Outlook: Accessing the Temporary Internet Files Folder for Attachments

When I open a file attachment from an Outlook message, I notice that when I choose File, Save As, the opened file is in a folder named OLK6 in the\Documents & Settings\<username>\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files folder. How can I access this OLK6 folder directly? When I use Windows Explorer, the OLK6 folder isn't visible, even though I've set the options in Windows Explorer to show hidden files and folders.

Outlook never opens a file attachment directly but always saves it to disk first. The Microsoft article "OL2002: Opened Attachments Are Saved in a Subdirectory in Your Temporary Internet Files Directory" (http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=296115) explains that Outlook generates a random folder name for these temporary attachment copies for each user. So, your folder name is OLK6, but another user's folder name might be OLKC320. The folder path is stored in a Windows registry string value named OutlookSecureTempFolder in the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\Outlook\Security subkey (for Outlook 2002; change 10.0 to 11.0 for Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 or to 9.0 for Outlook 2000).

After you know the name of the folder (you can easily find the name by using File, Save As to save an attachment), you can display that folder by following these steps:

1. In Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE), choose Tools, Internet Options, and on the General tab, under Temporary Internet Files, click Settings.
2. In the Settings dialog box, click View Files to display the hidden \<username>\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files folder.
3. In the Address box in IE, append your Outlook temporary attachment folder name to the folder path, then click Go to switch to that folder.

When Windows displays the folder, you can select Favorites, Add to Favorites to create a shortcut in IE so that the folder is easy to locate next time.