Calendaring through MS Outlook
If you have never used your Outlook calendar to keep track of your appointments, here are some reasons why you may want to consider it.
Availability :
Your calendar can be viewed from the World Wide Web, using our own Outlook Web Access, giving you access to your schedule from home or anywhere else you may have an Internet connection.
Ease of Use :
The calendar is bundled with MS Outlook, which is what we use for the processing of email on our office computers. It is already on your office PC and can be easily viewed by simply clicking on the calendar folder in Outlook.
Full-featured :
The MS Outlook calendar offers multiple views, color coding, reminders, flexible options for recurring appointments, categorizing, printing and more.
Scheduling :
You can schedule meetings with other users in the system by automatically inviting them to meetings (see below).
Sharing calendars :
You can view other users' calendars and have others view yours. You can also assign people to update and edit your calendar.
There are several ways to make a new appointment for yourself. The easiest way is to double-click the day and time in the calendar view that you wish to reserve. It brings up a new appointment window where you can add a subject line (which appears in the calendar's view), set reminders, add details and attachments, and set other customizations for the appointment. Click save, and you're done.
If you receive an email that requires an appointment be made, you can drag the email from the inbox to the calendar folder. A new calendar window appears with the subject already filled in. You can set the day and time and click save. It's simple!
Scheduling is one of the more powerful features of MS Outlook. When you open a new appointment [click file, new, appointment], you can click the Scheduling tab * (see diagram below) to view the scheduling options.
This feature allows you to schedule meetings with any number of users in the system. You can select names of people you want to invite ** using the global address book (OC's list of email accounts). Once you have selected your invitees, you can click Send to send them an invitation via email.
If all of your invitees also use their Outlook calendars to schedule their appointments, you will be able to see if they already have appointments scheduled before you select a time for your meeting. If they have a calendar appointment already made, you will see a blue line across the time and day reserved in their calendar *** . This will help you select a time and day that is open to all of your invitees. Again, this view only works if all of the invitees use their Outlook calendar.
There are many good reasons to use your Outlook calendar to help you stay organized and to work even more cohesively with your various work groups. Parts II and III of our series will cover shared calendars and group scheduling.
Calendaring through MS Outlook
This is part 2 of a 3-part series on calendaring.
Part 2: Sharing your MS Outlook calendar
One of the next logical steps in using the Outlook calendar, which many campus departments find very useful, is sharing your calendar with others.
Since sharing, by its very nature, is a kind and benevolent concept, it's no wonder that so many departments find it to be one of the more friendly tools they employ in the office. Sharing calendars, unlike sharing colds, flues and other bugs (electronic and otherwise), improves communication and productivity. What makes it all possible is Microsoft Exchange. This is because Exchange, as a server-based application, stores each of our calendars on the server. You simply give permissions to people that you want to view and even edit your calendar appointments, and they in turn view and manage the scheduling processes for your department. Their level of access to your calendar is determined by you the calendar owner. What about your private items, you ask? You simply mark those private and they remain viewable only by you. This article will explain setting up permissions, opening another user's calendar, and printing calendars.
Sharing out the calendar:
The simplest way to designate a privileged viewer of your calendar is through what is called the navigation pane. (This is a view that appears on the left column of the Outlook window when you click ìViewî from the top menu and ìNavigation Pane.î) Once you are viewing the navigation pane, click the calendar icon located at the bottom of the screen to change your view to your calendar. The following graphic depicts the calendar icon as described.
After clicking the calendar icon, you will see a Share My Calendar link. If you click that link, you will be presented with the dialogue box (shown below) that allows you to add people to your calendar and set permissions for them.
The steps to add users and grant them permissions are as follows:
Click Add .
In the Add Users dialog box, in the Type Name or Select from List box, enter the name of the person whom you want to grant sharing permissions to.
Under Add Users , click Add , and then click OK .
In the Name box, click the name of the person you just added. Under Permissions , in the Permission Level list, click the permission level that you want.
Note: The Default user, shown above is for everyone. So if you don't want everyone to have access to your calendar, then leave the permissions for that set to None.
Opening another user's calendar:
Again, in the navigation pane, notice where it says Open a Shared Calendar Clicking this will display a dialogue box. From here you may type the first and/or last name (or even just part of the name) of your calendar-sharer and click OK, which either resolves the name immediately or pops up some name options from the list of users on the system. You may also pick the name from a list by clicking the NameÖ button. Only the calendars for those users who have granted you permissions will successfully open for you.
When you open another user's calendar, their calendar will display beside yours in the calendar view, using the same format as what your calendar uses. In other words, if you view your calendar by the week (rather than by month or day), then your calendar-sharer's calendar will also be in week view.
You may customize your views to your heart's contents. Some customizing features include changing fonts, setting work week options, changing the number of days displayed, adding and removing holidays, coloring your appointments (a useful tool for prioritizing), and displaying your availability status. This last feature is very useful when scheduling meetings. When people are trying to schedule you for a meeting, your availability indicator (free, tentative, busy, out of office, or no information available) will help schedulers understand how best to schedule around your calendar.
