SharePoint 2007: The Definitive Guide

Chapter 10. Creating and Managing Meeting Workspaces

Introduction

A Meeting Workspace is a web site you can use to collect all of the materials related to a project, such as documents, agendas, and reports for a single meeting, a series of reoccurring meetings, or meetings pursuant to a long-term project. As with other elements in MOSS 2007, such as the Enterprise Report Center site template, the Meeting Workspace serves as a single interface for data from many scattered sources.

The Workspace doesn't exist only for the sake of presenting information during the meeting; it also provides a dynamic web site for attendees to check and find out the latest information on meeting topics. Meeting Workspaces are a handy way to communicate with attendees ahead of time so they can be prepared to bring specific materials or so they have the latest updates on the agenda. The workspace could also be the dynamic repository for data related to regularly held meetings, such as staff meetings. A Meeting Workspace can exist for years or be deleted after a single meeting, depending on its purpose.

You can create a Meeting Workspace when you create an event in your calendar. This can be the calendar present in either Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 or Microsoft Office Outlook 2007. It's also possible to create a Meeting Workspace without creating a calendar event.