Auto-adding to a group calendar

[garethm]

We would like a system whereby people could book events such as their holidays in both their own calendar and on a shared calendar.

One way of doing this would be to create a resource called "holidays", set to auto-accept meeting request. Then to book a holiday, you'd create a meeting covering the days you need, and invite this resource to the meeting, which would populate both calendars.

The problem with this is that for everyone to be able to see the "holidays" calendar, they'd need to explicitly "open shared calendar" in Outlook, and the information wouldn't be available in SWA.

Alternatively, we can create a "Holidays" calendar as a Public Folder - which *is* automatically available to both SWA users and within Outlook - but there doesn't seem to be a way of inviting a Public Folder to a meeting. Indeed, in Outlook if you create a new Meeting Request in your own calendar, click the "Scheduling" tab and then click "Add Others", "Add Public Folder" appears but is greyed out!

Is this a setup/configuration error on my part, or is it just not possible? Do any of you use a different solution to this problem?

[dr_c]

Alternatively, we can create a "Holidays" calendar as a Public Folder - which *is* automatically available to both SWA users and within Outlook - but there doesn't seem to be a way of inviting a Public Folder to a meeting. Indeed, in Outlook if you create a new Meeting Request in your own calendar, click the "Scheduling" tab and then click "Add Others", "Add Public Folder" appears but is greyed out!

Any word on how to make something like this work?

[Valerion]

The problem with this is that for everyone to be able to see the "holidays" calendar, they'd need to explicitly "open shared calendar" in Outlook

One way around this is to open the "Holidays" mailbox in Outlook and make the default permissions at least Reviewer. Then in Outlook you can go to Tools -> Scalix Properties -> Advanced and add the Holidays mailbox to your Outlook profile.

[garethm]

This work-around doesn't help, unfortunately - it requires the user to take explicit steps in Outlook, and isn't an option in SWA.

[sckemp]

Curious if you found a solution. The best thing I could think of was just to copy the vacation item from your calendar to the shared calenar ( right click drag, pretty easy ).

[garethm]

Sadly, no solution. A two-step solution is one step too far for some of our members of staff!