Getting Entourage and Exchangfe server to actually work

M

Maarten

Can anybody explain to me why it is such a pain to get entourage to
work with the exchange server to synchronize calender events and such?

I have been trying to get this to work (on and off) for months now,
without any success. I don't get any help from our ICT people since
they just do not support anything mac related.

What really frustrates me that when I use the trial version of a
program called Groupcal to export my iCal calender to the exchange
server, it works instantly and all my calender events show up in OWA.
Then I use the same settings with Entourage for the Free/Busy server,
and I get no synching whatsoever. Moreover there is no insight to what
Entourage is doing, whether it actually connects to the Free/Busy
server, or WHEN it actually tries. An option 'synch now' or something
would at least let us know instantly whether it is working or not.

It is amazing that with a third party software package DEMO, I get
everything working instantly and with a microsoft program it has to be
ever so complicated. Needless to say of course that the automatic
configuration option in Entourage fails altogether of course...

PS mail is no problem. I have been using it using IMAP and our
exchange server for years.
 
P

Paul Robichaux [MVP]

Can anybody explain to me why it is such a pain to get entourage to
work with the exchange server to synchronize calender events and such?

I have been trying to get this to work (on and off) for months now,
without any success. I don't get any help from our ICT people since
they just do not support anything mac related.

What really frustrates me that when I use the trial version of a
program called Groupcal to export my iCal calender to the exchange
server, it works instantly and all my calender events show up in OWA.
Then I use the same settings with Entourage for the Free/Busy server,
and I get no synching whatsoever. Moreover there is no insight to what
Entourage is doing, whether it actually connects to the Free/Busy
server, or WHEN it actually tries. An option 'synch now' or something
would at least let us know instantly whether it is working or not.
Click to expand...

Maarten, what version of Entourage and Exchange are you using?

Cheers,
-Paul

--
Paul Robichaux <[email protected]>
MVP - Exchange
Exchange security book: http://www.e2ksecurity.com
FAQs: http://www.swinc.com/resource/exchange.htm &
http://www.swinc.com/resource/e2kfaq.htm
 
B

Bob Bernstein

I'll have to 100% agree with Maarten regarding Entourage/Exchange setup -
especially on the free/busy server / meeting requests/appointments.
Global Address Book was no treat either and it's half working if I type in
the full e-mail address.

I'm running Panther with 10.1.4 Entourage.

E-Mail works just fine, although when people forward back my messages, the
punctuation always gets messed up (apostrophe's turn into commas).

I've followed all the FAQ's and advise and fact of the matter is, my
calendar events and appointments come across without the accept/decline
buttons. They just look like e-mails.

I've tried TCP Flow with the Outlook Web Access, the Entourage/Exchange FAQ
and various amounts of advise in this forum.

Outlook 2001 on the OS/9 emulator works fine. It's just a dog to use and
doesn't seem to give me the settings I need to make MICROSOFT Entourage work
smoothly like Outlook. There's no indication whether or not I have the
proper free/busy server setup. I assume the free/busy server setup properly
is what will make the appointments work properly in Entourage.

Paul - Maybe you've solved this a few times....
 
J

Jeremy Reichman

If your Exchange environment is front-end and back-end, like ours, I've
found your Exchange admin needs to replicate the free/busy Public Folders to
the front end servers (where OWA runs).

Otherwise, you need to enter the direct hostname of the server that runs
your Public Folders. This is not what your Exchange admin will typically
want. The MVPs site tells you how to find where the Public Folders are
hosted by using Outlook 2003 on Windows -- you can do this, but you'll
actually need to open a Public Folder to get Outlook 2003 to report the
Public Folder host to you. (Found that out the hard way.)

Your calendar will be transfer to/from Exchange by just entering your front
end server (OWA) address. The free/busy information isn't so easy, so unless
your Exchange environment is set up to replicate it to the front end, you
can't use the same host as your OWA server.

HTH.
 
M

Maarten

Paul Robichaux said:
Maarten, what version of Entourage and Exchange are you using?

Cheers,
-Paul
Click to expand...

