All-day and Multi-day appoints showing one day early with Exchange

[T-Fen]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: Intel
Email Client: Exchange

I have setup Entourage 2008 via the new account wizard to connect to my company Exchange mail account. I believe it's Exchange 2003. All has worked well thus far with one exception.

All-day events and multi-day events are showing up a day early. If I view the calendar via Outlook or using online WebDAV access, the appointments appear on the dates they should.

However, if an event created in Outlook on Windows has a defined start and end time, then it will appear correctly when viewed in Entourage. It is only all day and multi-day events that appear a day early. For example, if I create an all day event for Independence Day on July 4th in Outlook it appears on July 4th in Outlook and in the webmail client, but will appear on July 3rd in Entourage. Creating an event on July 4th that runs from 10:00AM to 11:00AM in Outlook appears correctly in *all* clients.

I had seen this behavior before when accessing the mail and calendar via Evolution on my Linux boxes (via WebDAV).

I thought this might be isolated to that platform and that using a Microsoft product with built-in Exchange support would provide an accurate calendar, but no.

I have checked and my company has apparently applied the DST patch and all Exchange servers are up-to-date with regard to their patching.

Has anyone else seen this? What is the solution to fix?

 

[Pawan Kapoor]

It seems like your exchange server and you are on a different time zone. Is
that correct?

 

[T-Fen]

Yes, that is correct. I am GMT -5 and the Exchange servers are GMT -6. However, would that explain why only all-day and multi-day appointments are off by a day and those with set times (11:00AM - 1:00PM) are not?

 

[Ed Kimball]

Yes, that is correct. I am GMT -5 and the Exchange servers are GMT -6.
However, would that explain why only all-day and multi-day appointments are
off by a day and those with set times (11:00AM - 1:00PM) are not?

Yes, it would. Only those events that occur at midnight (e.g., all day
events) would be a day off.

 

[T-Fen]

Yes, it would. Only those events that occur at midnight (e.g., all day

events) would be a day off.

OK. So what is the fix/workaround for this?

 

[Ed Kimball]

OK. So what is the fix/workaround for this?

I don't know. My Exchange server is in my time zone!

One of the more experienced Exchange users should have a better answer.

 

[William Smith [MVP]]

OK. So what is the fix/workaround for this?

I know this isn't really a time zone issue but I believe this problem is
caused by time zone differences.

First, let's check everywhere you can control your time zone settings.

1. Check your own computer under Apple menu --> System Preferences...
--> Date & Time --> Time Zone.

2. Log in to your Exchange account using Outlook Web Access (OWA). If
you're using Exchange Server 2003 or 2007 then look under Options.

If those don't work then let's do some digging. I may end up referring
you to the microsoft.public.exchange.admin newsgroup after all this but
I'm curious to know what you report here.

1. What is your Mac's time zone? What daylight saving scheme do you
follow (Daylight Saving in the U.S., Summer Time in Europe or something
else)?

2. What is your OWA time zone for your account?

3. Open a message that's displaying this problem. Do you see anything at
the top of the message window indicating time zone differences? What are
they?

4. Drag one of your problem events out of Entourage and to your Desktop.
This will create a copy of the event. Use TextEdit found in your
/Applications folder to open it. You'll see one line that begins with
"TZID" and it will display the event's time zone in both Standard and
Daylight Saving times. Does the time zone information near the top look
correct?

--

bill

Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>
YouTalk <http://nine.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/youtalk>
Twitter: follow <http://twitter.com/meck>

 

[T-Fen]

I know this isn't really a time zone issue but I believe this problem is
caused by time zone differences.

First, let's check everywhere you can control your time zone settings.

1. Check your own computer under Apple menu --> System Preferences...
--> Date & Time --> Time Zone.

2. Log in to your Exchange account using Outlook Web Access (OWA). If
you're using Exchange Server 2003 or 2007 then look under Options.

If those don't work then let's do some digging. I may end up referring
you to the microsoft.public.exchange.admin newsgroup after all this but
I'm curious to know what you report here.

1. What is your Mac's time zone? What daylight saving scheme do you
follow (Daylight Saving in the U.S., Summer Time in Europe or something
else)?

2. What is your OWA time zone for your account?

3. Open a message that's displaying this problem. Do you see anything at
the top of the message window indicating time zone differences? What are
they?

4. Drag one of your problem events out of Entourage and to your Desktop.
This will create a copy of the event. Use TextEdit found in your
/Applications folder to open it. You'll see one line that begins with
"TZID" and it will display the event's time zone in both Standard and
Daylight Saving times. Does the time zone information near the top look
correct?

1. Time zone on the Mac is EDT with daylight savings time in US)

2. OWA shows Eastern Time Zone as well (GMT -5)

3. Nothing shows in the calendar item when I open that would indicate there is a problem with a time offset. I have read some have seen a yellow band with these items, but none is shown with mine.

