Managing Exchange Server 2003 Free/Busy Folders

Free/busy data is published information that contains a user's personal availability data based on the user's schedule. Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 uses the information extensively when users schedule meetings. These topics provide an explanation of how clients such as Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 work with Exchange Server 2003 to manage free/busy data. They also provide information about how you can best deploy and maintain free/busy servers.

Exchange Server 2003 stores free/busy information in a dedicated public folder that is named SCHEDULE+ FREE BUSY. This folder contains a separate subfolder for each administrative group in your Exchange organization. When a user publishes free/busy data, Exchange Server 2003 posts the information in a message in the appropriate free/busy subfolder. The free/busy folders are system folders and function in a manner that is similar to offline address book folders.

In Exchange System Manager, you can view the system folders for a specific public folder tree by right-clicking the public folder tree node, and then clicking View System folders.

Messages in the SCHEDULE+Free/Busy system folder