create a new draft, I'm shown a compose window within the webmail
client's "window". I'll have the Inbox folder having focus, and click
"New mail". I'm shown an inline draft compose window. There is an
option to open it separately, but I don't use it that way. While
composing the draft, the Inbox folder still has focus. There is no Save
button in draft compose mode to force saving a copy into the Drafts
folder. While I am in the compose window, nothing is yet saved to the
Drafts folder. Instead there is a tab at the bottom showing one of the
tabs is for the draft. If I don't enter anything in the compose window,
and select the Drafts folder, nothing is in there yet. The compose tab
has not yet been saved. At some point after entering some non-blank
data into the fields in the compose window does the draft get saved into
the Drafts folder. There needs to be some trigger to get a new item to
appear in the Drafts folder while composing the draft, like switching
focus from the Inbox folder to the Drafts folder. With Inbox focused,
and clicking "New message" to get the compose window, the tree pane is
still shown, but the Drafts folder does not yet have a count (no items
yet in that folder). As I enter text into the fields of the draft
message, I'll see the count get updated for the Drafts folder. If
you're trying all this just after logging in, perhaps you're getting
nailed by their webmail client being overly slow to paint for when it
has stabilized.
When you exit and relaunch your web browser, are you flushing all
locally cached data, like cookies? With Firefox, it has an option to
purge local data on its exit. Chrome doesn't have that feature. You
have to add an extension to Chrome, like Click&Clean, to do the local
data purge, but it is not on exit. Chrome doesn't permit extensions
from running (except as worker processes) after exiting Chrome, so the extension actually does the cleanup when Chrome is next loaded for when
the extensions also get loaded.
Are you logging into outlook.com, or through a portal using your
college's contracted service with Microsoft for outlook.com accounts? I
have a free account at hotmail.com (and another at outlook.com), but
they are personal accounts. Educational and corporate accounts that are contracting use of Microsoft's e-mail services have an admin assigned to
manage those account. Because I have a personal-use account, I don't
have the admin functions available that contracted accounts have. For
example, to get Microsoft to disable their ATP (Advanced Threat
Protection) SafeLinks "feature" which eliminates Microsoft modifying URL hyperlinks in messages to point at Microsoft who then decides if the
link is safe to then redirect you to the target, I have to use their
feedback link, and wait for them to contact me. It usually takes at 2
tries before Microsoft gets it right. Admins of contracted accounts
have an overt option in settings to enable/disable SafeLinks. You
should have the option to contact the admin to inquire if there is a
problem with their portal or accounts at Microsoft.
As far as Microsoft's webmail client, I find it far too slow to
stabilize, and overall too flaky. I primarily use a local e-mail client
on my desktop or phone to use my Hotmail.com and Outlook.com accounts.
Their webmail client is a pain. Was okay in the past, but it got way too
slow to paint, to slow to become fully functional. I still use it
primarily to define server-side rules, but I load it in the web browser,
and go get a cup of coffee, or check the postal mail, before I start
using it.
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