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[EWS/C#] Exception calling Contact.Load() with FirstClassProperties & an ExtendedPropertyDefinition. Something to do with a blank 'FileAs' property?

• Friday, October 30, 2009 4:39 PMCalumJR

   
  

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  I have a problem which I just cannot seem to get to the bottom of and I really would appreciate any help on the matter. Thank you in advance :)
  
  Outline
  I have developed a Windows service which retrieves the contacts from a SharePoints list, compares them with the respective folder of contacts in Exchange Server and updates the contacts on both lists using both SharePoint Web Services and Exchange Web Services. I link the contacts by the ID of the contact in the SharePoint list (this ID is added as an extended property to the Exchange contact in order to ensure fine linking). This process all seems to work perfectly and is complete, minus any more bugs which may appear during the testing; however, I have come accross a fairly major problem which I can reproduce, described below.
  
  Problem
  When a contact in Exchange Server contains no 'FileAs' property, before my application starts its syncing, everything is fine, however if I add a contact with no 'FileAs' property or edit a contact which has previously not contained a 'FileAs' property I received the following error when stepping over the following statement:
  
  Error:
  

  Microsoft.Exchange.WebServices.Data.ServiceResponseException: The specified value is invalid for property.
  
     at Microsoft.Exchange.WebServices.Data.ServiceResponse.InternalThrowIfNecessary()
  
     at Microsoft.Exchange.WebServices.Data.ServiceResponse.ThrowIfNecessary()
  
     at Microsoft.Exchange.WebServices.Data.MultiResponseServiceRequest`1.Execute()
  
     at Microsoft.Exchange.WebServices.Data.ExchangeService.LoadPropertiesForItems(IEnumerable`1 items, PropertySet propertySet)
  
     at Microsoft.Exchange.WebServices.Data.Item.InternalLoad(PropertySet propertySet)
  
     at Microsoft.Exchange.WebServices.Data.ServiceObject.Load(PropertySet propertySet)
  
     at ShareSync.ExchangeConnector.GetContacts(String strListName, String strUser) in C:\Development\Projects\SharePoint 2007\ShareSync\Final solution\ShareSync\ShareSync\ExchangeConnector.cs:line 146}

  
  Statement:
  

  <em>objExchangeContact.Load(objContactPropertySet);</em>
  
  

  I assume you may need more code in order to aid me in solving this problem, so below I have provided the value of the 'objContactPropertySet' object and the ExtendedPropertyDefinition (which is a private member variable of my 'ExchangeConnector' class which houses all of the code relating to this problem). There is an actual GUID string in the GUID variable and it is valid, but I have taken it out of the snippet below.
  
  

  objContactPropertySet = new PropertySet(BasePropertySet.FirstClassProperties, objExtendedPropertyDefinition);
  
  

  private static Guid MyPropertySetId = new Guid("[THE GUID STRING");
  
  
  
  private ExtendedPropertyDefinition objExtendedPropertyDefinition = new ExtendedPropertyDefinition(MyPropertySetId, "SID", MapiPropertyType.String);
  
  

  
  This code does work absolutely fine every time, apart from in the conditions described above - when a contact is added with no 'FileAs' property or when a contact which has previously had no 'FileAs' property is edited (contacts which were added to Exchange Server with no 'FileAs' property before my service started running for the first time seem to be okay).
  
  
  What i have tried
  Seeing as this appears to be a problem specifically with the 'FileAs' field of the Exchange contact being read in and more specifically with this field being blank (or 'null' in the EWS Contact object) and everything works perfectly fine as soon as something is added to the 'FileAs' field in Outlook, I thought the best way to fix this would be to programatically add the 'FileAs' field if it is 'null' or empty, before 'Contact.Load()' is called; thus, I added the following code (there will always be a company name, given name or surname in our contacts, but not necessarily all of those, so I have catered for that in my code, keeping in mind we prefer the 'FileAs' to contain the full name of the contact):
  

  if (objExchangeContact.FileAs == null || objExchangeContact.FileAs == "" || objExchangeContact.DisplayName == null || objExchangeContact.DisplayName == "")
  
                              {
  
                                  if (objExchangeContact.GivenName != null && objExchangeContact.Surname != null)
  
                                  {
  
                                      objExchangeContact.FileAs = objExchangeContact.GivenName + " " + objExchangeContact.Surname;
  
                                      objExchangeContact.DisplayName = objExchangeContact.GivenName + " " + objExchangeContact.Surname;
  
                                  }
  
                                  else if (objExchangeContact.GivenName != null && objExchangeContact.Surname == null)
  
                                  {
  
                                      objExchangeContact.FileAs = objExchangeContact.GivenName;
  
                                      objExchangeContact.DisplayName = objExchangeContact.GivenName;
  
                                  }
  
                                  else if (objExchangeContact.GivenName == null && objExchangeContact.Surname != null)
  
                                  {
  
                                      objExchangeContact.FileAs = objExchangeContact.Surname;
  
                                      objExchangeContact.DisplayName = objExchangeContact.Surname;
  
                                  }
  
                                  else
  
                                  {
  
                                      objExchangeContact.FileAs = objExchangeContact.CompanyName;
  
                                      objExchangeContact.DisplayName = objExchangeContact.CompanyName;
  
                                  }
  
  
  
                                  objExchangeContact.Update(ConflictResolutionMode.AutoResolve);
  
                              }
  
  
  
                              objContactPropertySet = new PropertySet(BasePropertySet.FirstClassProperties, objExtendedPropertyDefinition);
  
                              objExchangeContact.Load(objContactPropertySet);

  This code was placed above the statements which assign the 'objContactPropertySet' variable and call 'Contact.Load()' (as can be seen in the code) and yet I still receive the same exception as provided above, when stepping over the 'Contact.Load()' statement. Oddly, the 'FileAs' field appears in that contact in the folder view in Outlook, but when clicking on the contact itself and viewing 'Edit' mode, the field is not there in the contact. I have tried 'ConflictResolutionMode.AlwaysOverwrite' as well as 'ConflictResolutionMode.AutoResolve' but neither work.
  
  As I say, modifying the 'FileAs' field in Outlook itself fixes this problem, but modifying that field using the code above does not.
  
  Any help really would be much appreciated and if you would like anymore information or code samples please just ask :)
  
  Thank you in advance and I look forward to finally getting to the bottom of this problem.
  
  Regards,
  Calum.
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