Failing to create an email with outlook interop when outlook has been opened by another user account

Question

Hello
I have an addin that customizes the excel ribbon. I added a button so that when the user clicks it, a new outlook message windows pops up with some default information on the email body, CCs, etc.
The problem is that if outlook is already running and it's running under another user account different from the one that was used to open excel (e.g. after opening excel i open outlook with shift + right click and then "Run As..."); i get an exception upon
instantiating the outlook interop object:
Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook.Application app = new Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook.Application();
The exception message reads:
Retrieving the COM class factory for component with CLSID {0006F03A-0000-0000-C000-000000000046} failed due to the following error: 80080005 Server execution failed (Exception from HRESULT: 0x80080005 (CO_E_SERVER_EXEC_FAILURE)).
What can i do to prevent this issue from happening?
Thanks

Answer 1

In that situation I would test first for an existing Outlook process running and hook into it if it is running. If it's not running then I'd use new to create an Outlook session. There can only be one Outlook session running
at a time.
This sort of code will do the trick for you I think:
System.Diagnostics.Process[] processes = System.Diagnostics.Process.GetProcessesByName("OUTLOOK");
int collCount = processes.Length;
if (collCount != 0)
// Outlook already running, hook into the Outlook instance
outlookApp = Marshal.GetActiveObject("Outlook.Application")
as Outlook.Application;
An else there would create a new Outlook.Application object.
Ken Slovak
MVP - Outlook
http://www.slovaktech.com
Author: Professional Programming Outlook 2007
"wildarmss" <=?utf-8?B?d2lsZGFybXNz?=> wrote in message
news:870d6093-a7fb-4431-a38f-1896ce4cf963...
Hello
I have an addin that customizes the excel ribbon. I added a button so that when the user clicks it, a new outlook message windows pops up with some default information on the email body, CCs, etc.
The problem is that if outlook is already running and it's running under another user account different from the one that was used to open excel (e.g. after opening excel i open outlook with shift + right click and then "Run As..."); i get an exception upon
instantiating the outlook interop object:
Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook.Application app = new Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook.Application();
The exception message reads:
Retrieving the COM class factory for component with CLSID {0006F03A-0000-0000-C000-000000000046} failed due to the following error: 80080005 Server execution failed (Exception from HRESULT: 0x80080005 (CO_E_SERVER_EXEC_FAILURE)).
What can i do to prevent this issue from happening?
Thanks
Ken Slovak MVP - Outlook