Paul, I use the latest version of entourage vX (v10.1.4 (030702) ).
The exchange server is Exchange 2000 (with at least sp 2).

Thanx,Maarten
 
M

Maarten

Jeremy Reichman said:
If your Exchange environment is front-end and back-end, like ours, I've
found your Exchange admin needs to replicate the free/busy Public Folders to
the front end servers (where OWA runs).
Click to expand...

Thanks. I am affraid that is going to be hard (since I don't get any
cooperation from our exchange admins), but I'll ask them anyway.
Otherwise, you need to enter the direct hostname of the server that runs
your Public Folders. This is not what your Exchange admin will typically
want. The MVPs site tells you how to find where the Public Folders are
hosted by using Outlook 2003 on Windows -- you can do this, but you'll
actually need to open a Public Folder to get Outlook 2003 to report the
Public Folder host to you. (Found that out the hard way.)
Click to expand...

This one is going to be harder for me, since I don't have access to a
pc that has outlook 2003 (and no privileges to install it...)
Your calendar will be transfer to/from Exchange by just entering your front
end server (OWA) address. The free/busy information isn't so easy, so unless
your Exchange environment is set up to replicate it to the front end, you
can't use the same host as your OWA server.
Click to expand...

I'll ask the sysadmins. However, How come thatI can easily publish my
iCal calender on OWA using ths third party software demo? Using the
same settings, Entourage does not seem to work... And I'd rather use
Entourage, since this (should) give me more options asnd I'm using it
as an email client anyway.
 
M

Maarten

Jeremy Reichman said:
If your Exchange environment is front-end and back-end, like ours, I've
found your Exchange admin needs to replicate the free/busy Public Folders to
the front end servers (where OWA runs).
Click to expand...

Thanks. I am affraid that is going to be hard (since I don't get any
cooperation from our exchange admins), but I'll ask them anyway.
Otherwise, you need to enter the direct hostname of the server that runs
your Public Folders. This is not what your Exchange admin will typically
want. The MVPs site tells you how to find where the Public Folders are
hosted by using Outlook 2003 on Windows -- you can do this, but you'll
actually need to open a Public Folder to get Outlook 2003 to report the
Public Folder host to you. (Found that out the hard way.)
Click to expand...

This one is going to be harder for me, since I don't have access to a
pc that has outlook 2003 (and no privileges to install it...)
Your calendar will be transfer to/from Exchange by just entering your front
end server (OWA) address. The free/busy information isn't so easy, so unless
your Exchange environment is set up to replicate it to the front end, you
can't use the same host as your OWA server.
Click to expand...

I'll ask the sysadmins. However, How come thatI can easily publish my
iCal calender on OWA using ths third party software demo? Using the
same settings, Entourage does not seem to work... And I'd rather use
Entourage, since this (should) give me more options asnd I'm using it
as an email client anyway.
 
M

Maarten

Jeremy Reichman said:
If your Exchange environment is front-end and back-end, like ours, I've
found your Exchange admin needs to replicate the free/busy Public Folders to
the front end servers (where OWA runs).
Click to expand...

Thanks. I am affraid that is going to be hard (since I don't get any
cooperation from our exchange admins), but I'll ask them anyway.
Otherwise, you need to enter the direct hostname of the server that runs
your Public Folders. This is not what your Exchange admin will typically
want. The MVPs site tells you how to find where the Public Folders are
hosted by using Outlook 2003 on Windows -- you can do this, but you'll
actually need to open a Public Folder to get Outlook 2003 to report the
Public Folder host to you. (Found that out the hard way.)
Click to expand...

This one is going to be harder for me, since I don't have access to a
pc that has outlook 2003 (and no privileges to install it...)
Your calendar will be transfer to/from Exchange by just entering your front
end server (OWA) address. The free/busy information isn't so easy, so unless
your Exchange environment is set up to replicate it to the front end, you
can't use the same host as your OWA server.
Click to expand...

I'll ask the sysadmins. However, How come thatI can easily publish my
iCal calender on OWA using ths third party software demo? Using the
same settings, Entourage does not seem to work... And I'd rather use
Entourage, since this (should) give me more options asnd I'm using it
as an email client anyway.
 
Top