Outlook 2003 filter

February 23, 2006 9:34 AM

Outlook 2003 filter: Simple question, what the heck is the difference between booking something as an attendee vs as a resource when planning a meeting?

You can book something like a projector or meeting room as a resource but most people at my work just book them as attendees, is there any difference or reason to do it the resource way?

posted by Cosine to computers & internet (18 comments total)

Attendee requires a delegate to accept/decline the invitation based on availability.

Resource allows you to directly book the room/projector/etc based on availability.
posted by jerseygirl at 9:52 AM on February 23, 2006

Yeah, I read that, not sure I get it though. What difference does it make if the room accepts the meeting or not, it still gets marked as busy.
posted by Cosine at 9:59 AM on February 23, 2006

No, it gets marked as "tentative", and someone else can come along and swipe your room by booking it as a resource.
posted by briank at 10:02 AM on February 23, 2006

Hmmm... it gets marked as busy, not tentative, on all the calendars I have checked here.
posted by Cosine at 10:05 AM on February 23, 2006

I get an error on our exchnage setup if I try to book a meeting room as an attendee, as it doesn't have a mailbox.
posted by GuyZero at 10:13 AM on February 23, 2006

Cosine- in a typical Exchange envi. while you see it as busy on your calendar when booking as attendee, other people do not: that's the difference. If you book it as attendee, you haven't actually "booked" the room, and you'll have that awkward encounter when two groups are convinced they have the same room at the same time. When you book it as "resource"- provided the Exchange administrator properly denoted that room as a resource- then you in fact are grabbing it exclusively- anyone else who tries to book the room in a meeting invite will be automatically told the room is busy, and won't be allowed to book it at that time.

Caveat: I guess it's possible in your Exchange world, the admin has inexplicably created the rooms as just more user mailboxes, and set them to autoaccept all meeting invites. This is a valid- if unnecessary- method in a small environment. If this is the case, you'd actually achieve the same effect that you're seeing: sending as attendee works, properly books the meeting, and updates the room's calendar. So that may be what's happening in your case.
posted by hincandenza at 10:21 AM on February 23, 2006

hincandenza: thanks, now we are getting somewhere. The meeting rooms HAVE been created as regular users with mailboxes, is there a reason not to do this?
posted by Cosine at 10:31 AM on February 23, 2006

Note: this is Exchange 2000, which tells me that resources MUST have a mailbox, if this is the case then what is the point of having resources?
posted by Cosine at 10:36 AM on February 23, 2006

If you book it as attendee, you haven't actually "booked" the room, and you'll have that awkward encounter when two groups are convinced they have the same room at the same time.

Is this an outlook/exchange bug? I see absolutely no reason why you'd want to invite someone/something to a meeting and have everyone else still see them/it as being free.
posted by mr_silver at 10:44 AM on February 23, 2006

It's not a bug, if you boot a room as an attendee then Exchange/Outlook think it is a person, and a person needs to be able to accept or decline the meeting.
posted by Cosine at 10:50 AM on February 23, 2006

umm... book, not boot
posted by Cosine at 10:51 AM on February 23, 2006

Can you go to someone else's computer and see if the room is marked as busy from their account? That might clear up at least part of how this is set up.
posted by SuperNova at 11:07 AM on February 23, 2006

On other people's computers the meeting room shows as available, which is bad. I wonder why this has never been an issue...
posted by Cosine at 11:28 AM on February 23, 2006

This probably explains why the IT network set up items to have their own email account with auto accept otherwise no-one I know would remember to set it as a resource and 6 people would be fighting for a projector.

What still confuses me is why you have to make the distinction in the first place. The exchange server should know that "Room G1" is a resource - why on earth do you need to specifically tell it so?

Unless of course other companies have projectors and rooms that occasionally want to have a choice about who books them out!
posted by mr_silver at 1:31 PM on February 23, 2006

Sorry, just got back from a job interview. Exchange was not a topic we discussed. :)


Cosine: luck, that's why it's not an issue. I'm guessing your company is small enough that it's not a big deal, and people can usually tell by sight if the room is available. In larger companies where more people might compete for spaces, they won't be able to easily move or adjust if double booking occurred.

But now you know why to do it as a resource. Resources can easily be set to auto-accept meetings, and auto-deny any additional meetings that conflict, whereas with a user account you can set up auto-accept yet people can still schedule the meeting even if you see a conflict... without any error from the Exchange server. When it's a resource, you'll be forced to pick another time or room if it's already booked, when setting up the meeting. It's been a while since my Exchange days, but I believe the other reason to set it as a resource is in the larger AD context: for decent sized organizations, you may have other reasons for grouping your resources in their own OU as separate objects types- the schema will be different, and you can manage resources as a unified group.


mr_silver: Reasons you have to call it a resource is because the schema is extensible. Calling it a resource offers options not available to standard user accounts, and your org may wish to further delineate between conference room resources, printer resources, car resources, etc. The AD schema could be modified to allow for fine distinctions between these resource types, aiding in searching and in managing them that wouldn't be available otherwise. You certainly wouldn't want to hardcode into Exchange to look for "Room" in the text string to determine it's a room, because god forbid any company anywhere ever have an employee named 'Room'. After all, the Exchange server does know Room G1 is a resource, and will error if it has no mailbox and is added as an attendee- as GuyZero noted. This is up to the Exchange Admins to set up correctly in the first place, and no software has been written to fix that known bug. =P

And the reasons you wouldn't have auto-accept always on: maybe it's a VP conference room, or a special conference room where the receptionist or an executive admin has to approve and manage it; you would grant an individual or group delegation rights to manage that resource. At MS for example, there were a couple of conference rooms that could be scheduled, but with the understanding that the receptionist or exec assistants at any time reserved the right to rip it away from you if needed by some high muckety muck. If they did, you were SOL- go scrounge for a new conference room like the peon that you are. :)
posted by hincandenza at 2:30 PM on February 23, 2006

I am still confused, how can I create a resource that doesn't have a mailbox?
posted by Cosine at 3:14 PM on February 23, 2006

Jeez, cosine, I'm gonna start having to charge a consulting fee. :) Did a google search, this might help out:
http://www.msexchange.org/tutorials/MF019.html

You can create a resource account without attaching a mailbox. Although now that I'm actually doing research on this, I may have been mistaken about not having a mailbox attached and still being schedulable in Outlook/Exchange. Dangit, Cosine- you're embarassingly exposing my rust! :)
posted by hincandenza at 6:27 PM on February 23, 2006

Lol, thanks, you've been a big help, I am just starting out in IT myself so am learning as I go, I have done many Google searches on the subject, it seems like in Exchange 2000 you need a regular user account with a mailbox but apparently it's different in Exchange 2003 (which we dont use here anyway). The link you posted is already one of my bookmarks and as you can see in it you need a mailbox, thanks again, I think I know enough for now.
posted by Cosine at 8:41 AM on February 24, 2006