Description of performance implications of clients looking up a form in the Outlook Security Settings public folder

Office XP includes a feature an administrator can use to customize security features such as granting end users access to specific types of attachments. These features are customized with a form in a "Outlook Security Settings" or "Outlook 10 Security Settings" public folder.

This article describes the performance impact of clients looking up the form in the Outlook Security Settings public folder. Because Outlook 2002 performance may be affected by factors other than those that are described in this article, it may be useful to look at other possible causes and resolutions.

Outlook 2002 uses Microsoft Remote Procedure Calls (RPCs) to perform operations such as opening or moving messages and using public folders. RPCs are also used to look up the Outlook Security Settings public folder and find the form with custom-configured security settings.

On a sample desktop computer, with Outlook 2002 configured to look for security settings in the Outlook 10 Security Settings public folder, the RPC cost to start-up Outlook was approximately 36 RPCs. With the default level of security and no look-up in the public folder, the RPC cost to start-up Outlook was approximately 20 RPCs. These additional 16 RPC calls only occur one time when you start Outlook, and have no significant affect on client or server performance.

Note These RPC costs are a general guideline and may change depending on your Outlook configuration. For example, if the Preview pane is enabled or there are a large number of items in your Startup folder, you may see an additional number of RPCs for the base example and when the lookup to the public folder is performed.

For additional information about how an administrator can customize the security features of Outlook 2002, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: