Solved Microsoft's POP3 email problem

Rollback_Jockey said:

Care to share the resolution for people with future issues?

Click to expand...

• I contacted MS Tier1 support. I decided I would try and engage them through chat, rather than voice...
  • We agreed to allow him to control the computer...but only under certain conditions
  • First thing I did was insisted that I man the mouse as much as possible. I'd gone through this before and I didn't want to waste OUR time having to go through it again.
    • I realized that because Tier1 support probably did what they did so many times that I needed to slow down the process
    • and I needed to make the mistakes...
    • After checking it out he came back with some definition of the "profile as an email client...addressing a server...ya da ya da" (all very interesting but nothing I could use) Just like the 'ad-monition/vice' I'd be given here it was probably all correct but was intended to do little more than try and impress/insult me with what someone knew about something but nothing about how that something might be used (in hindsight, I should've saved this part).
  • I patiently waited...
    • Then he suggested I set up a different profile (good move)
      • By this time I'd done this so often that everything was rote for me.
      • I finished up and it still didn't work (had a problem accessing the xxx.pst file...)
    • So I did it again...
      • This time he stopped me between the time I set up the profile on the first page and the time I traveled onto [more settings...] (oh a small but telling diversion here...an interesting thing happened. The only time the tech support person corrected what I typed was when I was filling in all the boxes (I've done it so many times I know it by heart!) and filled in the box with pop3,
        Without missing a beat, Nayeef typed in "IMAP" --that immediate action said a whole lot more about how Microsoft feels about IMAP than anything I'd experienced before.) -- I IMMEDIATELY CORRECTED HIM: (Chat: NO, POP)
        • He interjected right before I typed in the password for my accoount, saying: "now do the app password".
        • So I went in and recreated the app password.
          • He then pasted THE APP PASSWORD INTO THE FIELD WHERE I HAD (in fact, rightfully) TYPED IN MY EMAIL PASSWORD!
            • It turns out that there is/was NOT anything in the instructions that instructed one to type in this totally random, unrecognizable, and non-memorable, computer generated password INTO THE FIELD THAT BEFORE (before 2-step verification???) housed the email password.
            • But that made "all the difference". And it taught me:
              • I was essentially right in knowing (to a high degree of probability) that the number codes required by the profile, and based on whether one was doing a POP or IMAP account, were essentially 'set in stone', and, as I remarked 'available on numerous websites to copy and plug in". (True, there's someone in the hierarchy assigning ports and port numbers and that person can decide to totally screw up the assignments so you have to contact him/her/ISP/IT department and get the official imprimatur (look it up) from above)
              • There's a difference, a BIG difference, between the definition of something and the kind of questions I asked about Google-related things in my thread Google Account specifics and part of that is:
                • One you can look up.
                • The other (more important one) you actually have to know something.
            • That even having all the instructions doesn't guarantee that anyone...no matter how adept..can solve the problem
              • And that when one admits so, that one is being humble, inquisitive, and probably smart.
            • That its worth it to stick to one's (there must be a better word) "guns" than
              • Going with the crowd because they're too lazy to have a reason for what they're doing.
              • They're sheep.
              • They're going for the easy solution--not knowing or caring that it might change them in existential (look it up) ways.
            • That everything isn't done a certain way because it makes sense, to wit:
              • Putting one's email account password when the email field is followed by its password field makes sense, whereas,
              • Putting in a totally random and incoherent password into that same field instead of the sensible password it asked for previously MAKES NO SENSE WHATSOEVER. yet is what one has to do to get the machine to work.
              • AND that people who know this is the way it has to be done, should inform others of the fact, even if they're not capable of realizing this is an insane way of doing things. (But then, what do you expect of the 'privileged class' they know so MUCH about so LITTLE, and less about what matters.