Entourage calendar/time zone problem

[Mark Strom]

I'm using Entourage 11.2.3. Ever since the switch to daylight savings time,
when I add a new calendar event I get the warning "Event and computer time
zones do not match. In Calendar views, the even time is adjusted to display
correctly". What's going on? The computer time zone is correct, and in
Entourage preferences the default time zone is also set correctly. This is
more an annoyance than a problem but would like to find a fix. Thanks!

 

[Barry Wainwright [MVP]]

I'm using Entourage 11.2.3. Ever since the switch to daylight savings time,
when I add a new calendar event I get the warning "Event and computer time
zones do not match. In Calendar views, the even time is adjusted to display
correctly". What's going on? The computer time zone is correct, and in
Entourage preferences the default time zone is also set correctly. This is
more an annoyance than a problem but would like to find a fix. Thanks!

It's a minor bug in Entourage.

 

[Keysaw]

It's a minor bug in Entourage.

--
Barry Wainwright
Microsoft MVP (see http://mvp.support.microsoft.com for details)
Check out the Entourage User's WebLog for hints, tips and troubleshooting
<http://homepage.mac.com/barryw/weblog/weblog.html>

I think enough people are having this problem and have complained to
rank it above a _minor_ bug.

 

[markwplatt]

Not really minor, we have users that sync their blackberry to entourage
and then get meeting reminders 1 hour earlier than needed. So my
definition would be more than "minor"

 

[Paul Berkowitz]

I think enough people are having this problem and have complained to
rank it above a _minor_ bug.

No. EVERYBODY is having this issue. But it's still a minor bug. It doesn't
actually affect anything. Everything is correct - only the error banner is
wrong. Not a big deal. (There are some people in certain locations in
Australia who had a different issue for a while, where Daylight Savings
started at a different date than Entourage knew about.)

--
Paul Berkowitz
MVP MacOffice
Entourage FAQ Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/faq/index.html>
AppleScripts for Entourage: <http://macscripter.net/scriptbuilders/>

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PLEASE always state which version of Microsoft Office you are using -
**2004**, X or 2001. It's often impossible to answer your questions
otherwise.

 

[Michel Bintener]

No. EVERYBODY is having this issue.

I don't have it. GMT time zone, with daylight savings.

--
Michel Bintener
Microsoft MVP
Office:Mac (Word & Entourage)

***Always reply to the newsgroup.***

 

[rplatt]

I would say that it is an actual issue because my meeting invitations
are going to other users and they are all thinking are appointments are
1 hour before my intended time...I have stopped using Entourage for
Meeting Invitations for just this reason...

 

[Charles Pickrell]

I agree with rplatt. I received an iCal invite from a friend of mine
and all the events were off by an hour. We are both in PST and in the
same town. If every event states that the time zone is wrong, how do
you know when it actually is? This is a very serious bug in a
calendaring tool and should be addresed by Microsoft, even if it is
just a hotfix.

MVPs - do you have the ability to report this up to the product team,
or do we need to do it directly through microsoft.com?

Charles

 

[Barry Wainwright [MVP]]

I don't have it. GMT time zone, with daylight savings.

When Paul said 'everybody', he meant 'everybody in america' - it's a common
US misconception that there is nobody else in the world ;-)

(I'm also in GMT, and not seeing a problem

 

[Paul Berkowitz]

When Paul said 'everybody', he meant 'everybody in america' - it's a common
US misconception that there is nobody else in the world ;-)

So many people had reported it I assumed it was universal. People don't
generally report here that they don't have a problem. ;-) Furthermore, I'm
not American, although I now live in the US, and I lived for 21 years in
England, so I'm vaguely aware of the location.

I don't believe that nationality has anything to do with it. We've heard
from several people in Australia already, but some of them (Melbourne's time
zone, I think it's called Eastern there) at least had a separate - real -
problem.

(I'm also in GMT, and not seeing a problem

I'd be very interested to know if it's only GMT time zone - actually you're
in British Summer Time now, not GMT - who don't have the problem, or also if
other time zones east of GMT but west of the International Date Line are OK.
It might be that only you are OK.


