What is OLK File Extension?

Full Form of OLK File

There is not any abbreviation or Full form of OLK file. It is actually a file format for storing Address or Outlook Contacts on Mac platform. As you can see that the full form of OLK defines what is OLK file.

Introduction to OLK File

OLK file format is an additional resource for Outlook’s mail as well as Address Book File. It is developed by Microsoft for the data management. OLK file format is not known by most of the users, as contacts in Outlook are mainly stored in PAB (Personal Address Book) files, whereas the messages are saved in the OLM file. Whereas, OLK is referred as the backup file for Mac Outlook 2011 that can facilitate to retrieve the permanently deleted mails of Outlook 2011 mac.

Types of OLK Files

There are two types of OLK file, which are associated to save emails, i.e. OLK14Message and OLK14MSGSOURCE. OLK14Message can be referred as the storage of information file, which manages all the information about the headers regarding the mails, which are received in Outlook Mac 2011. However, this file does not its own mail body instead; it saves all the header information. The body of mail is saved in another OLK File, i.e. OLK14MSGSOURCE. It saves the replica of all mails, which are there in Outlook 2011.

OLK15 are files mainly made for Outlook 15 for Mac or Office365 for Mac.  Microsoft introduced OLK15Message Outlook for Mac for the edition v15.3 along with Office 365. This edition is available only for commercial users of Office 365.

Storage Location of OLK Files

OLK14MSGSOURCE

Username\Documents\MicrosoftUserData\Office2011Identities\MainIdentity\Data Records\Messages_Source\OM\OB\OT

OLK14Message

Username\Documents\MicrosoftUserData\Office2011Identities\MainIdentity\Data Records\Messages\OM\OB\OT

Variants of OLK File

The messages are further divided into various components that are stored with unique extensions of OLK. The various variants of OLK files are:

1. Category File: It is used for tagging contacts, messages, calendars, etc. The file consists of name and color assigned to the category. These files cannot be opened or stored by the user. This is an application generated as well as readable file only for reading the category.
2. Calendar Event: This file is to save data of the event(s), which are created by using Outlook calendar. An event may exist with various information, i.e. time, date, etc. It is used for saving local cache of copy of the event, which is created even in the cases where the calendar is saved remotely.
3. Contact File: The contact OLK file stores information related to contacts with all details such as name, email address as well as business information. This information is entered on the Outlook UI and is utilized for storing a contact. No direct interaction is made by users after OLK14CONTACT is created by Outlook.
4. Email Message: The OLK14MSGSOURCE file involve the source data of an email for referencing a message. All the application loads this file while opening and viewing a specified message. When the focus is on reading then, a particular mail of data from OLK14MSGSOURCE file is loaded automatically by the application.
5. Group File: The group file by Outlook for Mac is made for saving the grouped contacts in a collection. This is done for preserving collection of contacts in an systematized way by the client.
6. Message File: OLK14MESSAGE file is only meant for saving the header related information.
7. Signature File: OLK file for signatures is a file, which saves mail signature of Outlook for Mac profile in the form of HTML code. The file is stored and automatically loaded by the Outlook email client is inaccessible by users.

Recommendation :- Now, User can view data from OLK file without installation of Mac operating system.

Conclusion

Management of data is quite important; similarly, there is an OLK file in Outlook that manages the data completely. In the above-discussion, deep about OLK file extension are discussed that makes easy for users to understand it completely.