Hi JuneBug
I am setting up a calendar with multi users and read, with interest, your
description of your reporting calendar. I notice you used the Timeline View
and you had colours to signify various events (Blue - start up stage, green -
sign off stage etc.).

My question to you is: How did you get the colours to appear in the TimeLine
view?

I look forward to your reply
--
Poppy


"JuneBug" wrote:

> As ground breakers in Information Technology often do, I learned that Outlook
> wasn’t really designed or conceived to be used in quite the fashion I used it
> for the tickler system described in the previous post. While the description
> above may sound fairly straight forward, some of the execution was incredibly
> cumbersome. However, Outlook did possess many of the necessary features that
> we needed at the price we could afford and in the amount of time and
> personnel resources we had to give our project. While I would have loved to
> use Visual Basic and C++, and XML and all that stuff, that would have been
> another learning curve for me - one I hope to climb some day. But for now,
> pushing Outlook to its edges also helps to reveal the possibilities of this
> tool, and one can hope for future upgrades and development that continue to
> enhance functionality and ease of use. For future versions of Outlook I would
> suggest several “improvements.”
>
> Provide more color choices for labels.
>
> Provide increased functionality between recurring instances of a calendar
> entry and the underlying “master.” For example for any change made to the
> master, provide the user with a right click menu option to apply it to one or
> more of the instances – and vice versa.
>
> Streamline the size of recurring calendar entries so that they are not so
> large. Presently, if you add graphics and documents to a recurring calendar
> entry, it becomes much larger than the sum of its parts.
>
> Provide a “clone” feature for calendar entries to facilitate re-entering
> them into the calendar or copying them from a test calendar to a production
> calendar.
>
> Provide multiple levels of recurrence in a calendar entry. For example each
> of our reports has a four stage compliance strategy. However each of our
> reports also recur as quarterly, semi-annual, and annual reports.
>
> Provide a more meaningful “view” for this type of calendar entry. For
> example, presently when we see an entry in an Outlook calendar, the first
> thing that shows is the time. But for this type of calendar entry, the time
> is not really that meaningful.
>
> Provide more consistency between Word, Excel, Outlook email, and Outlook
> Calendar entries so that formatting and other “meanings” do not get lost when
> copied between them – I think a common web-based interface and presentation
> between them would be great.
>
> In conclusion, using Outlook to model the tickler system has proven
> effective in helping people to remember, to collaborate and to get reports to
> funding streams in timely fashion for our agency. Users have become
> increasingly responsive as the system increasingly responds to their needs
> and input. In fact, in this second round of reporting, I would say that we
> have actually achieved the goal set forth in our Compliance Strategy to
> submit 98% of our reports to funding sources timely. Going through the
> process of modeling and testing the tickler system with Outlook has also
> helped us to identify and refine what components and features are needed in a
> tickler system and how people need to see and receive them.
>
> As for Phase Two, I envision setting up a more collaborative report writing
> environment within the tickler system, perhaps with our Outlook Exchange
> Server and SharePoint. I also envision automating the tickler system with a
> database. Currently the ticklers are serving as repositories for everything
> we know about getting a particular report to a funding source – they include
> text and graphics and word files and excel files and emails from sponsors.
> They include instructions and links and copies of previous reports and blank
> forms. They include a hopefully effective visual presentation strategy of all
> the previous to motivate the user to do their part in getting the report out.
> In fact, they are one-stop shopping for getting a grant report out on time
> for organizations on a shoe-string. I envision a future when perhaps much of
> this information and many of these items may more efficiently reside in a
> database from which calendar entries and email ticklers can be more easily
> and automatically generated and much more information about our grants and
> funding sources can be tracked – and the entire system would be much more
> intuitive and easy to maintain and “pass on” to a successor. However, I
> believe the ticklers, in order to succeed, must retain their capability to be
> adaptable to the moment and to project “immediacy,” “responsiveness,” and
> “online presence.” To foster compliance from the inside out, especially in
> volunteer and not-for-profit organizations which are not generally ruled with
> an iron hand, we must keep in mind that people need “to know, to care, and to
> act” (James Banks). The tickler system model needs to find ways to address
> people on those three levels. We must empower both their cognition and their
> conscience in hopes that we can impel them to “do the right thing.”
>

Hi, Poppy, thanks for reading my report on the tickler system. Actually I was
referring to our agency's compliance timeline strategy for gettting reports
out timely, not the software's timeline view. In my tickler system, the
different stages of a report show up in different colors on the calendar view.

However, you have just given me a fresh view and a new idea. I am still
learning about Outlook's features, and now I want to take a look at how tasks
and Outlook's timeline views might integrate into my design and make it a
better one. If I discover a better way, I'll write back!

As for your question about getting Outlook's timeline view to show colors
for various stages of completion, sounds like that might be another
suggestion to the developers to incorporate into a future version of Outlook?

Thanks again for responding,

JuneBug


"Poppy" wrote:

> Hi JuneBug
> I am setting up a calendar with multi users and read, with interest, your
> description of your reporting calendar. I notice you used the Timeline View
> and you had colours to signify various events (Blue - start up stage, green -
> sign off stage etc.).
>
> My question to you is: How did you get the colours to appear in the TimeLine
> view?
>
> I look forward to your reply
> --
> Poppy
>
>
>

I've been reading about and experimenting with Outlook's Journaling and Task
features, and I think they offer some very interesting possibilities and
alternatives for the Report Tickler System, and potentially solve a couple of
problems. Certainly worth playing around with. Potentially, I could have a
Grant Reports Calendar, a Grant Reports Task Folder, A Grant Reports Journal
folder, and also any pertinent Word and Excel and Email Documents all out on
the Exchange Server and all together in the Public folder. Journal could
organize them for the user because it stores shortcuts to these items as
icons in a timeline view. So I could add shortcuts to all the necessary
information on the first day of the report's compliance timeline. That would
take care of my bandwidth problem. Calendar could still be used to show the 4
stages of getting a report out the door - but the events wouldn't have to be
so big and bulky. Tasks could be used to regenerate themselves for the next
quarter or year, depending on report cycle. That would take care of my
multiple levels of recurrence problem.

Now that I have a working model with which to remind people, I'll just have
to play with these other features as new reports come do and as I have time.
Eventually I'll end up with a more efficient and hopefully better "second
generation" working model. Thanks, Poppy!

JuneBug

"JuneBug" wrote:

> Hi, Poppy, thanks for reading my report on the tickler system. Actually I was
> referring to our agency's compliance timeline strategy for gettting reports
> out timely, not the software's timeline view. In my tickler system, the
> different stages of a report show up in different colors on the calendar view.
>
> However, you have just given me a fresh view and a new idea. I am still
> learning about Outlook's features, and now I want to take a look at how tasks
> and Outlook's timeline views might integrate into my design and make it a
> better one. If I discover a better way, I'll write back!
>
> As for your question about getting Outlook's timeline view to show colors
> for various stages of completion, sounds like that might be another
> suggestion to the developers to incorporate into a future version of Outlook?
>
> Thanks again for responding,
>
> JuneBug
>
>
>