Sync Work and Private Calendars the right way.

[gusanitoverde]

I have my mac setup at home. I have mobile me to sync 2 of my macs and my iphone. Mobile me synchronizes all that can be synchronized.

My boss got me a mac and is connected in a Windows Exchange environment. It works great. But I want to combine my work calendar with my private calendars.

So, I want to bring the exchange calendar of my work computer to show in my private calendars in my mac at home and in my iphone. Maybe through publishing and subscription...?

The issue is that I do not want to put my mobile me password in this work computer, since it is a "Company computer" and it's going to sync all my private info.

How bad can it get if I put my mobile me credentials in this work computer and syncs all my private info? Is there a potential that my info be out in the open for all to see in my workplace?

Is there any right way to sync work and private data?

Thanks.

 

[nadyne]

In Exchange, other users cannot see the details of your calendar. They can see your free/busy information -- that is, if you have an event on your calendar that's marked as "busy", then they'll see that you're not available at that time, but they won't be able to see the details of it.

The exception to this is when you have given someone else access to your calendar by either setting it as a shared calendar or by assigning delegate rights to someone else. In that case, all that you need to do is mark your calendar event as "private", and then others won't be able to see it either. This is relatively rare, and it's not something that happens automatically.

I'm not sure which client you're using to access your Exchange account. Certainly in Entourage (which is part of Microsoft Office:Mac), if you have it access your MobileMe account, it won't expose anything to Exchange -- they're stored completely separately.

Personally, I find it much easier to simply keep one calendar. I let everything live on my Exchange calendar, which means that I've only got one single place to see everything that's going on. It also means that I've always got instant access to my complete calendar on my iPhone, which is massively important to me.

Regards,
Nadyne.

 

[gusanitoverde]

Thank you. It is absolutely true. However, in Mobile Me I have all the calendars for all members of my family. Looks horrendously busy. I was trying to include my work calendar from Exchange in to my mobile me calendar. Practically making a fusion, of both.

Now putting aside the fear of private information disseminating into corporate apps (which I thank you for your info), I am still unsure about bringing the full connection of Mobile me to the work computer.

That's the thing about about Apple products. It integrates so well that soon this mac mini at work will soon be like my computer with Mobile Me Syncing. There are no layers of access to control the flow of private stuff to migrate to work. But in case I ever leave work or one given day my station is ever locked up from me, I do not want to leave personal info here. Yet, I want to keep one calendar for my private stuff and my job.

 

[nadyne]

But in case I ever leave work or one given day my station is ever locked up from me, I do not want to leave personal info here. Yet, I want to keep one calendar for my private stuff and my job.

In that case, you need to take care of the security of your Mac. You should have your own user account on the Mac which has admin privileges, and which you have to login to when you boot up (that is, you should not set it up such that it automatically logs in to your user account when it boots). Personally, I also have my Mac set up so that when the screen saver is on (mine comes on automatically after ten minutes), I have to enter my password so to use my Mac again. Since no-one else will be able to get into your user account on your Mac, they won't be able to see your personal stuff. Then you can have one calendar and not have to worry about anything.

Regards,
Nadyne.

 

[CarlJ]

My boss got me a mac and is connected in a Windows Exchange environment. It works great. But I want to combine my work calendar with my private calendars.

So, I want to bring the exchange calendar of my work computer to show in my private calendars in my mac at home and in my iphone. Maybe through publishing and subscription...?

If what you want is to see all your calendars in one place, while they stay logically separate, iCal is set up to handle precisely that. Simply go into iCal's preferences, Accounts, click "+" to add an account, and add your Exchange account (with help from your sysadmin at work if necessary). It won't replace your "local" Mac calendar or any subscriptions, it'll add it as an additional section that you can assign a color to, click on and off, etc., just like your current calendars.

On my iCal (both at home and at work, where I have considerable autonomy over the setup of my machine, but it is attached to Active Directory, and using Exchange), I have my personal calendar (which is sync'd between the two with MobileMe), my work calendar (by virtue of having entered my Exchange account info on both), an Exchange "delegation" so that I can see my boss's calendar, and subscriptions to my wife's calendar (she uses Google Calendar), Address Book's birthdays calendar, our university's academic calendar, and Google's "US Holidays" calendar. iCal handles it all beautifully, and I can turn the individual bits on and off as needed.

So, I have both my home and work calendars in iCal, displaying together, but not leaking into each other. On the infrequent occasions where I have personal appointments during the work day, I put the specific details of an appointment (who/where/why/etc) in my personal calendar, and then put a corresponding entry in my work (Exchange) calendar that just says "Appt".

I expect the iPhone can do the same thing, though I don't have one (yet).