Summary: Notes7/Mac fails to correctly import a meeting invite in iCal (.ics) format.
Details:
I just upgraded my Notes/Mac client from 6.5 to 7.0.3. (Our IT dept. is still evaluating Notes8/Mac before rolling it out here.)
I read my email in Apple Mail because I prefer it to Notes Mail. Because I’ve had trouble in the past with the Notes POP server, I have all my email forwarded to a UNIX machine which I POP into. Notes does a decent job of translating calendar operations (meeting invites, time/room changes, etc) into iCal format, which results in a .ics file attached to my email.
Dragging and dropping this .ics attachment from Apple Mail into the mail Inbox pane in Notes 6.5 resulted in a mail entry in Notes that looked exactly as if I had originally received the email in Notes. I would double click on the mail entry and I would have all the options of Accept/Decline/etc, as well as the full content of the invite, and everything worked smoothly.
In Notes 7.0.3, however, this drag and drop operation now results in a somewhat mystifying dialog titled “Import Calendar”. The dialog has two controls (plus OK and Cancel): 1) a single empty text field titled “Calendar Name”; and 2) a check box titled “Preview Entries”. Clicking the “Preview Entries” checkbox reveals a listbox containing the title of the meeting invite and doesn’t appear to have much other behavior.
If I click OK without filling in the Calendar Name field, a nag dialog appears saying “You must specify a name for your imported calendar.” It doesn’t seem to matter what I type in the field. I’ve tried my full Notes name, as well as garbage names (“foo”). The result is always that the dialog is satisfied and a message appears in the status bar at the bottom of the Notes window that says “Note created from iCalendar conversion has been placed on your Calendar.” However, I don’t see it until I Refresh the window, after which it appears in the correct location in my calendar.
So now I have the entry on my calendar, but these behaviors are missing:
– I never got a chance to Accept or Decline the meeting
– the meeting shows up in my calendar in the color of an appointment
– the chair of the meeting receives no notification that I have accepted or declined the meeting.
– the meeting invite does NOT show up in my Notes email Inbox as it did in 6.5.
If you are still reading this message I thank you for your time and patience. Any help is appreciated. Thanks in advance.