WebDAV for Calendar Sharing in Outlook

I setup webdav on an IIS7 box and for some reason the calendars i'm posting to it aren't updating. User one updates calendar shared with user two. User two's calendar doesn't update. Any ideas what to look into?

thanksajdotcom

@Hubtech I haven't really used WebDAV but things that generally come to mind:

Check permissions on the calendar and that user two has permissions from user one to view/modify/whatever.
Check connection. Doubtful but eh.
Check settings for calendar.

Those are the big three that come to mind off-hand.

Dashrender

I didn't think WebDAV was automatic. doesn't the person sharing have to upload the changes to the server regularly? I've only read about this, not used it - wouldn't have worked for my situation.

thanksajdotcom

@Dashrender This is a good point too. Is there a refresh interval of some sort that needs to be set or lowered?

It is supposed to update on every send/receive but it's just saying "busy" and not giving much detail. Kind of a pain. Going through a lot at this company right now, and money isn't really an issue but we're changing a lot of operations as to how they do business and i didn't want to move their mail to office 365 quite yet.

thanksajdotcom

@Hubtech It might be the perfect time. Change everything over. Don't get everything squared away with one system to have to go back and redo it later.

Dashrender

@ajstringham said:

@Hubtech It might be the perfect time. Change everything over. Don't get everything squared away with one system to have to go back and redo it later.

Agreed.. but make sure that O365 will solve your problem first.

thanksajdotcom

@Dashrender Agreed.

PSX_Defector

Considering that Office 365 uses the Exchange calendar engine if I'm not mistaken, yeah, it's gonna work just fine. And if you are not using Exchange, you can always use Sharepoint. Either way, bound to be a much better solution than IIS7 hack and crap.

@PSX_Defector said:

Considering that Office 365 uses the Exchange calendar engine if I'm not mistaken, yeah, it's gonna work just fine. And if you are not using Exchange, you can always use Sharepoint. Either way, bound to be a much better solution than IIS7 hack and crap.

I agree, but alas i am working on fixing up some sort of hack and slash tonight. i'll let you know what I come up with.

So this is where I'm at. hopefully someone's got some insight.

Folder setup and tested permissions and users ability to write/read data to/from folder - Check
WebDAV setup, using windows authentication - Check
Calendars published and ics files created in Calendars webdav folder - Check
Published calendar initially shared with another user - check
Changes to calendars being updated to ICS files - check
Guest calendar viewer seeing updates - big ole X

any ideas as to why all the puzzle pieces are working except for the updating of appointments to the person whom the calendar had been shared?

If I delete the shared calendar and then open the ICS from the share, all of the updates are there, so I know that the edits are being pushed to the folder share, just not downloaded at the guest PC. weird

thanksajdotcom

@Hubtech I know Google uses ICS files for its calendars but I'm not sure sure about Exchange, etc. I'm thinking the issue may be that if you're reading it in Outlook that it's reading it as a static file. I see all calendar appts given to you by webinars, etc as .ics files. I'm curious to know what the difference is between a .ics used for a calendar invite and one used for a calendar you want to update. That is where I would start and based on what's happening, it sounds like it's treating it as a static file instead of dynamic.

@ajstringham said:

@Hubtech I know Google uses ICS files for its calendars but I'm not sure sure about Exchange, etc. I'm thinking the issue may be that if you're reading it in Outlook that it's reading it as a static file. I see all calendar appts given to you by webinars, etc as .ics files. I'm curious to know what the difference is between a .ics used for a calendar invite and one used for a calendar you want to update. That is where I would start and based on what's happening, it sounds like it's treating it as a static file instead of dynamic.

I believe ICS stands for internet calendar. Exchange uses the pst. The ICS i'm working with is their entire calendar pushed to a folder. I've proved it by manually removing and adding the calendar which shows at that point all of the updates since the previous "sync". The issue i'm having is with the calendar automatically syncing. Supposed to happen on send/receive but isn't

thanksajdotcom

@Hubtech What version of Outlook are you using?

10-13

Dashrender

Is there a setting on the client to tell it to look at the folder for updates? I'm sure you're on to something about how the client is not checking, but just staying static.

Well, for simplicity sake client 1 owns the calendar, client 2 is viewing. when client 1 send/receive it pushes the updates. I can check the file mod time, and size increase. When client 2 send/rec it does not download the update. weird stuff. I think i've talked them into O365 because we just so happened to have an issue with their site host moving servers without letting us know and breaking our mail settings....i dont think o365 would do that

thanksajdotcom

@Hubtech Awesome. Make sure you get a good partner, such as NTG.

thanksajdotcom

@hubtech For the Office365 that is. We do other things too though.

AJ, i think i'll just use myself lol thanks for the offer though.