Microsoft Office Live Small Business Community

Hi everyone,

on this list of features that would come to Office Live Small Business it says for Office Live Basic "All customers can now take advantage of full synchronization with Outlook 2007 for e-mail, personal contacts, calendar, and tasks." I just tried this, i.e. I signed up with my primary Windows Live ID account for Office Live Small Business, then created a new Office Live Mail account and pointed my Outlook with Outlook Connector to this new account (which is an Office Live Mail account, I can verify this in the web interface). But Outlook Connector says that Calendar sync is only available to subscribers. What's up?

Cheers,

David

Do you have the latest version of Outlook Connector?

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=7AAD7E6A-931E-438A-950C-5E9EA66322D4&displaylang=en 

Yes, I do.

Best,

David

Hi David,

I use Outlook 2007 to sync with my Office Live accounts and have done for some time with no problems. I did have the issue you are describing, however, when I tried to sync a free Hotmail account with Outlook a while back so I'm guessing that the new free service has not yet been cleared for Outlook syncing and is being treated like a free Hotmail account for some reason. If Filberto says this is all OK then all I can suggest is that you reinstall the outlook connector, set up an email account using your Office Live ID, close Outlook and re-open.

Any update on this from MS? Should it work? As far as I can see everything is configured/setup properly from my side, why can't I sync the calendar?

Best,

David

Just to be 100% sure, I installed a fresh WinXP system today, put Outlook 2007 on it, downloaded the latest Outlook Connector and hooked it up to my newly created Office Live Mail account. And no calendar sync. This rules out that this is either due to an outdated Connector, or some old settings on the computer or anything like that. It simply doesn't work, very much contrary to the information provided by MS that it actually should work. An update on the status of this would be highly appreciated! And, in case it just is not ready, I really suggest you change the marketing information out there and make it clear that Calendar sync is not one feature of Office Live.

Best,

David

Have same issue. Tried to sync office live account info with Outlook 2007 using connector and all ok except calendar which states you have to subscribe. Also can't sync business contact manager list either... error is "sharepoint reported error (0x8000FFFF) an error occurred either in Outlook or sharepoint. contact the sharepoint site administrator". Cheers, Jim

Using the Premium version here. Vista laptop between a home network and an SBS 03+ domain, Outlook syncs with calendar but have never had my BCM list show in OL error er not.

Takes more time at sync using this machine inside an SBS03 domain (not in domain). At some point during the day I have to disconnect from the network and establish a new connection. This has only started happening since I installed the sync connector. At home on a network (dedicated XP machine), sync with any new calendar updates is mostly instant.

Chris Schatte

 I'm having the same issue syncing my calendar with Outlook in OLSB.  I have Office Live Small Business, and can't seem to find anywhere to upgrade to a "paid" version as is recommended by the Outlook Connector. 

 I'd like to migrate some additional users to OLSB, but need to have e-mail and calendar sync to make it work.

 Best regards, Brian

I have not forgotten this thread; one question: the email account you are trying to have the calendar synch; is it associated with a custom domain?  i.e. it looks like: mymail@mydomain.com ??

The e-mail address is brian@bftcpa.net, so yes, it is associated with a custom domain.

Same challenge here with a Microsoft supplied Domain name of success4realestate.com.

Contacts Manager shows up in Outlook fine, and my Windows live email account inbox is accessable.

Here's my sync report:
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Outlook Connector Version 12.0.4518.1068

Account: derek@success4realestate.com

Signed in successfully at 3/4/2008 1:44:52 PM                                                                          

Mail: Last successfully refreshed at 3:30 PM.                                                                          
Calendar: Error at 1:44 PM.                                                                                            
Contacts: Last successfully refreshed at 3:30 PM.                                                                      

Errors :

Time: 3/4/2008 1:44:52 PM
Error in Calendar
Outlook Connector is available only to subscribers.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And my understanding is that there is only one version of Office Live Small Business these days.

Help!!!

 I'm trying to sync up calendars, tasks, and contacts and it tells me:

 Share Point reported an error 0x8000ffff

 I've successfully synched on all my other computers.  I don't know what's different about this one.  It's a brand new Dell like the rest.

Melissa Olson

www.o2esidaho.com

Outlook Connector Version 12.0.4518.1068

Account: brian@bftcpa.net

Signed in successfully at 3/7/2008 7:26:37 AM                                                                          

Mail: Last successfully refreshed at 7:26 AM.                                                                          
Calendar: Error at 7:26 AM.                                                                                            
Contacts: Last successfully refreshed at 7:26 AM.                                                                      

Errors :

Time: 3/7/2008 7:26:40 AM
Error in Calendar
Outlook Connector is available only to subscribers.

These kinds of problems are exactly why I haven't tried this service yet with my business or any of my customers..  I have several customers that I am sure I could convince to use this service however it's so poorly documented and sloppily implemented, and barely supported  that I can't risk recommending it.

 The email, contact, calander, task sync is essential.   It's also essential that it WORK with outlook..   I can't figure out how to set it up wtih the provided documentation.   There's so little there, like MSFT expects people to just sign up and risk their businesses without having any confidence in MSFT to deliver.   And look what happens when one signs up..  it doesn't work. . 

Not to be negative (because I really would like to see this service be successful and come out ahead of Google)  but the service is so poorly documented, specifially missing detailed informaton about features, how they work, how to set them up, where to go for help, step-by-step instructions, etc that I can't risk a real business on this yet.   Google's services look so much better and they now have IMAP email.

 Also, the lack of nested folders in email is a major drawback with my customers.

 I used the contact sync with my hotmail account and it worked ok, except when I needed that address book to be available to sync with my mobile device - couldn't see it..   I had to revert back to using a local PST for my contacts (and calendar since that's not available to hotmail users - even paid ones)..  yet Microsoft publishes an article on how to sync Outlook with Google's online calendar..   Go figure.!  Great marketing, I guess !!! . 

 This seems to be little more than a hogepoge of services with sporatic features slung together to quickly come up with something to counter Google with.  Too much marketing and too little engineering.

 I wish Microsoft would get serious about providing a online solution to email, contacts,& calendaring, that actually works with Outlook (with little problems) for both businesses and consumers.   One that's actually e a s y to setup and works consistently and reliably..   It's long overdue...   So far this isn't it or even near it from what I can see.

 Bryan