With regard to the "no information" message, it appears whenever any of the following for an individuial who is not an Exchange user. (If the individual is an Exchange user, then free/busy information comes from the Exchange server.):
1) There is no contact record for the individual.
2) There is a contact record, but it contains no free/busy URL.
3) There is a free/busy URL, but Outlook can't connect to it.
4) There is some problem with the data retrieved from the free/busy URL.
I suggested that you try FTP as a way to try to address #3.
There is not much in the way of troubleshooting information for this feature. However, the fact that your f/b information below doesn't have an SMTP address for an organizer:
ORGANIZER:/O=citrix systems/OU=MIS/cn=Recipients/cn=t_waynee
certainly suggests that there's a possible problem with the data. You're not trying to use Internet free/busy with an Exchange account, are you? That won't work.
--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Microsoft Outlook 2007 Programming:
Jumpstart for Power Users and Administrators
http://www.outlookcode.com/article.aspx?id=54
We have a few red herrings by this point - all I'm trying to do right now is test the capability and I used my own user ID because it seems certain that I have access to all of the files on my own computer, thus keeping permissions out of the picture.
I used http: as a common protocol.
Given the uninformative message "No information. No free/busy information could be retrieved". I'm not sure how much farther I can get - perhaps there are posts on this message that I could find elsewhere, as we've established that Outlook cannot import the file directly, and that is what was causing the original error message.
If you can offer any insight into the "No information" message please do so, otherwise I think we can close out this thread.
Thanks very much for your time - I've learned something useful already about the current Free/Busy capabilities. At my previous employer we had a general Free/Busy application that ran outside of Outlook, and that is what started me on this search.
---Wayne
Correct, .vfb files are not files you can import into Outlook. There's no scenario in which accessing them directly makes any sense.
On IIS, you've set the MIME type for .vfb files to text/calendar, right? What if you use FTP instead of HTTP?
BTW, it's not clear to me where you're going with this. Accessing your own free/busy data isn't terribly useful. It is other people's f/b data that's actually interesting.
I gather that I should not be trying to access the file directly with IIS.
In that case, staying with Outlook:
The file is being created.
I have included a valid and accessible http:// url in the "Internet Free/Busy" field of the "Details" of the contact.
http://mycomputername/WWEFreeBusy.vfb. If I try to access the file directly it tries to import it into Outlook, which fails but tells me that I have access to the file at that url.
When I try to schedule a meeting with that contact, Outlook displays a popup telling me that it could not read the file: "No information. No free/busy information could be retrieved". No other information is provided as to the reason the information was not retrieved.
---Wayne
Share how? Outlook does not import .vfb files or open them directly. It should, however, be able to use them to display availability information in a meeting request if you add the URL to the contact's record, on the Details page.
One of the posts I read said that in order to open a free/busy file through IIS, a MIME type of "text/calendar" was needed, so I added that MIME type. Before that, I could not open the file at all via IIS.
If that post was wrong, then what MIME type should I use in IIS so that I can share a url such as:
http://mymachinename/myfreebusy.vfb ?
Thanks!
---Wayne
Here if the file:
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
PRODID:-//Microsoft Corporation//Outlook 11.0 MIMEDIR//EN
VERSION:2.0
METHOD
UBLISH
BEGIN:VFREEBUSY
ORGANIZER:/O=citrix systems/OU=MIS/cn=Recipients/cn=t_waynee
DTSTAMP:20070806T132143Z
DTSTART:20070801T040000Z
DTEND:20071001T040000Z
FREEBUSY:20070801T040000Z/20070804T040000Z
FREEBUSY:20070806T173000Z/20070806T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070807T180000Z/20070807T200000Z
FREEBUSY:20070808T150000Z/20070808T170000Z
FREEBUSY:20070808T173000Z/20070808T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070809T173000Z/20070809T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070810T173000Z/20070810T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070813T173000Z/20070813T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070814T180000Z/20070814T200000Z
FREEBUSY:20070815T133000Z/20070815T140000Z
FREEBUSY:20070815T150000Z/20070815T160000Z
FREEBUSY:20070815T173000Z/20070815T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070816T173000Z/20070816T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070817T173000Z/20070817T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070820T173000Z/20070820T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070821T180000Z/20070821T200000Z
FREEBUSY:20070822T150000Z/20070822T160000Z
FREEBUSY:20070822T173000Z/20070822T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070823T173000Z/20070823T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070824T173000Z/20070824T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070827T173000Z/20070827T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070828T180000Z/20070828T200000Z
FREEBUSY:20070829T150000Z/20070829T160000Z
FREEBUSY:20070829T173000Z/20070829T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070830T173000Z/20070830T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070831T173000Z/20070831T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070903T173000Z/20070903T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070904T180000Z/20070904T200000Z
FREEBUSY:20070905T150000Z/20070905T160000Z
FREEBUSY:20070905T173000Z/20070905T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070906T173000Z/20070906T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070907T173000Z/20070907T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070910T040000Z/20070922T040000Z
FREEBUSY:20070924T173000Z/20070924T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070925T180000Z/20070925T200000Z
FREEBUSY:20070926T150000Z/20070926T160000Z
FREEBUSY:20070926T173000Z/20070926T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070927T173000Z/20070927T180000Z
FREEBUSY:20070928T173000Z/20070928T180000Z
END:VFREEBUSY
END:VCALENDAR
