12
Groups

This chapter describes the different tasks involved in managing groups and group members within a calendar server node network.

The following topics are dealt with in this chapter:

• Managing Groups
• Directory Server Groups and Group Filters

Managing Groups

Calendar groups of users and resources can be created by an administrator to be used by everyone in the calendar network. Private groups can be created by any user for their personal usage. Calendar groups allow users to schedule meetings efficiently with other users and resources.

Groups can include members on any remote node. There are four types of groups:

Private groups

• available only to the users who created the groups
• created and modified by users in the Group Management dialogue box of a calendar client
• the right to create these groups is available to all calendar users

Members-only groups

• available only to members of the group
• created and modified by users in the Group Management dialogue box of a calendar client
• the right to create these groups is available to all users

Public groups

• available to all users
• the user will have the right to create, modify and delete his own public groups
• ownership of these groups is exclusive and cannot be transferred
• can be created and modified only by users who have been granted the administrative rights to do so

Administrative groups

• available to all users
• administrative groups are owned by the SYSOP, not the users who create them
• can be created and modified only by users who have been granted the administrative rights to do so

Private, public and members-only groups are managed by the users who created them. Users can create or modify these groups using their Calendar client. Administrative groups can be managed by administrators using the group utility unigroup or the Calendar Administrator client.

The server administrator can give special group administration rights to calendar users. For full information on how to grant users group management rights, see Chapter 11, "Administrative Rights".

NOTE: Oracle does not recommend the use of public groups. Public groups are supported only as a legacy of previous versions. Administrative groups offer all of the characteristics of public groups with the added advantage that ownership of the groups can be shared and transferred among users possessing the necessary administrative rights.

Web GUI

Use the Calendar Administrator to create groups easily. Click the Calendar Management tab and then on Groups. To add a new group click Add Group on the far right. To modify an existing group or to add members to it, search for the group you want to modify using the search box. When the group is listed click the corresponding pencil icon in the Actions column. Click Users or Resources. The list of existing members in the group will be listed. To delete a user or resources, click the Remove User or Remove Resource icon in the Actions column. To remove more than on member, check mark each one in the Select column and then click Delete Users or Delete Resources button at the bottom right. To add new members to the group, click Add Users or Add Resources on the far right.

Cmd line

To add a group:

Use unigroup with the -add option to create a new group. Use the -mod option to modify the group name or other attributes. Use the -attach option to add members to the group. Use the -ls and -members utility can be used to list public and administrative groups and their members. For full information on use and syntax of unigroup, see Appendix E, "Utilities" of your calendar server Reference Manual.

% unigroup -add "NAME=Marketing" -n 8 -p sesame 
unigroup: NAME=Marketing/ID=4096/NODE-ID=8/TYPE=admin

Directory Server Groups and Group Filters

Oracle calendar clients allow users to view and create groups of calendar users. If any groups exist in the LDAP directory server, these groups will also be available for viewing (but not modification) in the calendar client. The Oracle server also allows users to view Oracle Mail distribution lists as groups. This includes any mailing lists present in Oracle Internet Directory. Only the Oracle Connector For Outlook gives access to these groups for sending mail or inviting users to meetings.

For more info on directory groups and how to configure them, see "LDAP Groups and Distribution Lists", on page of Chapter 4, "Directory Servers for Calendar".