.ics sees existing Meeting instead of Appointment

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BigWaylon

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running Office 2007 on XP...




our corporate travel system uses some American Express site, and at the end of booking a trip we get the option to add the segments (air, hotel, rental car) to our Calendars...




for several years it has worked just fine...before and after I upgraded from '03 to '07...




however, for the last couple trips, I've had a problem when I double-click the link to open the .ics file. when it opens, I have a To: field at the top and a Send Update button to the left. I assume this is because it sees it as an existing meeting rather than a new appointment. I have been forced to copy/paste the information into a blank appointment and changes the date/times, and it's getting annoying.




the help desk for the travel site can't reproduce the problem...says it works just fine for them.




Any ideas?




in case it helps, here's what I get in Notepad from the .ics file:




BEGIN:VCALENDAR


X-LOTUS-CHARSET:UTF-8


PRODID:Trip Sync


VERSION:2.0


METHOD:pUBLISH


BEGIN:VEVENT


ORGANIZER:MAILTO:my email


DTSTART:20100725T221000Z


DTEND:20100726T001900Z


TRANSP:OPAQUE


SEQUENCE:0


UID:TripSync-1277878671.97118-air/0/0


DTSTAMP:20100706T173840Z


SUMMARY: DEPARTURE 6:10 PM Local Time (CLT) - United Airlines\, Flight ####
(CLT-MIA)


DESCRIPTION:United Airlines\n\n\nFlight ####\n Charlotte (CLT) to Miami (
MIA) \n Depart: Jul 25 at 6:10 PM (local time)\n Arrive: Jul 25 at 8:19 P
M (local time)\n Seats: ##D \n \n \nAirline Confirmation: United Airlines:
###### \nSabre Record Locator: XXXXXX \n\nThe subject line displays the a
ctual (local) time at point of departure.\nThe calendar entry is based on
your time zone configuration.


PRIORITY:1


LOCATION:Flight #### (CLT-MIA)


CLASS:pUBLIC


BEGIN:VALARM


TRIGGER:pT24H


ACTION: DISPLAY


DESCRIPTION:Reminder


END:VALARM


END:VEVENT


END:VCALENDAR




I blanked out a couple of the details (flight numbers, record locator, email address), but they're all correct in the actual file.




Thanks.


Greg
 
I can repro it with that sample - i'll see what i can find out. However, as a workaround until its solved, send the meeting request to yourself (its actually a meeting update). It's easier than redoing the appointment.

FWIW, i've had the same problem with the ics files from Delta's website. i'm not sure if its still a problem, i quit flying. :)
 
BTW, if i put a valid address in the organizer field, it works better - i get a meeting invite and i can either accept it or save it. Either way, its added to my calendar.

This is what it looks like with a valid address as the organizer:

2010-07-07_1818.png

ORGANIZER:MAILTO:my email

This line is the culprit but why its being added to your ics and not theirs is unknown. If you remove that from the text, it works as a normal appointment, which is what you had before. When the content of that field is not valid (either "my email" as your example or a munged address like slipstick@slipstick) i get the meeting update form.

ETA: I presume you had an appointment before, not a meeting request you needed to accept.
 
I can't send it to myself (well, I can...but it doesn't help), as it gives me the note at the top that I'm the meeting organizer and don't need to respond. Thus, I don't even have the Accept, Tentative and Decline buttons.




My copy does have my actual email address...I edited it out when I posted. The AMEX site is tied to my email address, so it's trying to load in on my calendar (as it should).




I just don't know why it went for months/years as giving me an appointment (no other attendees) to giving me a meeting (with a To: field). If it was an initial meeting invitation, I would have the option to Cancel Invitation and it would just transition back to an Appointment. However, it's seeing it as an existing Meeting and only giving me the Send Update option.




There shouldn't be an "invitation" of any kind...just a simple Save and Close with all the information there and the appropriate time in the fields.




I think when tech support opens it, with my email address, they see what they "should" see.




Greg
 
I am too running into similar issue. Was this issue resolved?
 
No, it wasn't resolved on Outlook's side AFAIK. It no longer happens with USAir and some hotels chains but does with other sites, so i think the problem was on the generating side.

It's been a while since I've had the problem, so I forget exactly what I did to get it on my calendar and its not exactly easy to repro with making a reservation, so i can't test it. :) Is there a forward button on the form? If it won't add an event to your calendar without sending the update, send the update to yourself - then you can move or copy the invite to another calendar to break the link and move it back. Just because its a meeting is no reason to copy it to a new appt form, you just need to be able to save it to your calendar.
 
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