5.1 Creating an appointment

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5.1 Creating an appointment

You may enter appointments into a BSCW calendar to organize events of different types (private dates, group meetings, computer conferences). An appointment is described by at least a date and a name. If the appointment concerns a group of people, you may specify its participants. Upon request, the participants are invited automatically and their individual status (accepted, declined) is managed along with the status of the appointment itself. Appointments may also be used to organize synchronous cooperation: BSCW helps to start of a computer conference between the participants of an appointment. Besides name, date and eventual participants, you may provide additional information about the appointment like a category, a description or a location.

Inside a calendar, select File New Appointment in the top menu, click in the action shortcuts or click in the day entries of a week or month view to create a new appointment.
By clicking the tabs in the ‘Add Appointment’ form you may add different kinds of information to an appointment.
Appointment: Besides name and date (and possibly time and duration) you may optionally specify:
- Description: provides additional information.
- Category: selects a category for the appointment. Appointments of different categories may be displayed in different colours (see 5.7).
- Status: specifies the status of an appointment (tentative, confirmed, cancelled). Choose ‘confirmed’ if the appointment will take place, regardless of whether individual participants decline their participation. The default status ‘automatically’ means that the status is initially set to ‘tentative’ and then is changed automatically when participants confirm or decline.
Participants of the appointment may be chosen from your address book. You may also specify whole member groups of one or more of your workspaces as participants of an appointment. If you do not want to invite all members of a workspace group, select the group and click on [resolve selected groups]: the individual group members will be indicated in the ‘Participants’ field and you may de-select some of them. You may also enter the email addresses of persons you would like to invite to the appointment. Tick the respective check box, if you want the participants invited by an email message. When inviting to an appointment of a group calendar, you may of course also invite persons who are not members of the group calendar’s workspace. If you plan to attend to an appointment that you are about to create, don’t forget to invite yourself: you are not a participant by default!
Details: Here you may enter the physical location of the appointment (if applicable). If the appointment is about a virtual meeting, specify the online tool that is to be used (cf. also 5.4). Most of the online tools currently supported by BSCW may be used free of charge or for a small licence fee. Download the software — in part licensed for test and evaluation only — from:
- Microsoft NetMeeting: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/netmeeting/
- Intel Internet Video Phone, Proshare Conferencing: http://www.intel.com
- Netscape Conference, Netscape Cooltalk: www.netscape.com
Note:
Supplementary audio or video hardware may be required to use these tools. Interoperability may be limited to specific hardware platforms.

If you use any other online tools not listed here, please let us know. We will try to integrate the software into BSCW as soon as possible. Some of the online tools listed in BSCW may not be supported by vendors anymore. You may, however, still use the software with BSCW.

Recurrence: Here you may specify a series of recurrences of the appointment you are about to create. This is done via rules of various types (e.g. weekly, weekly on certain weekdays or monthly on certain days of month) that may be selected from the ‘Add Rule’ list box. By clicking on [Add Recurrence] you get a rule field that you fill in according to your needs. In the same manner you may add more rules that generate further recurrences of your appointment. If you want to exclude some dates from the recurrences of the appointment, you have to generate exceptions: choose a rule, click on [Add Exception] and specify the details in the respective exception field.

Reminder: Here you may specify a reminder email message to be sent to yourself, the participants of the appointment or the members of your workspace. Select the persons the reminder is to be sent to from the ‘Add Reminder’ list box. By clicking on [Add] you get a reminder field that you fill in with the details of when the reminder is to be sent. You may also attach a personal note to the otherwise automatically generated reminder message. You may specify several reminders to be sent at different times to different numbers of people by repeatedly hitting [Add].
Confirm with [OK] in one of the tabbed forms to create the appointment according to the specifications made so far.

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5.1 Creating an appointment You may enter appointments into a BSCW calendar to organize events of different types (private dates, group meetings, computer conferences). An appointment is described by at least a date and a name. If the appointment concerns a group of people, you may specify its participants. Upon request, the participants are invited automatically and their individual status (accepted, declined) is managed along with the status of the appointment itself. Appointments may also be used to organize synchronous cooperation: BSCW helps to start of a computer conference between the participants of an appointment. Besides name, date and eventual participants, you may provide additional information about the appointment like a category, a description or a location. Inside a calendar, select File New Appointment in the top menu, click in the action shortcuts or click in the day entries of a week or month view to create a new appointment. By clicking the tabs in the ‘Add Appointment’ form you may add different kinds of information to an appointment. Appointment: Besides name and date (and possibly time and duration) you may optionally specify: Description: provides additional information. Category: selects a category for the appointment. Appointments of different categories may be displayed in different colours (see 5.7). Status: specifies the status of an appointment (tentative, confirmed, cancelled). Choose ‘confirmed’ if the appointment will take place, regardless of whether individual participants decline their participation. The default status ‘automatically’ means that the status is initially set to ‘tentative’ and then is changed automatically when participants confirm or decline. Participants of the appointment may be chosen from your address book. You may also specify whole member groups of one or more of your workspaces as participants of an appointment. If you do not want to invite all members of a workspace group, select the group and click on [resolve selected groups]: the individual group members will be indicated in the ‘Participants’ field and you may de-select some of them. You may also enter the email addresses of persons you would like to invite to the appointment. Tick the respective check box, if you want the participants invited by an email message. When inviting to an appointment of a group calendar, you may of course also invite persons who are not members of the group calendar’s workspace. If you plan to attend to an appointment that you are about to create, don’t forget to invite yourself: you are not a participant by default! Details: Here you may enter the physical location of the appointment (if applicable). If the appointment is about a virtual meeting, specify the online tool that is to be used (cf. also 5.4). Most of the online tools currently supported by BSCW may be used free of charge or for a small licence fee. Download the software — in part licensed for test and evaluation only — from: Microsoft NetMeeting: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/netmeeting/ Intel Internet Video Phone, Proshare Conferencing: http://www.intel.com Netscape Conference, Netscape Cooltalk: www.netscape.com Note: Supplementary audio or video hardware may be required to use these tools. Interoperability may be limited to specific hardware platforms. If you use any other online tools not listed here, please let us know. We will try to integrate the software into BSCW as soon as possible. Some of the online tools listed in BSCW may not be supported by vendors anymore. You may, however, still use the software with BSCW. Recurrence: Here you may specify a series of recurrences of the appointment you are about to create. This is done via rules of various types (e.g. weekly, weekly on certain weekdays or monthly on certain days of month) that may be selected from the ‘Add Rule’ list box. By clicking on [Add Recurrence] you get a rule field that you fill in according to your needs. In the same manner you may add more rules that generate further recurrences of your appointment. If you want to exclude some dates from the recurrences of the appointment, you have to generate exceptions: choose a rule, click on [Add Exception] and specify the details in the respective exception field. Reminder: Here you may specify a reminder email message to be sent to yourself, the participants of the appointment or the members of your workspace. Select the persons the reminder is to be sent to from the ‘Add Reminder’ list box. By clicking on [Add] you get a reminder field that you fill in with the details of when the reminder is to be sent. You may also attach a personal note to the otherwise automatically generated reminder message. You may specify several reminders to be sent at different times to different numbers of people by repeatedly hitting [Add]. Confirm with [OK] in one of the tabbed forms to create the appointment according to the specifications made so far.

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