I can use the "Move Up" option to arrange the folders in Favorites but when I close the program and open it again, 2 1 or two are in a different location. These two seem to be predictable while others never get relocated,

I wonder if there is a "save settings" option somewhere.

This problem is related to the favorites shortcuts disappearing, this has been a known problem for some time and is related to the corruption of the Outlook.xml file. There currently is no solid fix yet but some have luck in rebuilding the Outlook.xml file but this will need to be done again when the file corrupts again.

See how to rebuild it here: http://blog.palehorse.net/2007/09/26...ite-shortcuts/

See on of the very long ongoing threads about the issue here: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/...2-c27ea9a182de

I will look into the rebuild thing but meanwhile, I wonder if I delete all the folders in Favorites pane then place them back in using the order in which I want them to appear. This way, none will be moved up or down.I get the feeling that they are storred in a list as they get created and that list remains in that order. When it comes to displaying, the order as seen in the pane is the result of a re-sorting list. The list remains in the original order and the order gets display according to this secondary file.

I have learned that Microsoft tends to work if you do not personalize anything. Everything has to be in the default position otherwise MS gets angry and pouts. Just like Bill Gates did at the Supreme Court hearings back in 94. It is "like father, like son:...

Nope, I just tried that link. Some dingus designed it with a hatred of older people. What kind of programmer uses this gray-on-white background? Apparently the information is not intended for anyone to read it. I grow tired of using copy/paste into a word document just to be able to decipher it.

Yeah that page is not very user friendly. Here is the entire page.

Outlook ate my shortcuts! (Favorite folders and calendar disappearing in Outlook)

This one has been bothering me for a long time. It also happens that three or four others in the office are having (soon to be past tense) the same problem.
About Outlook favorites

In Outlook, one of the features that is very nice is the one where you can create a set of “favorite” folders. This extents to public folders and even calenders (which are just folders that hold appointment items). I use this constantly, changing out my favorites when I am moved from one project to another.
The Problem of disappearing favorites

Several months ago my favorites began ‘resetting”. When I would add or remove a favorite folder, my changes would disappear the next time I started Outlook. This held true for shared calendars as well. I would add another persons calendar to my list, but the next time I started Outlook that person would no longer be in my list.
Getting my favorites back in Outlook

This, of course, was frustrating. I did quite a bit of research at the time to no avail. Today it finally got me riled up again so I decided to take another stab at it and wouldn’t you know it, I found two possible solutions!

1. You can create a new mail profile. This resets everything you’ve customized unfortunately, so it is, in my opinion, a last resort.
2. You can navigate to the folder that Outlook stores settings in. In Windows XP it defaults to:
   C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook
   In this folder you will find a file called Outlook.xml. Very innocuous sounding, don’t you think? This is the file causing all of the woes! You should exit Outlook completely then rename the file (never delete outright, bad form my good Pan!). Restart Outlook and you will notice all of your favorites and calendars are gone. Reset them to the way you would like, exit Outlook again and restart. *Poof* they are back!

Now the problem appears to be some sort of corruption to this file. The odd thing is, the file is only saved when you exit Outlook. I have confirmed this by watching the file system when starting Outlook with the file already gone. It does not reappear until I exit. My best guess is that if a corrupt file is loaded it messes something up within Outlook itself. No error that I could find is generated; however, the file is never saved again.
After some more poking around (it was easier to search for Outlook.xml than for the symptom itself) it seems that the general consensus is that this file becomes corrupt more often than you would imagine. If you’ve had this problem once, chances are pretty good that you will once again find your Favorite Shortcuts not being saved so keep these instructions handy!
An observation

As a side note, it was interesting to view the “corrupt” version of Outlook.xml and a “good” version of the file. They are very similar, but it would appear that one section called <userDefined> is the one that does not get saved after the file has went down the drain.

I will look at it later but meanwhile, I did the delete all and then installed then back in using the order I wanted them. No moving and it looks like it is going to hold.

Sounds like it is far easier than trying to deal with a corruptible file.

Alternatively, is there a way to disable or hide the Favorites Folder?

I can only imagine that if you did not want the folder then you would have to delete all the entries from the folder. When it is empty, it does not show up. Unfortunately, in order to get it to show again, you would have to populate it.

I doubt that you could have the convenience of having it populated and to make it disappear to have it come back at will.

I was looking for a more programatic way to disable or hide the folder for all users on our network at work. Thanks though.

Yes, if you go to the View Tab, on the Navigation Pane button you can uncheck "Favorites" and it won't appear.

You might also see if starting Outlook with the /ResetNavPane switch helps with your problem. See if this helps - http://www.officeforlawyers.com/outlook/tsol.htm#CLS