Integration for Notes can be configured either to look for problematic repeating/recurring meeting activities or to ignore them. In the case of the latter, all events will be allowed to proceed to their destinations untouched. However, these unsupported events cause unexpected and unwanted calendar workflow behavior. Calendars are often not updated correctly without any indiction to the chairperson or invitees. In the case of the former, Integration for Notes will stop the problematic activity and send a failure notification to the activity originator. Optionally, Integration for Notes can be configured to send a failure notification to a designated administrator or multiple administrators. The text of this delivery failure is also customizable using the BTMULTISCHEDREPORTTEXTx NOTES.INI variable.
For example:
Dear User
You are performing an operation on a repeating/recurring meeting, which is not supported in a mixed environment. Unsupported functionality includes:
Scheduling or rescheduling one or more occurrence(s) of a meeting using an unsupported (complex) recurrence pattern.
Adding one or more invitees to a meeting, who reside in a different environment than yours.
Please cancel the original meeting and schedule a new one using a supported pattern.
There are several options in the Notes implementation of repeating meetings, which are not available in Microsoft Outlook. Likewise, there are several options in the Microsoft Outlook implementation of repeating meetings, which are not available in Notes. When these options are used in scheduling or modifying a repeating meeting, they will be intercepted and handled based on the configuration options described earlier in this document.
Unsupported Recurrence Pattern Originating in Notes
Yearly repeating meetings on the last day of the month, generated from Notes to Outlook, causes an unsupported meeting pattern message to be received in Outlook.
Modifying Meeting Subset in Notes
As stated earlier in the document, Notes supports rescheduling, update, confirmation and cancellation of a subset of repeating meeting instances defined as “This instance and all previous instances” and “This instance and all future instances”. Since these options do not have an equivalent in Microsoft Outlook, they cannot be supported as part of a cross-platform calendar workflow.
Extending or Altering Recurrence Pattern in Microsoft Outlook
As stated earlier in the document, Microsoft Outlook supports modification or extension of a recurrence pattern. This functionality does not have an equivalent in Notes, therefore cannot be supported as part of a cross-platform calendar workflow.
Recurrence Pattern with No End Date in Microsoft Outlook
As stated earlier in the document, Microsoft Outlook supports recurrence patterns without a defined end date. This functionality does not have an equivalent in Notes, therefore cannot be supported as part of a cross-platform calendar workflow.
Handling of the Entire Series Reschedule in Notes
Notes treats the rescheduling of the entire repeating meeting series as relative to any reschedules which have been previously made to any individual instance of the meeting. This functionality is described in the following example:
Original meeting:
Repeating meeting was scheduled to start on Monday and repeat every day for 5 days from 9 A.M. to 9:15 A.M.
Subsequent individual modification events followed by reschedule of the entire series:
Tuesday’s occurrence was rescheduled to take place from 10 A.M. to 10:15 A.M.
Wednesday’s occurrence was rescheduled to take place from 8 A.M. to 8:30 A.M.
Thursday’s occurrence was cancelled
Then the entire meeting was rescheduled to take place from 1 P.M. to 1:15 P.M.
Resulting meeting dates/times:
Monday: 1 P.M. to 1:15 P.M.
Tuesday: 2 P.M. to 2:15 P.M.
Wednesday: 12 noon to 12:30 P.M.
Thursday: no meeting
Friday: 1 P.M. to 1:15 P.M.
Microsoft Outlook treats rescheduling of the entire repeating meeting series as an absolute event, ignoring any previously made changes to individual occurrences. This functionality is described in the following example:
Original meeting:
Repeating meeting was scheduled to start on Monday and repeat every day for 5 days from 9 A.M. to 9:15 A.M.
Subsequent individual modification events followed by reschedule of the entire series:
Tuesday’s occurrence was rescheduled to take place from 10 A.M. to 10:15 A.M.;
Wednesday’s occurrence was rescheduled to take place from 8 A.M. to 8:30 A.M.;
Thursday’s occurrence was cancelled;
Then the entire meeting was rescheduled to take place from 1 P.M. to 1:15 P.M.
Resulting meeting dates/times:
Monday: 1 P.M. to 1:15 P.M.
Tuesday: 1 P.M. to 1:15 P.M.
Wednesday: 1 P.M. to 1:15 P.M.
Thursday: 1 P.M. to 1:15 P.M.
Friday: 1 P.M. to 1:15 P.M.
In another example of rescheduling repeating meetings, consider the following and its outcome.
Original meeting:
An Outlook user schedules a repeating meeting to start on Monday and repeat every day for 5 days from 9 A.M. for an hour.
Subsequent individual modification events followed by reschedule of the entire series:
Wednesday’s occurrence was rescheduled to take place from 1.00 P.M.
Then the entire meeting was rescheduled to take place from 10.00 A.M. for an hour.
If the Outlook user used the Outlook client, then the Notes user will receive a message that the individual occurrence (Wednesday) has been canceled; and if the Outlook user used Outlook Web Access (OWA), then the Notes user will receive a message that the Wednesdays’ meeting has been rescheduled to 1.00 P.M.
In both cases, an NDR will be returned to the Outlook originator stating that rescheduling a series when an individual occurrence has already been rescheduled is not supported, and that the entire meeting should be canceled and rescheduled.
Although Integration for Notes successfully remediates repeating/recurring meeting workflow for the vast majority of cross-platform calendar events, there are still examples of functionality that cannot be supported. The most important success factor of any coexistence infrastructure implementation is the proper setting of expectations among end-users. Considering that limitations for the infrastructure are minimal, properly informing end-users about such limitations will avoid negative perception and attitude toward the coexistence solution.
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