Is it possible to NOT sync a calendar with the exchange server?

[vicki]

Until now, I have had to connect to the server with a POP account
rather than as an Exchange account. I would rather not have my
calendar events (or contacts, for that matter) synched with the
exchange server. I prefer to only keep the entries on my computer. Is
that an option?

 

[Andy Ruff]

In SP2, you now have a local calendar/address book and an Exchange
calendar/address book. If you don't want it on the Exchange server, just
save/create the items within your local calendar/address book.

-Andy

 

[Paul Berkowitz]

Until now, I have had to connect to the server with a POP account
rather than as an Exchange account. I would rather not have my
calendar events (or contacts, for that matter) synched with the
exchange server. I prefer to only keep the entries on my computer. Is
that an option?

Yes. in SP2, the local (On Mt Computer) calendar and address book do not
sync with the Exchange server.

--
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
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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.

 

[ehamburg]

I understand the concept of the local calendar and the exchange
calendar. What will work best for me is to copy all current exchange
calendar items to the local calendar as well as my contacts, which I
have already done, and then delete the exchange calendar and contact
items. My concern going forward is that if I get an invite from
someone from my exchange account and that I expect that it will get
added to the exchange calendar and not show up in my local calendar
(and subsequent sync to my PDA) unless I drag the invite into the local
calendar. Is there a way to disable the exchange calendar and assure
that only the local calendar is used?

Thanks,

Eric

 

[Paul Berkowitz]

I understand the concept of the local calendar and the exchange
calendar. What will work best for me is to copy all current exchange
calendar items to the local calendar as well as my contacts, which I
have already done, and then delete the exchange calendar and contact
items. My concern going forward is that if I get an invite from
someone from my exchange account and that I expect that it will get
added to the exchange calendar and not show up in my local calendar
(and subsequent sync to my PDA) unless I drag the invite into the local
calendar. Is there a way to disable the exchange calendar and assure
that only the local calendar is used?

No. You'll have to keep dragging exchange invitations over to local calendar
and deleting from Exchange. I don't believe you can delete the actual
primary Exchange calendar in toto, but I haven't tried.

--
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.

 

[Scott Wilkie]

This is SERIOUSLY LAME!

I don't want to use the exchange calendar, and prior to this SP2 update, I
never did.

But now whenever I receive 'invitations' they are added to my exchange
calendar ONLY.

C'mon... seriously... there is really no way to fix this and skip the
exchange calendar??? It's hard to believe that MS would be that
shortsighted!

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

sw

 

[Nathan Herring [MSFT]]

This is SERIOUSLY LAME!

I don't want to use the exchange calendar, and prior to this SP2 update, I
never did.

But now whenever I receive 'invitations' they are added to my exchange
calendar ONLY.

C'mon... seriously... there is really no way to fix this and skip the
exchange calendar??? It's hard to believe that MS would be that
shortsighted!

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

sw

So if you get an invitation in a non-Exchange mail account, it still goes to
the Exchange calendar? That's not what happens on my machine.

That an Exchange-based mail containing an Exchange-based invitation goes to
your Exchange-based calendar makes sense to me... doing something like what
you're describing sounds like customization.

On the other hand, you could have a schedule run an applescript that
moved/copied calendar events over to your local calendar, but event updates
and cancelations and whatnot are going to be hard to process.

-nh

 

[Scott Wilkie]

Thanks for the response, Nathan. Appreciate your thoughts.

However, the problem arises in that there is NO WAY to view a single
calendar of all of my events (Local and Exchange). If there were, I'd be
fine with putting my work stuff on the Exchange calendar.

1) But the fact that I have to switch back and forth between TWO calendars
just to check if I'm out of town for work (Exchange calendar) which would
conflict with my daughter's piano recital (Local calendar) is, as I said
before... inexcusably shortsighted and LAME.

