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Shared Calendars with SharePoint and Outlook 2007
By Siegfried Jagott, siegfried.jagott@siemens.com
Managing shared or team calendars has always been a problem in Microsoft Office Outlook. You either had to use a mailbox that was accessible by everyone, or you used a public folder that didn't work with your Outlook calendar. Using Outlook 2007 combined with Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 or Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, you can now link a SharePoint calendar to Outlook, and you can even add, modify, or delete appointments when you're offline. Let's see how you and your team can benefit from using shared calendars.
In previous columns, I explained how you enable synchronization by selecting the desired SharePoint list or document library and clicking "Connect to Outlook" on the Actions menu ("SharePoint Integration with Outlook 2007, Part 3," June 29, 2007, http://list.windowsitpro.com/t?ctl=5FE53:731F0B724FD64543E9A9477B47153703 ).
Syncing the calendar with Outlook adds the SharePoint calendar to Outlook's Navigation pane under Other Calendars and sets it to active. When a calendar is active (checkbox selected), you'll receive reminders set on appointments in the shared calendar--a pop-up window appears to alert you about your group appointments, such as department meetings. You don't need to add these appointments to your local calendar to get a notification.
However, if you want to add shared appointments to your calendar --for example, to synchronize them with other devices, such as your PDA--you just need to open the appointment and use the "Copy to My Calendar" button.
To read the rest of this article and find out how you can use shared calendars to improved teamwork, click here:
http://list.windowsitpro.com/t?ctl=5FE54:731F0B724FD64543E9A9477B47153703
Last update: 2007-07-27 13:35
Author: Martin Criminale
Revision: 1.1
