Public folders in Microsoft Outlook allow you to share information with groups of individuals. As the owner of a public folder, you give those individuals permission to read, delete, or edit the contents of the folder, or to add their own content to that folder. In practical terms, this gives them the right to post messages to the folder or add files to it.

A public folder hierarchy has been established for the entire campus and it appears at the bottom of the folder list on the left side of the Outlook window. (To see the folder list, click on View/Folder List on the toolbar menu at the top of the Outlook window.) The hierarchy is based on the areas associated with the vice presidents (academic, administrative services, advancement, enrollment management, student life) and the president. The president and the vice presidents are technically the "owners" of the public folders associated with their specific area. You are given automatic rights to create subfolders in relevant areas of the hierarchy. An important fact to remember is that "ownership" has an ‘inheritance’ quality about it. The owner of a public folder will also be, by default, the owner of any subfolder and will be listed among the persons who have permissions associated with being an owner. That means that the VP of your area will appear as owner of any folder that you construct. In addition, if you are faculty member, then a distribution list name for the entire faculty will appear as a virtual owner ("publishing author") of your folder. I suggest that you remove the VP’s name from the list and the HCFaculty DL distribution list alias, if it appears. That way, unauthorized individuals can’t view the contents of your folder and can’t delete or edit any of the content accidentally.

Your ability to create a public folder under a vice president is based upon being a member of a distribution list associated with your particular area of the hierarchy. For example, all faculty members are included in HCFaculty DL and each member has been given permission to create folders under the folder labeled ‘Academic/Classes’ and under their department folder. They can also create folders under ‘Committees’. The overarching principle here is that individuals have default permission to create subfolders under certain parent folders, but not others.

In summary, every public folder has an "owner" (an individual who originates that folder). For the first and second levels, it is a vice president or president. For each succeeding level, it is someone who has permission to create subfolders under particular first or second level public folders. You can find out who the owner of a public folder is by highlighting the public folder and then right-clicking on it. Left click on "Properties" and then the "Summary" tab at the top of the Properties window. That should show you the folder contact(s) or owner(s) of the folder.

To create a public folder, you must know which first and second level public folders you have permission to be an owner in. Once you have done that, you should:

1. highlight the public folder under which you wish to create your own public folder.
2. Right-click on that folder and then select "New Folder". That will bring up the Create New Folder window.
3. Type in a name for the new folder and verify the place where the new folder will be placed. Click on "OK". The new folder should now be part of the public folder hierarchy.

So you don’t have to wander through an entire list of public folders to get to the one that you wish to view, you can put a copy of that folder in "Public Folders/Favorites." (Notice that the latter is just above "All Public Folders".) Click and drag the Public Folder that you want – to Favorites.

To give permissions to individuals to gain deal with the contents of your newly created public folder,

1. right click on the folder and select "Properties". When the Properties window appears, click on the "Permissions" tab at the top of the window. This will show you who has default permissions and allows you to add individuals and grant specific permissions.

Please Note: Rights to folders are inherited. That means that the owner of a particular first or second level folder established by Technology Services will appear in the Permissions area as having the right to be part of sub folders. You will have to Remove their permissions if you don’t want them to view or manipulate the contents of that folder.

2. "Remove" individuals whom you don’t want to give access to the folder.
3. "Add" individuals you wish to give access to and grant them the rights you wish to them to have.

To do that,

1. click on "Add" and select the individual’s name from the address book. Their name will appear in the list of names in the Permissions window. The default for permissions is "none".
2. Highlight the name of the person you wish to give permissions to. (You can give permissions to an individual, a series of individuals, or a distribution group. Just highlight them and then choose the permissions.) You can give permissions in two ways. First, you can click on the check box beside relevant permissions in the lower half of the window. As you do that, you will notice that the entry in the "Roles" blank will change to reflect the permissions given. Or second, you can click on the arrow next to the ‘roles’ blank and choose which role you wish to grant to the individual. The permissions will then reflect the role you choose for them.

Note: When you create a folder and give individuals permissions within that folder, any subfolders that you create subsequently will automatically give those individuals the same permissions. This makes it easy to create a class folder, for example, and then also create topical folders that you want all the members of the class to have access to. (Create the class folder first, give the necessary permissions, then create the subfolders.)

You can use the public folder as a discussion listserv. You (or anyone with ‘create" and "read" permissions rights) can ‘post’ messages to the folder.

1. Highlight the public folder you wish to post a message to.
2. Click on "New" on the toolbar at the top of the Outlook window. This will bring up a window for developing you message. Notice that the window tells you where the message will be posted and allows you to input a subject heading and the message. Once you have done both of those,
3. Click on "Post" at the top of the window. The message will then appear in the public folder and will be accessible to anyone with permissions to do so.

After you have opened a message in a public folder, you can reply to it in two ways. You can post a reply to the public folder or you can reply to the originator of the message privately. (To reply to a message, a person must have the right to ‘read items’ and ‘create items’.)

Posting a reply to the public folder:

1. Highlight the message in the public folder. Right click on the message. Select "Post Reply to Folder". That will bring up a "Post" window that has the original message and space for replying to it. Note that the subject of the original message is designated as a "conversation". You can, at this point input a subject heading that relates to the "conversation".
2. Type in your response and then click on "Post".

Replying privately to the originator of the message:

1. Highlight the message, then right click on the message.
2. Select "Reply" and a reply window will appear, with the name of the message originator in the "To:" field. Generate your reply as you would any non-public folder message.

To view related message together, right click on the message that you wish to find related messages about and then select "Find All/Related Messages". This will bring up a window that includes the message lines for all of the related messages. They are listed chronologically with the most current being at the top.

You can also generate threads in a public folder by clicking on "View" on the toolbar and selecting "Current View/By Conversation Topic". This will create a hierarchy of messages according to the topic of ‘conversation’. Click on the plus-sign beside a particular line and all of the messages associated with a conversation will appear. The indentation of the message writer’s name shows the thread of the conversation.

Some of you may be able to use this technique.

1. Open the file that you wish to place in a public folder.
2. Click on File/Sendto/Exchange Folder on the menu bar at the top of the window.
3. When the folder hierarchy appears, find and highlight the public folder you wish to place the file in. Then click on "OK".

The file should now appear in the public folder.

Those who cannot use that technique can use the following:

1. Make the Microsoft Outlook window as small as you can while leaving the relevant public folder visible. Move the window toward the side of your screen by clicking and dragging the blue bar at the top of the window.
2. Open Windows Explorer. Find and highlight the file you wish to place in the public folder.

1. Decrease the size of Windows Explorer so you can see both the Outlook and Explorer windows. (Click and drag a window to move it into position that is beside the other.)
2. Click and drag the file from the Explorer window to the public folder. Drop it into the public folder.
3. You can now view the contents of the file in the public folder by double-clicking on that file.