Creating Recurring Appointments - Outlook 2007 - Keyboard

Creating a Recurring Appointment in Outlook 2007

A recurring appointment is a meeting or event that occurs on a daily, weekly, monthly or even annual basis. Maybe it's a team meeting every Monday - or maybe you have a specific task to be undertaken at the same time each day? In these instances and more a recurring appointment is the best solution.

In this post I am going to walk through how you create an example recurring daily task event in Outlook 2007 using keystrokes.

Creating a Recurring Appointment

1. Open MS Outlook 2007 and create a new appointment item using CONTROL SHIFT A. You can also create a recurring appointment by:
   • Pressing ALT F to open the File menu, moving to the New submenu and choosing the Appointment option there.

   Alternatively, you can:

   • Press CONTROL 2 to move focus to the Calendar then press CONTROL N to create a new item (which will be an appointment if you are focused in your Calendar.)
2. With the new appointment open, focus will be in the Subject edit field so type in an example subject line there for now. (As a general rule of thumb, subject lines need to be short and to the point but not so cryptic that you can't figure out what the bleep the appointment is for later on.)
3. Press the TAB key to move to the Location edit combo box and either type in a new location or choose a previous location from the list.
4. Press the TAB key again to move to the Start Time Date field and type in a test example date using the format: DD/MM/YYYY.
5. TAB to the Start Time edit field and enter the appropriate time in 24 hour notation.
6. Continue onwards and complete the End Date and Time fields in a similar manner.
7. Another press of the TAB key will move focus to the All Day Event checkbox and you can leave this unchecked. That said, if your recurring event is going to last the whole day, then you would check this checkbox using the SPACEBAR.
8. With the details of the first model appointment or event in place it is time to add the pattern of recurrence so first you need to move to the upper ribbon using the ALT key.
9. If the Appointment tab is not already selected then use the LEFT or RIGHT ARROW keys to move there. With the Appointment tab selected, press the DOWN ARROW to move to the lower ribbon.
10. Now press TAB to move all the way along to the Recurrence button in the Options Group box. Press SPACEBAR to activate the button.

11. Focus will now be in the Appointment Recurrence dialog box which is visually split into three sections, these are:
• Appointment time - Start, End and Duration.
• Recurrence pattern - Daily, Weekly, Monthly or Yearly.
• Range of recurrence - No end date, End after X occurrences or End By
12. Press the TAB key to move the cursor through the fields and get a feel for how the options are structured and laid out.
13. After you have explored for a bit, move the cursor back to the Start: field and check the details in there - the value should be what you typed in to the appointment item when you created it. Press TAB to move to the End field also and again check the details. Another press of the TAB key will put focus on the Duration field and this should give you the total time for the appointment automatically.
14. With all of the Appointment Time details set (they should have all been pulled through from the appointment correctly anyway) you can TAB to the Recurrent Pattern radio buttons. The default option on focus is normally "Weekly" and from there you can press the UP and DOWN arrow to change to Daily, Monthly or even Yearly.

NOTE:If you are using a screenreader you may hear some extra feedback as you move, this is because when you focus on a new radio button the options appropriate to your new choice appear on the right. For example, if you choose the "Daily" radio button then you can TAB over to two further radio buttons, but if you choose "Weekly" then you can TAB over to a series of checkboxes, one for each day.

15. The Recurrent Pattern radio buttons also have some corresponding keystrokes that you can use to activate the radio button directly. These individual keystrokes are as follows:
• Daily is ALT D
• Weekly is ALT W
• Monthly is ALT M
• Yearly is ALT Y
16. Choose the correct setting for the scenario you are dealing with then press TAB to move and set the further options.
17. When you have set the Recurrence Pattern press the TAB key to move to the Start field and check the date there. This should already be correct for the appointment you have set but if it isn't you can manually change it. Note that this Start edit field has a direct keystroke of ALT S.
18. Press TAB to move away from the Start edit field. Focus will now be on the first of three radio button choices which determine how long the recurrence pattern is to run for. Use the DOWN and UP ARROW to move focus between the three radio buttons. The default choice is the first option, labelled No End Date, leaving this set means that the recurrence is ongoing. The second radio button option - labelled End After - lets you set a maximum number of occurrences after which the pattern ceases. The final option, End by, simply stops the recurrence when the date - set in the associated edit field - is reached.
19. When you have chosen appropriately for your own event or appointment, TAB to the OK button. Your recurring appointment is good to go!

Some Example Recurring Appointments

Okay, not so fast! Let's get more of a feel for how some of these options work by throwing a few real world scenario's into the mix. We start with a fairly common example, the weekly team huddle meeting:

Creating a Weekly Monday Morning Meeting (Ongoing)

1. Press CONTROL SHIFT A to create a new appointment.
2. Complete the basic appointment information - Subject, Location, Start Date and Time, Finish Date and Time.
3. Press ALT to the upper ribbon, choose the Appointment tab using the RIGHT and LEFT ARROW keys as necessary.
4. DOWN ARROW to the Appointment tab lower ribbon and press the TAB key to move along to the Recurrence button. Press the SPACEBAR to activate this.
5. In the Appointment Recurrence dialog box, press ALT W to select the Weekly recurrence pattern radio button.
6. Press TAB to move to the Recur edit field and ensure that it is set to 1 - doing this ensures that the event occurs every week. (However, if the team meeting was every two weeks you would set this to 2.)
7. TAB to the day checkboxes and press SPACEBAR to check the option associated with Monday.
8. TAB again or press ALT S to move to the second Start field and check the Start date is correct.
9. Press TAB again to the No End Date radio button - this is the option I want - so I TAB a few times more until I have focus on the OK button. SPACEBAR to confirm and focus goes back to the main appointment screen.
10. Press ALT S to save the recurring appointment after a final check. We're done here!

Creating a Daily Event, From Now to a Specific Date.

1. Follow the above steps to the Appointment Recurrence dialog box.
2. Press ALT D to move to and activate the Daily recurrence pattern radio button.
3. Press the TAB key and focus will move to the first of two radio buttons. Press the DOWN ARROW to move to and select the Every Weekday radio button.
4. Move to the second Start field using the TAB key or by pressing ALT S. Press TAB to move to the associated radio buttons and press the DOWN ARROW to the third radio button option labelled End By.
5. TAB twice to move to the edit field associated with this radio button and change the date as necessary.
6. TAB to the OK button and press the SPACEBAR.
7. Back in the main appointment dialog box, save your appointment after a final check through with ALT S. We're done here too!

Creating a Monthly Team Meeting, on the third Thursday (Ongoing)

1. Follow the same steps as previous to the Appointment Recurrence dialog box.
2. Press ALT M to move to and activate the monthly radio button.
3. Press TAB to the Day radio button then DOWN ARROW to focus on the second of the two radio buttons. The specific keystroke for this is ALT E.
4. Press TAB three times to focus on a combo box, tap letter T to change this setting to show "third".
5. TAB once more to the next combo, again tap the letter T until the value shows "Thursday".
6. TAB to the edit field and ensure it contains the value of 1.
7. TAB to the second Start edit field or use ALT S. From there, TAB to the No End Date radio button and check that it is selected.
8. Finish up by pressing TAB to move to the OK button, press SPACEBAR then save the main now recurring appointment using ALT S.

Creating recurring appointments can be a bit quirky at times but I hope these steps give you a few more keyboard strategies to help make the process a bit easier.

Have fun!