--
Paul Berkowitz
MVP MacOffice
Entourage FAQ Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/faq/index.html>
AppleScripts for Entourage: <http://macscripter.net/scriptbuilders/>

Please "Reply To Newsgroup" to reply to this message. Emails will be
ignored.

PLEASE always state which version of Microsoft Office you are using -
**2004**, X or 2001. It's often impossible to answer your questions
otherwise.

 

[Paul Berkowitz]

I would say that it is an actual issue because my meeting invitations
are going to other users and they are all thinking are appointments are
1 hour before my intended time...I have stopped using Entourage for
Meeting Invitations for just this reason..

Entourage seems to be creating a faulty Standard vs. Daylight time zone
schedule. If you drag an event to the desktop to make an .ics file, then
open it in TextEdit or any test editor, the Time Zone section of it is:

---------

TZIDacific Time (US & Canada); Tijuana

X-ENTOURAGE-TZID:1

X-ENTOURAGE-CFTIMEZONE:US/Pacific

BEGIN:STANDARD

TZNAME:Standard Time

RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;INTERVAL=1;BYDAY=-1SU;BYMONTH=10

TZOFFSETFROM:-0700

TZOFFSETTO:-0800

DTSTART:20001029T020000

END:STANDARD

BEGINAYLIGHT

TZNAMEaylight Savings Time

RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;INTERVAL=1;BYDAY=1SU;BYMONTH=4

TZOFFSETFROM:-0800

TZOFFSETTO:-0700

DTSTART:20010401T020000

ENDAYLIGHT

END:VTIMEZONE

-------------------


See the start time for DAYLIGHT? DTSTART:20010401T020000. That's April 1,
2001 with a recurrence rule of
RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;INTERVAL=1;BYDAY=1SU;BYMONTH=4

So it should come into effect on the 1st Sunday of the 4th month (April)
every year. It changes the TimeZone offset (from GMT) to -0700 (7 hours
earlier) rather than -0800 (8 hrs earlier) which pertains from the first
Sunday in October. That's correct/So I'm not sure why it's being misread.

The start time for this event is given as

DTSTART;TZID="Pacific Time (US & Canada); Tijuana":20060501T140000

That's 2 PM (T140000) which in fact is correct.

Entourage did not used to have all this time zone info before v11.2.3.

Events dragged from iCal have :

---------------

BEGIN:VTIMEZONE

TZID:America/Los_Angeles

LAST-MODIFIED:20060505T044739Z

BEGINAYLIGHT

DTSTART:20040404T100000

TZOFFSETTO:-0700

TZOFFSETFROM:+0000

TZNAMEDT

ENDAYLIGHT

BEGIN:STANDARD

DTSTART:20041031T020000

TZOFFSETTO:-0800

TZOFFSETFROM:-0700

TZNAMEST

END:STANDARD

END:VTIMEZONE

-------------

See the TZOFFSETFROM:+0000 ? Entourage has TZOFFSETFROM:-0800 . Quite a
difference. Perhaps that's the problem. (Both have the same
TZOFFSETTO:-0700.)

In the case of people in Britain, the TZOFFSETFROM:+0000 (or -0000) would
be the same in both cases, so maybe that's why they don't have any problem.

--
Paul Berkowitz
MVP MacOffice
Entourage FAQ Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/faq/index.html>
AppleScripts for Entourage: <http://macscripter.net/scriptbuilders/>

Please "Reply To Newsgroup" to reply to this message. Emails will be
ignored.

PLEASE always state which version of Microsoft Office you are using -
**2004**, X or 2001. It's often impossible to answer your questions
otherwise.

 

[Michel Bintener]

I'd be very interested to know if it's only GMT time zone - actually you're
in British Summer Time now, not GMT - who don't have the problem, or also if
other time zones east of GMT but west of the International Date Line are OK.
It might be that only you are OK.

As an experiment, I quit Entourage and set my system to GMT+1 (Paris),
relaunched Entourage and changed its preferences to create new events in
that specific time zone, and once again, no warning.

--
Michel Bintener
Microsoft MVP
Office:Mac (Word & Entourage)

***Always reply to the newsgroup.***