Read Email stored in Exchange 2003 Public Folders in C#

Question

I have emails that are stored in Public Folders on an internal Exchange 2003 Server and I have some code that opens these emails, processes and then moves them to an archive folder.

To complicate things, the Exchange Server will be upgraded, but when this occurs is out of my control.

Currently my code uses Outlook automation and while this works, it does require Outlook to be installed - not a good look on a server.

I would like to write this using C# native code without involving Outlook. Do I have any options?

Answer 1

This thread has advice on the topic direct from Microsoft, for ExSrv 2003/2007. Basically: use Exchange Web Services (2007/2010), or WebDAV (2003).

For EWS, the recommended logic is

You can retrieve the Public Folder hierarchy using the FindFolder method and access items in the Public Folders using the FindItem method.

There is an introductory WebDav sample for Public Folders here.