Embed a Calendar delete in an email

[Randy Harris]

I have an Access program that creates appointments in the user's Outlook
Calendar. Occasionally the appointment gets cancelled and needs to be
deleted from the Calendar. When this happens an email message is generated
and sent to the user.

Several users have asked if something can be added to the email that would
automatically delete the appointment, or rather, make it simple for them to
delete the appointment from the mail message. Our exchange servers won't
permit sending VBscripts in the mail.

I'm looking for ideas of how to automate this. Adding some sort of link or
something to the email message that would permit deleting the appointment
with a click.

I would be grateful for any ideas or suggestion.

Randy Harris

 

[David C. Holley]

What TYPES of items are you using for this? MailItems or MeetingItems?
When the meeting organizer updates the MeetingItem on his/her calendar,
the change cascades to the meeting attendees, including if the item is
deleted. Additionally, there's space to include a message or other
information pertaining to the MeetingItem just like an email.

 

[Randy Harris]

What TYPES of items are you using for this? MailItems or MeetingItems?
When the meeting organizer updates the MeetingItem on his/her calendar,
the change cascades to the meeting attendees, including if the item is
deleted. Additionally, there's space to include a message or other
information pertaining to the MeetingItem just like an email.

There's no meeting or attendees. It's a simple AppointmentItem in the
user's Calendar Folder. The AppointmentItem can be easily identified by a
UserProperty attached to it.

What I'm looking for is a way to send something in an email. Some sort of
macro or script or link or something that the user can simply click to
delete the AppointmentItem. I was thinking that perhaps some sort of macro,
run from a toolbar button, that would read the currently open message to get
the UserProperty value, then go delete the appointment.

I don't know if it's even possible to do this, I was simply looking for some
advice.

 

[David C. Holley]

What information does the AppointmentItem represent and are you sending
it to everyone? Who determines if the Appointment should be cancelled
and how do they do it? From within Access? From within Outlook? Can you
shed some light on the bigger picture?

 

[Randy Harris]

What information does the AppointmentItem represent and are you sending
it to everyone? Who determines if the Appointment should be cancelled
and how do they do it? From within Access? From within Outlook? Can you
shed some light on the bigger picture?

The AppointmentItem will have been created by another process. It is an
Access program that schedules Instructors to teach classes in a training
center. Occasionally, the class will get cancelled. When that happens an
email is generated and sent to the instructor. I'm looking for some
simplified method of deleting the AppointmentItem in the instructor's
schedule from that email. Since I haven't yet been able to conceive of a
better method, I am assuming that the instructor will have to do something
to cause the deletion when he reads the message.

I've been trying to get it to work with a COM add-in. Unsuccessfully, so
far. I tried building one from scratch using a template from the Office
2000 Developer's CD. It will delete the appointment but I can't get it to
register with Outlook. I downloaded a couple of samples from the web. One
is a phone number changer thingee. It registers with Outlook but gets
errors when I try to run it. I haven't gotten any further with another one
that is supposed to extract attachments. I think if I can find one that
actually works I can study it and figure out what is wrong with mine.

The reason that I posted here to begin with is that I don't know whether I'm
going about this whole matter in anything like a rational manner. Perhaps I
am overlooking a much simpler means of accomplishing the objective.

Thanks for any light you can shed on this matter.

 

[David C. Holley]

While I don't recommend this, you'll probably want to create code that
executes on CLOSE event for on item. The article on the CLOSE event in
the Oulook Object Model found in Outlook's VBA Help file provdes the
information on setting up the code to run. While this is a feasible
soultion, I don't recommend it for two reasons...

#1 - You'll have to setup the code on each and every PC in order for it
to work. If the PC is replaced or reimaged, you'll have to setup the PC
again.

#2 - The capability that you're looking for (user calendar management)
already exists within Outlook between users today. When I, as a meeting
organizor, send out a meeting request to a person or person(s) the
meeting can appear immediately on his/her calendar. If I then cancel the
meeting, a notice is sent to the attendee(s) which cancels the meeting
and removes it from their calendar.