If used faithfully, Outlook s Calendar component can eliminate the need for a paper schedule and can actually function better than one. This is especially true if you supplement the calendar you keep on your desktop computer with a synchronized calendar on a personal digital assistant (PDA) that you can carry with you wherever you go. (If you are considering buying a PDA and want to be able to synchronize your calendar, contacts list, and task list with your desktop computer, make sure the PDA is compatible and works with Microsoft Office XP.) There might be times, however, when you do need a paper printout of your schedule. To print a calendar, click the Print button on the toolbar, select a print style and any other options you want, and click OK. If you re not sure what style you want, you can select one of the style options and click the Preview button. You can also specify the dates you want to print in the Print range area of the Print dialog box.

Looking at a Different Time Interval

You probably don t have any appointments in your calendar yet, but before you start adding appointments, it is useful to know a few standard techniques for viewing your calendar in different ways. Knowing how to look at a particular day, your entire work week, or the entire calendar week will help you when you start scheduling your own appointments. Later in this chapter, we will talk about ways to customize your calendar, but for now, follow these steps to explore some simple possibilities:

1. If necessary, start Outlook, and if the folder list is open , close it.

2. On the Outlook bar, click the Calendar icon.

   The workspace now looks like the one shown in this graphic:

   

   On the left side is the appointment pane , divided into halfhour intervals. By default, Outlook displays your schedule for today. In the upper-right corner is the Date Navigator , which displays calendars for the current month and next month. (You can cycle through the months by clicking the left and right arrows on the calendar headers.) In the lowerright corner is the TaskPad, a small version of the to-do list maintained by Outlook s Tasks component.

   Outlook obtains the date and time from your system clock. If this clock is wrong, Outlook keeps an inaccurate calendar and reminds you of appointments at the wrong time. To set the right date and time, double-click the clock at the right end of the Windows taskbar. In the Date and Time Properties dialog box, make the appropriate adjustments to the date or time. (If Outlook has trouble keeping your schedule, there might be problems with your computer s battery, which maintains the system clock.)

3. Click the Work Week button on the toolbar.

   The workspace now looks like the one shown here:

   

4. Click the Week button on the toolbar.

   The result is shown in this graphic:

   

5. Finally, click the Day button on the toolbar.

   The workspace switches back to the original single-day view.

Outlook Today gathers information about the current day s activities from Calendar, Tasks, and the Inbox and summarizes them on one screen. To display Outlook Today, click its icon on the Outlook bar. From this screen, you can jump to other components by clicking the appropriate section heading, and you can mark tasks as complete.

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By default, Outlook uses an 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM, Monday through Friday work week. It displays these hours of these days in a light color and the rest of the time in a darker color. But if your schedule is different, you can change the default times and days. Click Options on the Tools menu, and then on the Preferences tab, click the Calendar Options button. In the Calendar work week area, enter the start and end times of your work schedule. To change the days worked, click the desired days check boxes. To have Outlook add holidays to your schedule, click Add Holidays, and then click the check box for the country whose holidays you would like added to your calendar. (If you work with clients or customers in other countries, you might also want to keep track of the national holidays of those countries in your calendar.) Then click OK three times. To remove a holiday, click Current View and then Events on the View menu. Then select the holiday, and click the Delete button.

Creating a New Appointment

The half- hour intervals in the appointment pane designate time slots. You use these time slots to schedule appointments for the day.

Suppose you have a meeting with David Perry at 3:00 next Monday afternoon, and you expect the meeting to last half an hour. Here s how to enter the appointment:

1. Display the calendar in Day view.

2. In the Date Navigator , click the date for the following Monday.

3. Click the 3:00 time slot, type David Perry , and then press the Enter key.

   The David Perry appointment now occupies the 3:00 slot, and a bell icon tells you that Outlook will remind you of the appointment 15 minutes in advance. Next Monday s date is now bold in the Date Navigator, indicating that you have an appointment on that day.

You can schedule appointments based on e-mail messages you have received. Select the desired message header in the Inbox and drag it to the Calendar icon on the Outlook bar. Outlook then displays the appointment window with the contents of the message displayed in the message area at the bottom of the window and with the message subject displayed in the Subject box. To complete the appointment, fill in the remaining information and then click the Save and Close button. This same procedure works for quickly creating tasks. Simply drag the desired message header to the Tasks icon on the Outlook bar to display a task window and fill in any additional information.

