Updated: 2009-04-09

In Microsoft Office Outlook 2007, you can customize Internet Calendar features. Users can send and receive Internet Calendar files as well as subscribe to third-party calendars. You can set up subscriptions for a specific project and then make the calendar available on an internal server. For example, you could set up subscriptions to a calendar that shows project deadlines. Users can set up subscriptions as well. For example, a user might send an Internet Calendar soccer schedule to team parents. Or a user might sign up for an Internet Calendar subscription for a professional baseball team schedule, where the schedule is updated on the team's Web site and sent to the subscriber.

NoteNote:

This topic is for Outlook administrators. To customize Internet Calendar options on your computer, see Sharing your calendar.

You can lock down the settings to customize Internet Calendar features by using the Outlook Group Policy template (Outlk12.adm). Or you can configure default settings by using the Office Customization Tool (OCT), in which case users can change the settings. The OCT settings are in corresponding locations on the Modify user settings page of the OCT.

The Outlook template and other ADM files can be downloaded from 2007 Office System Administrative Templates (ADM) on the Microsoft Download Center.

To deploy Internet Calendar subscriptions by using Group Policy

  1. In Group Policy, load the Office Outlook 2007 template (Outlk12.adm).

  2. Under User Configuration\Administrative Templates\Microsoft Office Outlook 2007\Tools | Accounts\Internet Calendar Subscriptions, double-click Default Internet Calendar subscriptions.

  3. Click Enabled.

  4. Click Show.

  5. In the Show Contents dialog box, click Add to add a Value Name and Value pair for each subscription.

  6. In the Add Item dialog box, enter the Value Name and the Value in the text boxes. The Value Name is for your reference only.

    The Value is the URL of the WebCal subscription, specified as: webcal://url of subscription.

  7. Click OK to add the subscription to the list.

  8. Click Add if you want to enter another subscription.

  9. When you finish entering subscriptions, click OK to exit the Show Contents dialog box.

  10. Click OK.

To configure Internet Calendar options by using Group Policy

  1. In Group Policy, load the Office Outlook 2007 template (Outlk12.adm) and go to User Configuration\Administrative Templates\Microsoft Office Outlook 2007\Tools | Accounts\Internet Calendar Subscriptions.

  2. Double-click the option that you want to configure. For example, to disallow roaming for subscriptions, double-click Disable roaming of Internet Calendar subscriptions

  3. Click Enabled.

  4. Click OK.

The settings you can configure for Internet Calendars are as follows.

Internet Calendars options Description

Override published sync interval

Prevent users from overriding the sync interval published by Internet Calendar providers.

Disable roaming of Internet Calendars

Disable roaming so that Internet Calendars are available only on the client that originally linked them.

Automatically download enclosures

Automatically download enclosures (such as graphics) on Internet Calendar appointments.

Disable Internet Calendar Integration

Disable all Internet Calendar functionality in Outlook.

Default Internet Calendar subscriptions

The URLs listed are added to each user's profile as an Internet Calendar subscription.

More information about configuring Internet Calendars

More information about configuration options is included in the following sections.

Disabling Internet Calendar subscriptions

You can disable Internet Calendar subscriptions in Office Outlook 2007 if, for example, you are concerned about bandwidth usage and want to delay introducing Internet Calendar subscriptions. By default, Internet Calendar subscriptions are enabled.

When you disable Internet Calendar subscriptions, the Internet Calendar heading does not appear in the Calendar's folder hierarchy, and the Internet Calendar tab does not appear in the Outlook Account Manager dialog box.

Providing Internet Calendar subscriptions to users

You can deploy Internet Calendar subscriptions as default subscriptions that users can change or delete. Or you can lock down Internet Calendar subscriptions so that users cannot make changes or remove them. Users can add new Internet Calendar subscriptions, however.

By default, there are no Internet Calendar subscriptions, but users can add and remove them.

Synchronization interval for Internet Calendars

Outlook sets the synchronization interval so that each Internet Calendar subscription is updated at the publisher's recommended interval. Users can override the default interval unless you disallow that option. However, if users set the update frequency to a short interval, it can cause performance problems.

By enabling the option in Group Policy, you can enforce the use of the publisher's update intervals, so users cannot change the intervals. This setting is used for all Internet Calendar subscriptions; you cannot set this option differently for different subscriptions.

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