Common Tasks

This page will help you get started using Oracle Calendar. Below you will find an overview of the program's main features and instructions for performing common tasks.

Changing the Agenda View

Once you have logged in, Oracle Calendar will display your In-tray and your agenda in Day View. The In-tray displays recent events you have created, accepted, sent, or refused. The Day View displays your Meeting schedule in the main panel, Tasks in the right panel, and Daily Notes and Daily Events in the bottom panel.

There are three basic ways to display an agenda:

Day View

Displays single-day view of agenda. All meetings, tasks, notes, and day events are displayed for the selected day.

Week View

Displays work-week view of agenda. Only schedule and daily notes are displayed for each day.

Month

View Displays month view of agenda. Similar to Week View, only schedule and daily notes are displayed for each day.

Oracle Calendar starts by displaying the agenda for the current day. However, you can center the view on a specific date by clicking on either the arrows or calendar icon directly above the agenda view.

Building an Agenda

Oracle Calendar allows you to create an agenda by adding meetings, tasks, day events, and daily notes. New events can be created by clicking the appropriate icon on the Oracle Calendar toolbar.

New Meeting

New Task

New Day Event

New Daily Note

Creating a Meeting

Meetings are events of finite length that block out sections of time on an attendee's agenda. Once you have clicked the Create Meeting icon, you can edit the specifics of a meeting:

General Options

• Title - meeting title (optional, Untitled if left blank)
• Location - meeting location (optional)
• Remind Me - selects personal reminders
• Tentative - indicates unfixed meeting time
• Date - indicates meeting date
• Start time - indicates meeting start time
• End time - indicates meeting end time (automatically adjusted if Duration changed)
• Duration - indicates length of meeting (automatically adjusted if End time changed)

People/Resources

• Add - finds a user based on input text box and adds to attendee list)
• Delete - removes selected user from attendee list

Groups can be selected by clicking the Select a Group icon , and a more powerful search utilty for finding users, groups, and resources can be used by clicking the Directory Search icon .

Details

• Importance level - indicates meeting priority (Normal, by default)
• Access level - indicates meeting visibility to other CorporateTime users (Normal, by default)
• Attachment - attaches document to meeting details
• Description - additional meeting details (optional text)

Reminders

• No reminder - disables personal reminder for this event
• Display upcoming for - enables upcoming event reminder (as a Daily Note) for selected time interval
• Remind me - enables personal reminder prior to event
• Add Date- adds meeting date manually

Repeating

• Repeat - determines repetition interval (Don't Repeat, by default)
• Start and end dates - determines range of meeting repetition
• Additional date - manually adds a date for meeting repetition (cannot be combined with Don't Repeat repetition interval)
• List dates - calculates dates of meeting repetition based on selected interval
• Delete - removes selected repetition date (can be done without modifying repetition interval)
• Include - includes Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays (not selected, by default)
• Check conflicts - checks for scheduling conflicts for all attendees

Creating a Task

Tasks are floating events, events not necessarily limited to a specific range of dates or times. Uncompleted tasks, if not already past a specified due date, carry over to the next day, and are displayed on the Daily Planner view. Tasks can be continually updated to reflect status or actual date of completion.

General

• Description - task name (optional, Untitled if left blank)
• Due date, Due time- due date/time of task. A due date can be assigned, or left undetermined.
• Start date, Start time - start date/time of task. A start date can be assigned, or left undetermined.
• Access level - indicates task visibility to other Oracle Calendar users (Normal, by default)
• Priority - task priority (ascending priority)
• Completed - task completion status. Completion is measured by percentage.
• Completion date - marks task as complete (100%) on specified date.

Creating a Day Event

Day Events are events that last an entire day, but do not reserve times on an agenda, as meetings do. Options for a day event are the similar to those for a meeting, except that there are no times specified, and conflicts are not checked for attendees. Like meetings, day events display on all agenda views.

General

• Title - day event name (optional, Untitled if left blank)
• Date - date of day event

People/Resources, Details, and Reminders options follow those for creating Meetings.

Creating a Daily Note

A Daily Note is not really an event, but more a reminder of things to do for a specific day. The configuration options for daily notes are the same as those for day events.

