Sharing Online Calendars, RSS Feeds, Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Folders, and Exchange Folders

  • Article

In Microsoft Outlook, you can share and subscribe to a variety of online resources, including:

  • Webcal calendars (webcal://mysite/mycalendar)

  • RSS feeds (feed://mysite/myfeed)

  • SharePoint Foundation folders (stssync://mysite/myfolder)

  • Exchange folders

Calendar information can also be shared either by providing direct access to a calendar folder or by exporting calendar information to an iCalendar calendar (.ics) file. For more information about sharing calendars, see Sharing Calendars.

Sharing Online Resources

For publically available online resources, such as Webcal calendars, RSS feeds, and SharePoint Foundation folders, a sharing message is not required. You can use the OpenSharedFolder method of the NameSpace object to open the online resource. For online resources to which access is required, such as Exchange folders, a sharing request can be created to request access. You can create a sharing request by using the CreateSharingItem method of the NameSpace object to create a SharingItem object. The shared resource (a Folder object reference to the desired Exchange default folder) is used to establish the sharing context for the sharing request.

You can also use a sharing invitation to direct another user to an online resource. To construct a sharing invitation, the CreateSharingItem method of the NameSpace object is used to create a SharingItem object. The shared resource (either a Folder object reference to the desired folder or a string containing the appropriate URI for the online resource) is used to establish the sharing context for the sharing invitation.

Note

Sharing requests can be created only for Exchange default folders. To access other Exchange folders, a sharing invitation from the owner of the folder is required.

Sharing Providers

Each type of online resource, such as Webcal calendars, is supported by a corresponding sharing provider. A sharing provider encapsulates the access and interpretation tools for a given online resource type. You can use the SharingProvider and SharingProviderGuid properties of a SharingItem to determine the sharing provider used by a given sharing message.