Printing your calendar:
Printing the calendar is very useful at times. Here is how you go about it:
On the File menu, click Print and then in the Print style box, click the print style you want.
To print the details of appointments and meetings, in the Print Style box, click Calendar Details Style . click Calendar Details Style .
In the Start list and the End list, enter the first day and the last day to print.
To set other print options, such as the paper orientation or the fonts used, click Page Setup , and then select the options that you want.
Notes
To print the details of private appointments, clear the Hide Details of private appointments check box.
To print non-adjacent days, change to Week or Month view , select the days you want to print, and then on the File menu, click Print .
How about printing a blank calendar? Here is how that is done:
On the File menu, point to New , and then click Folder .
Type a name for the folder.
In the Folder contains list, click Calendar Items .
In the Select where to place the folder list, click Calendar , and then click OK.
On the Go menu, click Folder List .
In the Folder List , click the new folder you just created.
On the File menu, point to Page setup , and then click the print style you want.
Select the print style options you want, and then click Print .
Here is a link to more training if this subject intrigues you and you want to learn more. You will need to set aside about 45 minutes to complete it. http://office.microsoft.com/training/training.aspx?AssetID=RC010333631033
The Crabby Office Lady articles at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/FX010778051033.aspx also offer many helpful and useful tips on using Microsoft Office.
Well, that's about it on calendaring for this time around. Hopefully, you learned something new and useful about sharing calendars in MS Outlook. Our next issue will feature group scheduling, which adds a whole new dimension to calendaring and scheduling
Calendaring through MS Outlook
This is part 3 of a 3-part series on calendaring.
Part 3: Group Scheduling with MS Exchange
Scheduling is a feature of MS Exchange. Exchange is a server-based product, so you will likely not be able to do scheduling on your home computer, even if you use MS Outlook there. Because our employee e-mailboxes and calendars are stored on the server, we can not-only share our calendars with other Exchange users, but we can invite others to meetings via the scheduling screen. Many of us use this feature and find it to be very helpful, so it is worth noting how it is done.
Group scheduling is an added feature of the calendar, which can be put to good use by departments that need to schedule the same group of individuals regularly. It is easy to create a group, then invite that group to meetings. You can even invite only part of the group if it is relevant to do so.
Here is how it works. Start by adding a new group to your calendar.
Bring up your Outlook calendar.
Click the Actions menu item and select View Group Schedules… as shown in the graphic below.
This brings up a small window with options to create a new group, open an existing group or delete a group. Click New… to create a new group; give your group a name (whatever makes sense to describe the group's purpose); and click ok.
This brings up the window shown below, which is where you add the group's members. The members are pulled from all of your address books, which include your contacts, the office mailboxes and office groups. You add the names of individuals or email distribution groups on the lines below Group Members.
Scheduling a meeting with your group is easy. Simply click the drop-down button for Make Meeting and select from the options to send an email or schedule a meeting.
Group scheduling can be a powerful and convenient way to schedule meetings with particular groups of people. Meetings scheduled this way will show up as invitations in group members' email.
* * * * *
While we're on the subject of MS Outlook, here are a few more helpful tips for using the application:
Set a Reminder:
If you are in your inbox and you read an important message that you; 1) do not have time to respond to fully; or 2) need to respond to on a certain date, you can set a reminder to reply to the message later. Right-click the message you want to set the reminder for, point to “ Follow Up ,” and then click “ Add Reminder .” In the Due By list, click the date when you have to complete the reply. In the second list, click a time. In the Flag color list, click the flag color you want, and then click “ OK .”
Find Related Messages:
If you read an email that you believe has other email messages with the same subject line, you can find the related messages quickly and easily. To find related messages, right-click the message, and then on the shortcut menu, point to “ Find All” and click “ Related Messages .” The Advanced Find dialog box appears with a list of related messages.
Using the Bcc:
Sometimes you may need to send messages to multiple people without revealing other recipients' identities. To send a message to someone without other recipients of the message knowing, use the Bcc line in the message. Bcc stands for blind carbon copy. If you add someone's name to the Bcc line, a copy of the message is sent to that person, but his or her name is not visible to other recipients. This feature is often used during the holiday season when sending a holiday greeting (from home). You can place all of your friends' and relatives' addresses in the Bcc line and show only your own address in the To line, so that your address list is not shared with everyone. Some etiquette to remember if you are the Bcc recipient of a message: it would probably not be appropriate to reply to all if you are a bcc recipient, as the other recipients would then know you were blind carbon copied on the message. If you do not see the Bcc field in your compose message window, you can simply add it by clicking the Options… button on the Outlook email toolbar and clicking bcc. If you are an Outlook Web Access (Web-based email) user, the Bcc field should automatically appear in a new message window.
To reply to the current e-mail message, press CTRL+R.
To forward the current e-mail message, press CTRL+F.
To delete the current e-mail message, press CTRL+D.