2) And yes, you are correct about the hassle of updates as well. I manually
moved all of my Exchange events to my local calendar yesterday. But when I
received updates to two of those events today, Entourage placed the updates
in my (now empty) Exchange calendar. When those updates are dragged to the
Local calendar, they (of course) don't correctly update the existing event,
but instead create a SECOND event on the same day. Stupid.

So, you're basically forced to use the Exchange calendar, or be screwed into
this self-updating ritual day-in and day-out.

Just hard to imagine that NOBODY at Microsoft might have thought that
somebody would want to use only the local calendar?

Or even more basic... NO WAY to view all events from both calendars in a
single calendar view?!? How can that have escaped EVERY programmer of this
software?

sw

 

[Nathan Herring [MSFT]]

Just hard to imagine that NOBODY at Microsoft might have thought that
somebody would want to use only the local calendar?

I have to say that the desire to do that was new to me (at least with
regards to people using an Exchange account), but I am not on the program
management staff.

Or even more basic... NO WAY to view all events from both calendars in a
single calendar view?!? How can that have escaped EVERY programmer of this
software?

This, on the other hand, is something we're aware of. We did, however, need
to get the enabling technology out the door to support our Exchange
customers, so it's one step at a time.

-nh

 

[Scott Wilkie]

Just hard to imagine that NOBODY at Microsoft might have thought that

I have to say that the desire to do that was new to me (at least with
regards to people using an Exchange account), but I am not on the program
management staff.

Wow, really? Then PLEASE pass that urgent request to the program management
staff. We had a heated discussion about this in our office today
(unfortunately almost everyone has installed the SP2 update). And virtually
everybody in our department uses Entourage as their only PIM, with many
personal categories in the local calendar and work events now forced into
the Exchange calendar.

We can't be the only ones needing that functionality.

This, on the other hand, is something we're aware of. We did, however, need
to get the enabling technology out the door to support our Exchange
customers, so it's one step at a time.

This is urgently needed. It would at least be a usable "workaround" until
events can be handled and updated correctly in a local calendar.

Please alert the programmers. A simple "Combined Calendar" view would
suffice.

Thank you for your time, Nathan.

sw

 

[Bill Bryson]

I believe the best method is not to be moving all your data from the
Exchange calendar to the local calendar but to put your personal events on
the Exchange calendar marked as "private" and assigned a "personal" category
to each event when it is created.

When you create an event that is personal, create the event and then select
the Options toolbar button and select Private. Select the Categories
toolbar button and select "Personal". You now have personal meetings color
coded and marked private so that IF you share your exchange calendar with
others they should not be able to see the details of your personal meetings.

Bill

 

[Scott Wilkie]

Thanks for the tip, Bill. I fully understand the concept. However, it would
make much more sense to keep my private events in MY private calendar, and
not have to mark them as such every time I make a new event. There's just no
valid reason that I should have to put personal stuff onto an Exchange
server.

I do appreciate your suggestion though.

sw

 

[DanR]

I, for one, may have to stop using Entourage because of this new
calendar 'feature.' I'm a small business owner with my own email
domain, and just a few clients. One of my clients has set me up on
their exchange server for various reasons. Using Entourage, I was able
to manage personal and professional contacts using my personal email
domain, and use the exchange server for that one specific client.

Imagine my surprise when I see that ALL my contacts AND calendar events
are now on a client's exchange server. My first thought was "Who do I
sue for leaking my personal business contacts and calendar events to an
outside client?" My next thought was how do I stop this insanity
immediately so I can remedy this catastrophic event. I've been able
to copy my contacts off the exchange server and onto my local machine,
and I'm now wondering how to move the calendar events (several hundred,
going back at least a year, and forward a month or more) off the
exchange server. Seems that an export/import will not preserve the
categories (important!). Can someone help me out with the details for
moving the calendar events off my client's server and back on to my own
machine, where they belong?

Dan Rosenfeld

naked, exposed and pissed off!