Managing Access Levels

Agenda items can be created with four different access levels:

• Public - other Oracle Calendar users can view details about this item, including title and location.
• Normal - displays no title when viewed by other Oracle Calendar users.
• Confidential - displays no title and a lock icon when viewed by other Oracle Calendar users.
• Personal - displays no title and a lock icon when viewed by other Oracle Calendar users.

Viewing Agenda Items

Details of any item on an agenda view can be retrieved by double-clicking the block of time for for meetings, or the name of the item for non-meeting items. The resulting window will display item specifics, including location, date, time, additional details, and current attendees.

Additionally, the View window can be used to confirm attendance to an event you have been listed as an attendee for (will attend, will not attend, will confirm later, and later time preferred) or to set an email reminder. If the meeting has multiple dates, you may state your attendance for a particular instance by highlighting the appropriate meeting in the list at the bottom of the window.

Acknowledging meetings will change they color of the display in the Agenda view. Meetings that you have created or selected to attend will display with a green background, meetings that you have not yet decided to attend (will confirm later) are displayed in blue, and meetings you have elected to not attend are displayed in red.

Editing/Deleting Agenda Items

While the agenda views will display all events a Oracle Calendar user has created or been added as an attendee for, you can delete or modify only items that you have created or copied into your agenda.

To edit an agenda item, click the item from any agenda view. Any re-configurable item details will be active (either through dropdown menus or text fields). Make any necessary changes, and click OK.

To delete an agenda item, right-click the item from any agenda view, select Delete Meeting, and click the Yes button when Oracle Calendar asks for confirmation of the deletion.

Viewing Group Agendas

Oracle Calendar can be used to view general agendas for multiple Oracle Calendar users. This functionality can be used prior to scheduling an event to eliminate potential meeting conflicts, but can only compare schedules for a single day at a time.

To open Group View, click the Group View icon .

• Select users/resources/groups by placing the name in the Add text field and clicking the check mark button. By default, the current user's Oracle Calendar account is placed in the selected users box; any other matches will be placed in the box after they have been found. To remove any match, highlight the entry and click the Delete button.
• To view the group calendar, click OK. This will create a display below listing each individual's blocked times (for previously scheduled meetings), as well as any potential conflicts in the Combined column.
• The current Group View can be modified to include or remove others from the view by clicking the Modify Members button .

Viewing Other Oracle Calendar Users' Agendas

Oracle Calendar users can view items on the agendas of any other Oracle Calendar user. The amount of detail, however, depends on the Access level set when the agenda item was created.

To open View Agendas, click the Open Agenda icon .

• Select a user/resource/group's agenda to view by placing the name in the Search text box and clicking OK. The Directory Search button can be pressed for a more comprehensive search of Oracle Calendar users.
• Other Oracle Calendar users' agendas are navigated in the same way as your own, and are opened in a new window so as not to lose focus on your own agenda.

Creating Groups

Groups of Oracle Calendar users or resources can be created by selecting Manage Groups... from the Tools menu.

• To create a new group, click New. Existing groups can also edited with Edit or removed with Delete.
• Type a name for the group in the Group name field.
• Select the group visibility in the Group type field. Public groups are visible to all Oracle Calendar users, private groups are visible only to you, and Members-only groups are visible only to members of the particular group.
• To add new members, type the name in the text box and click the check mark button. Members inadvertently added can be removed from the list by clicking Delete.
• To save the group details, click OK.

Once a group has been created, it can be used when adding attendees to a new agenda item. When searching for users to add, click the Select a Group button instead , and search for the group name you created.

Creating Access Rights

Access rights to your agenda for other Oracle Calendar users can be created by selecting Access Rights from the Tools menu. Users can be granted rights to view aspects of your agenda--even to modify your agenda items--on an individual user basis.

Refer to the Oracle Calendar Help for a more in-depth treatment of Access Rights.

Changing Oracle Calendar Options

A number of Oracle Calendar options and defaults can be changed by selecting Options from the Tools menu. Refer to Oracle Calendar's Help for more details about specific options that can be changed in these menus.

Getting Additional Help

Oracle Calendar provides a comprehensive help system that can be accessed by selecting Contents from the Help menu.

If you need additional help, you can send an email to consult@usc.edu or contact the Customer Support Center at 213-740-5555.

Last updated: Monday, August 03, 2009, 14:18PM PDT