Update for Outlook 2013 breaks folder pane
[Update: This story has been edited to fix an incorrect link to the update description.]
One of the many updates served today to users by Microsoft through Windows Update is causing problems for users running Office 2013.
Sept 11, 2013 -- 15:05 GMT: Microsoft pulls buggy Outlook 2013 update
The update, labeled "Update for Microsoft Office 2013 (KB2817630) 32-bit Edition" or "Update for Microsoft Office 2013 (KB2817630) 64-bit Edition", contains bug fixes, and stability and performance improvements. After applying it, many users are reporting on TechNet that the Outlook folder pane is left empty. Many are also reporting that uninstalling the KB2817630 update fixes the problem.
The update is not one of the security updates released today, nor does there seem to be a hint of it in the non-security updates announced for today. But as shown in the screen capture below, the update is offered to users of Outlook 2013:
Quality control has been a problem lately for Microsoft software updates. Three separate updates recently (see Related Articles nearby) have had to be withdrawn and reissued after additional work.
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Furthermore, today's Patch Tuesday updates were supposed to include 14 bulletins, according to the Advance Notification issued last week. Only 13 were issued today. I asked Microsoft about the missing update. Microsoft’s Dustin Childs, Group Manager, Microsoft Trustworthy Computing, gave this statement:
We are committed to delivering high-quality security updates for our customers and extensively test each bulletin prior to release. During some additional testing after advance notification, we determined one of the updates was not quite ready. We have not detected any attacks against this issue, or any of the others addressed today, and we'll continue to work on the bulletin and release it once it is ready, through our regular bulletin release process.