 

[Scott Wilkie]

I, for one, may have to stop using Entourage because of this new
calendar 'feature.' I'm a small business owner with my own email
domain, and just a few clients. One of my clients has set me up on
their exchange server for various reasons. Using Entourage, I was able
to manage personal and professional contacts using my personal email
domain, and use the exchange server for that one specific client.

Imagine my surprise when I see that ALL my contacts AND calendar events
are now on a client's exchange server. My first thought was "Who do I
sue for leaking my personal business contacts and calendar events to an
outside client?" My next thought was how do I stop this insanity
immediately so I can remedy this catastrophic event. I've been able
to copy my contacts off the exchange server and onto my local machine,
and I'm now wondering how to move the calendar events (several hundred,
going back at least a year, and forward a month or more) off the
exchange server. Seems that an export/import will not preserve the
categories (important!). Can someone help me out with the details for
moving the calendar events off my client's server and back on to my own
machine, where they belong?

Dan Rosenfeld

naked, exposed and pissed off!

Well put, Dan! I couldn't agree more.

And it's staggering that NOBODY at Microsoft even considered that folks
would need to operate in both worlds simultaneously. Some project manager
there better be damn embarrassed. Worst of all - absolutely NO warning in
any upgrade documentation. Just "surprise"... you're now migrated to our new
Exchange system. No return. No downgrading. Infuriating.

Misery loves company, and I'm in exactly the same boat (along with all of my
co-workers) until they resolve this glaring issue.

Unbelievably stupid and simple-minded. Calendar "Feature" indeed.

sw

 

[Nathan Herring [MSFT]]

I'm going to assume you upgraded from 10.1.5 or later to SP 2. If you had
previously set your Calendar and Contacts not to sync with Exchange, then
during the upgrade, your local contacts would have remained local.
Otherwise, your local contacts would have synched up to the Exchange account
in the previous version, and you would have had the problem previously.

Am I misstating the situation?

Others have already reported similar instructions for moving events around,
but to recap:

Edit/Advanced Find...
Check only Calendar Events
Location: All Calendars (or just the Exchange Calendar)
Match: if any criteria are met
Criteria:
* Category is None
* Category is not None
Click Find

In the resulting table of calendar events, you can Select All, and then
Event/Move to/Calendar (On my computer). If "Calendar (On My Computer)"
isn't listed, you'll have to choose Choose Calendar... and then select it
from the resulting table. That will move all of your events to that
calendar, keeping all the categories and projects and links.

An analogous process will work for Contacts.

-nh

 

[Shahin]

Hi Dan,

I am also among the many people who was broadsided by this new
"feature" of Entourage. So I had to roll back my Office installation to
pre SP2. The only pleasant surprize so far has been that once I rolled
back my Entourage, since I had the synch feature still on, I got the
reverse situation happening which is that my local calendar and contact
folders got synched with what was copied over to the exchange server
during the SP2 upgrade. So, if you roll back your Entourage and then
open up a new datafile (unless you have a backup pre SP2), then your
local folders will automatically get populated. Hope this helps. Good
luck.

 

[DanR]

hello again,

was able to move all my events back to my local calendar. (thanks,
nathan)

I have automatic updates turned on so I'm not sure what version I went
from when SP2 was installed. I was prompted to install the
maintenenace, and just let it do its business. that's the same way my
OS-X maintenenace is installed.

DanR

 

[Andy Ruff]

Actually, in Entourage 2004, prior to SP2, EVERYTHING in your calendar and
contacts was synchronized with the Exchange server (the only way of working
around this was to use a category preference deep inside your Exchange
account settings).

If you didn't have this setting configured, all your events and contacts
show up on the Exchange server in SP2 just because that's exactly where they
already are. By going back to 2004 and re-synching, you're just seeing this
again. If you had never installed SP2, gone back, and created an Exchange
account, you'd see the exact same behavior as you are reporting now. SP2 is
not the culprit, it's 2004 pre-SP2.

With SP2, you can now make a distinction by having a separate calendar and
separate address book. It's a lot easier to keep your Exchange/work stuff
managed separately from your personal/local stuff.

-Andy