Topic: sharing calendars in outlook 2002

[helen]

We currently have outlook 2000 our pc's and use net folders in order to see each others calendars.  
We will soon be upgrading to outlook 2002 (decision out of my control), and will loose net folders.  I was hoping to get some advice on a alternative to net folders that works well with the March SME Server V5 and outlook 2002.  

Thanks
Helen

[jb]

Helen,

I can't answer your question, but what is net folders?  I have someone that is using OL 2000 and would like to share calendars.

[Charlie Hartill]

Helen,

Exchange Server is still Microsoft's killer app. There are alternatives, but none, it seems to me that are easy to use or even a satisfactory replacement. Most of them rely on web interfaces which are just too slow and fiddly for everyday use & don't interact with Outlook.

Hell, even Outlook's interaction with IMAP servers is crippled, presumably to tie people in with MS software.

Nothing would delight me more than to hear that I'm wrong.

Charlie

[Michiel]

There is however a poor-man's solution for the calendar offered by M$ themselves
You can automatically store your calendar free/busy information in a file in an i-bay, which will allow other users to check your availability when creating a meeting request. http://office.microsoft.com/assistance/2002/articles/olWebShareScheduleinfo4.aspx

Sure, you can't delegate the calendar to your secretary, view the actual activites of your employees, etc. but for meeting requests it works adequatly.

Michiel

[Rob Wellesley]

helen wrote:

> We will soon be upgrading to outlook 2002 (decision out of my
> control), and will loose net folders.  I was hoping to get
> some advice on a alternative to net folders

Check this helen. We use it with clients that need sharing. License is still cheaper than an Exchange CAL

http://www.vaita.com/index.asp

[helen]

Try the microsoft knowledge base article:
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=195867

[helen]

Try the microsoft knowledge base article:
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=195867

[Maggard]

helen wrote:
>
> We currently have outlook 2000 our pc's and use net folders
> in order to see each others calendars.
> We will soon be upgrading to outlook 2002 (decision out of my
> control), and will loose net folders.  I was hoping to get
> some advice on a alternative to net folders that works well
> with the March SME Server V5 and outlook 2002.

The short answer is that there is no good way to share MS Outlook calendars other then using MS Exchange.

NetFolders is one of those semi-features MS burped up a few years ago and promptly ignored. It was billed as being able to synchronize folders on Outlook via email sans server. In truth it was flaky as all get out and soon disappeared from most folk's attention.

MS no longer supports it (never did really).

There are any number of alternatives for sharing calendars. Hit http://slipstick.com for lists of third party tools. However while many are some-large-percentage replacements they're all still awkward quirky kludges. Everyone dreams of an Exchange-replacement but nobody has yet delivered an efficient, easily installed, & managed alternative that works well with Outlook.

One alternative strategy is to break calendering/scheduling out from Outlook and use a dedicated client/server like MeetingMaker. Another is to go web-based. For the latter there are any number of solutions that integrate nicely with SME. run some searches here for more information, check out Kronolith.

In the meantime say goodbye to NetFolders (good riddance for many folks) and prepare to cough up for the MS backend.

[Karl W. Mueller]

Hi Helen,

I do not use Outlook, so I dont know much about the "net-folders" problem. But there is a exchange-server available for linux. (exchange4linux) You can get a test-version at www.billworkgroup.org. The test-version is limited to 5 users but seems to have no other restrictions.

The commercial product is called easygate. (www.neuberger-hughes.de)

Hope, this helps

Karl

[Maggard]

BTW, /. (a popular geek site) just posted a question like yours yesterday and now has LOTS of suggestions/alternatives/metadiscussion.

http://slashdot.org/article.pl/06/30/1743216

Going through it I still don't see any 100% replacement for Exchange (Global Address Lists, Shared Folders, schedule conflict management, support for the full range of data types, etc.) but if you're willing to compromise there are alternatives. The better ones are all $ but less then M$.

[James Douglas]

Alternatives to netfolders I found are:

USING OUTLOOK

http://www.outlook4team.com/

http://www.vaita.com/index.asp

WEB BASED (prob many more)

http://www.billworkgroup.org/billworkgroup/home

http://www.suse.com/us/business/products/suse_business/openexchange/index.html

http://www.moregroupware.org/

http://www.phpgroupware.org/

[Jon Roberts]

There is a product that you can install as an add-in to Outlook called Bynari Insight Connector.  It means that you can use an IMAP server instead of Exchange and it works well.  Search forums for Bynari or IMAP.

Problem is it needs IMAP with ACL, which is not currently available on SME (as far as I know).  Bynari do their own Linux IMAP server, which works great on SME - right up until I reboot the server.  Then the SME services kick back in & the server grinds to a halt.

I'm no Linux expert, so if anyone has any tips I can try to ensure the SME services stay disabled & don't override the new IMAP install would be appreciated.