4. When I open an event with a time problem in TextEdit, here is where I believe the issue to be. Here are the important lines:

TZIDGMT-06.00) Central Time (US & Canada)
X-ENTOURAGE-CFTIMEZONE:
TZNAME:Standard Time
TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0600
DTSTART:16010101T020000
END:STANDARD
BEGINAYLIGHT
DTSTAMP:20090721T201636Z
DTSTART;TZID="(GMT-06.00) Central Time (US & Canada)":20090805T230000
DTEND;TZID="(GMT-06.00) Central Time (US & Canada)":20090806T230000

This is for an event that happens on 07AUG2009 that is showing in Entourage on 06AUG2009. This is a meeting request sent to me by someone in the Central Time Zone, but I also checked a multi-day event I created myself in the Eastern Time Zone and see the same TZ info.

 

[William Smith [MVP]]

1. Time zone on the Mac is EDT with daylight savings time in US)
Good.

2. OWA shows Eastern Time Zone as well (GMT -5)
Good.

3. Nothing shows in the calendar item when I open that would indicate
there is a problem with a time offset. I have read some have seen a
yellow band with these items, but none is shown with mine.
Good.

4. When I open an event with a time problem in TextEdit, here is
where I believe the issue to be. Here are the important lines:

TZIDGMT-06.00) Central Time (US & Canada)
X-ENTOURAGE-CFTIMEZONE:
TZNAME:Standard Time
TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0600
DTSTART:16010101T020000
END:STANDARD
BEGINAYLIGHT
DTSTAMP:20090721T201636Z
DTSTART;TZID="(GMT-06.00) Central Time (US & Canada)":20090805T230000
DTEND;TZID="(GMT-06.00) Central Time (US & Canada)":20090806T230000

This is for an event that happens on 07AUG2009 that is showing in
Entourage on 06AUG2009. This is a meeting request sent to me by
someone in the Central Time Zone, but I also checked a multi-day
event I created myself in the Eastern Time Zone and see the same TZ
info.

I'm comparing your event to an event created by someone in the same
timezone as myself (Central DST).

In my event, I see:

TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0600

I read this as "The event is current -0500 offset, which is Central DST.
The offset will be correct to -0600 Standard." Then your Mac's Date &
Time should correct for this and essentially make it appear as -0500 DST
again.

Your settings are the same, although you are in the Eastern time zone. I
would expect yours to be something like:

TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0500

I'm going to guess that the event was created by someone using Outlook
2003 for Windows. Correct? If so, this is related to a known issue:
<http://support.microsoft.com/kb/262451>. The workaround is to schedule
all-day events from 12:01 a.m. - 11:59 p.m. so that you're not crossing
the midnight threshold.

I thought this was addressed by a subsequent update to Outlook 2003.
Make sure the sender is fully patched himself. If he has the option to
use Outlook 2007 then the problem may be fixed there.

Hope this helps!

--

bill

Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>
YouTalk <http://nine.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/youtalk>
Twitter: follow <http://twitter.com/meck>

 

[T-Fen]

The events were created by Outlook 2007 on Windows...some may have been 2003 on Windows as well. The events in question appear correctly when viewed in Outlook 2007 or OWA. They do *not* appear correct when viewed in Entourage 2008.

I understand the workaround posted, but this seems a little extreme to have to consciously change all-day and multi-day events from the default to start at 12:01 AM and end at 11:59 PM. Not to mention every all-day and multi-day event sent to me by someone else. Plus, if I edit any of those and the sender updates the event, my changes are lost and I must repeat.

Surely there must be some way to fix this such that Entourage behaves like Outlook on Windows in this respect?

 

[William Smith [MVP]]

The events were created by Outlook 2007 on Windows...some may have
been 2003 on Windows as well. The events in question appear correctly
when viewed in Outlook 2007 or OWA. They do *not* appear correct when
viewed in Entourage 2008.

I understand the workaround posted, but this seems a little extreme
to have to consciously change all-day and multi-day events from the
default to start at 12:01 AM and end at 11:59 PM. Not to mention
every all-day and multi-day event sent to me by someone else. Plus,
if I edit any of those and the sender updates the event, my changes
are lost and I must repeat.

Surely there must be some way to fix this such that Entourage behaves
like Outlook on Windows in this respect?

Do be sure to post your question in the microsoft.public.exchange.admin
newsgroup for other suggestions. I would imagine someone there may know
exactly what's happening. Be sure to include the exact version and patch
level of your Exchange server. (Don't just say "the latest".)

Also, it's not uncommon for other applications like Outlook to cause
problems for other users even though users of Outlook have no problem.
In the example I cited, that particular problem was with Outlook and
only fixing Outlook would be the solution to the problem. Similarly,
Exchange Server 2003 has a problem with Active Sync Sent items that
appear to only affect Entourage. You'd think Entourage needs fixing but
in reality, the Exchange Server developers fixed this in Exchange Server
2007.

Moral of the story: While you may only see a problem with Entourage,
that doesn't mean Entourage is the cause of the problem.

--

bill

Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>
YouTalk <http://nine.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/youtalk>
Twitter: follow <http://twitter.com/meck>