Scheduling an Appointment at a Nonstandard Time

Suppose you need to schedule an interview with a prospective employee named Carol Phillips at 4:15 next Tuesday afternoon. The interview will probably last an hour and a half. Calendar s standard time slots are in half-hour intervals, so you need to make a special entry for this appointment. Follow these steps:

1. In the Date Navigator , click the date for the following Tuesday .

   That day s appointment area is now displayed.

2. Double-click the 4:00 time slot.

   Outlook displays the Appointment window shown in this graphic:

   

3. In the Subject box, type Carol Phillips , and in the Location box, type Conference Room .

   You can also click the Location box s down arrow and select one of the last seven locations you have used from the drop-down list.

4. Change the start time by selecting 00 in 4:00 PM and typing 15 . Then change the end time to 5:45 PM by clicking the rightmost End time box s down arrow and selecting 5:45 from the drop-down list.

5. Change the Reminder time to 10 minutes by either typing the time or selecting it from the drop-down list.

6. Click the Show time as box s down arrow to display a dropdown list of options.

   If you are working on a network that uses Exchange Server, the four options in the Show time as drop-down list show anyone who is trying to set up a meeting whether or not you are available at this time. Selecting Tentative or Free displays the time in a light color on other people s computers and indicates that you might be available. Selecting Busy or Out of Office displays the time in a dark color and indicates that you are not available.

7. Leave the Busy option selected by clicking away from the list, and then maximize the window and select the Private check box in the lower-right corner.

   Now other people will see that you are not available at this time, but they will not be able to see why.

8. Click the Save and Close button to confirm the appointment.

   The appointment pane now looks like the one shown in this graphic:

   

9. Click the Today button on the toolbar or click today s date in the Date Navigator to move back to the appointment pane for today.

Scheduling a Recurring Appointment

Unless you specify otherwise , the appointments you schedule are one-time occurrences. You can designate appointments that occur at regular intervals as recurring. Then instead of having to enter the appointment manually over and over again, you can let Outlook automatically make that appointment for you.

For example, suppose you meet with the Washington BEAT Coordinator, Nathan Chou, every other Wednesday from 12:00 to 1:00 PM. Here s how to schedule this recurring appointment:

1. Click the date for next Wednesday in the Date Navigator , and drag through the time slots for 12:00 and 12:30 to select them.

2. On the Actions menu, click New Recurring Appointment .

   Outlook opens an Appointment window and then displays the dialog box shown in this graphic:

   

   By default, Outlook assumes you want the meeting to occur weekly on the same day of the week, starting and ending at the times you selected, with no end date.

3. In the Recurrence pattern area, enter 2 in the Recur every box to change the appointment to every other week.

4. To add an end date, click the End by option in the Range of recurrence area, and use the drop-down calendar to change the date to the last Wednesday of the year. Then click OK .

5. In the Appointment window s Subject box, type Progress Report .

6. Click the Location box s down arrow, and select Conference Room in the drop-down list. Then change the Reminder setting for the appointment to 30 minutes , and click the Save and Close button.

   The result is shown in this graphic:

   

   Outlook has entered the recurring appointment in the specified time slot for next Wednesday and also for every other Wednesday thereafter, designating it with circular arrows to indicate that the appointment is recurring.

To turn an existing appointment into a recurring one, double-click the appointment in the appointment pane and click the Recurrence button. Outlook displays the Appointment Recurrence dialog box, where you can select the recurrence options you want. When you finish, click OK, and then click the Save and Close button.

Attaching files to appointments

To attach a file to a scheduled appointment, click an insertion point in the message area at the bottom of the Appointment window, click the Insert File button on the toolbar, navigate to the file you want to attach, and click to select it. Specify how you want the file inserted by clicking the Insert button s down arrow and selecting an option from the drop-down list. If you insert the file as text, the file becomes part of the appointment. If you insert the file as an attachment, Outlook attaches a copy of the file to the appointment. If you insert the file as a hyperlink, Outlook adds a link to the attachment that you can simply double-click to open the file from its original location.