Microsoft: Tasks not loading in sidebar

Simbiat

Microsoft, I am calling you out on quality of your tech support.

I have a ticket in Outlook's chat about tasks not showing on Outlook startup. Something which is clearly demonstrated on this video.

Practically from the very beginning I've been telling that this looks like a rendering issue (you if you watch the startup frame by frame you can see that tasks are there for a split second), but I played along at first. I checked for updates, I tried Office repair, and then... After you've insisted I even created a new profile. Twice, because you were not able to see original video which was in h.265 (codec which is supposed to be supported by modern Win11 out of the box). Here's the video for reference (this video also shows a transient version of the same issue, when the list of tasks is incomplete).

Somehow you still asked me to try changing default profile, even though it was recorded in the video, that I changed it. Specifically, because I expected that you will need proof of that. I was still annoyed, though. Same as when you asked me for screenshot of data files tab from the settings. I was so annoyed by that, I immediately created a 3rd test profile (since I did not keep the previous ones) to show, that new profile use separate data files.

Today I've reached it, because now I am being asked to create a new Windows profile. How is Windows profile even relevant here? There is NO issue with the data or with getting the data from Outlook servers. There is no technical reason to even consider a different Windows profile.

I am putting my foot down here. I am not going to waste my time on creating a new profile, which may also be considered expansion of attack surface, even if it is deleted afterwards. Because it won't help, and when it does not, you will suggest me Windows reinstallation.

Please, stop deflecting and wasting time. As I've stated in the ticket multiple times already, most likely there is some bug in the startup sequence. Something is clearly failing, possible that the format of data that is provided to a function that renders the list is incorrect. But this is something that developers need to look into. In the code. Get them to do it.

Simbiat

Microsoft, your inability to reproduce the issue on test machines does not justify creation of a new Windows profile. Even if by some miracle, it works in new profile - it does not give you any information you can actually use, because you won't know "what interferes" with the app. And I bet you won't waste a second before sending me off in this case, because you will see it as my problem, and not Outlook problem. You are also forgetting that you can install apps for the whole system, and not just for a profile, and that is the default behavior in lots of apps, so new profile may not be as clean as you hope.

Simbiat

I am starting to think that I am being seen as an idiot or something. Even though I mentioned in the chat, that I am a tech support. I am a tech person. I use logic. I will ask questions. I will ask for logic. I will question the steps that you suggest. I will not buy into "Hail Marry"-kind of suggestions.

Simbiat

Microsoft, I am not frustrated with the product even. I am frustrated with approach to tech support... Too bad you still have not understood that. Let's see what you "research" will result in.

Simbiat

Microsoft, you are disappointing me more and more with.

"We have not received reports from other users" is not a reason to not treat an issue as a bug. Any bug starts with 1 report. Also, how many users actually do report bugs? No, seriously, think about it. Most users will just treat this as an annoyance, and they will not contact support, because they know you won't be helping them, and you will just be deflecting, and deflecting, and deflecting again. A bug is a bug even if it is reported just by 1 person.

The "we were not able to reproduce" is also not an excuse to not go with this to the devs and continuously waste my time on actions that have nothing to do with the issue. I repeat myself again: I am a tech support, like you, if I have just 1 setup where the issue is easily replicable, and I can't replicate it in other setup, I will still go to the devs with a bug. Yes, it obviously won't be fixed at high priority for obvious reasons, that understandable. But they do know the code. If they watch the video and look at the code, read the assumptions I've shared - they may get an idea what is happening and why.

Even if they don't - they have a great opportunity to coordinate with me and provide me some debug build or whatever that will allow them to monitor what is happening during startup and analyze the logs then. Or maybe they already know about this even. I would not be surprised by that at all.

Either way, STOP DEFLECTING!

Simbiat

Microsoft, this is absolutely ridiculous. You have 0 (zero) logic. How is calendar even relevant here (proof it does not help here)? The only thing you have been doing since January 6th (probably earlier, but the ticket lost most of my messages for whatever reason) is trying to put the blame for a bug you can’t (yet) reproduce on the user (me) or “3rd party applications”. It’s a visual bug caused by something in the startup logic. And even if it’s caused by some conflict with whatever drivers or other services, you won’t be able to determine which one, unless you have a debug mode that can help with that. So… STOP DEFLECTING! START USING LOGIC!

Simbiat

Yesterday, Microsoft finally started asking sensible things, and we were able to confirm, that the issue has started after a certain build of Office. Which is great, but why did it take a literal month of me trying to convince, that this issue is a real bug, for us to get here? You could have asked me to do this during first week even. Do better next time.

Simbiat

I thought I posted more of this on LinkedIn, but looks like I did not? Or maybe I did, but LinkedIn seems to not allow me to easily find my own posts even. But either way, it took probably another month (if not more) to finally convince Microsoft to get devs on this, we tried rolling back to previous versions of Office, found one where the issue appeared, collected memory dumps, and eventually this was fixed.