Read Outlook Events via Python

outlook-2010, python, python-2.7, win32com

Solution

From here I need help with looping through the events and read them.

Basically, all you have to do is to follow the COM API documentation from Microsoft. For example, the `Restrict()` method returns `AppointmentItem` objects which are documented at AppointmentItem Object for Outlook 2010. So, starting with a folder, you can get and list the appointments as follows:

# Get the AppointmentItem objects
# http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/office/aa210899(v=office.11).aspx
appointments = someFolder.Items

# Restrict to items in the next 30 days (using Python 3.3 - might be slightly different for 2.7)
begin = datetime.date.today()
end = begin + datetime.timedelta(days = 30);
restriction = "[Start] >= '" + begin.strftime("%m/%d/%Y") + "' AND [End] <= '" +end.strftime("%m/%d/%Y") + "'"
restrictedItems = appointments.Restrict(restriction)

# Iterate through restricted AppointmentItems and print them
for appointmentItem in restrictedItems:
    print("{0} Start: {1}, End: {2}, Organizer: {3}".format(
          appointmentItem.Subject, appointmentItem.Start, 
          appointmentItem.End, appointmentItem.Organizer))

Note that I had to use a slightly different time format for the restriction expression (`"%m/%d/%Y"` instead of `"%m%d%Y"`). The proper solution would be to use Outlook's `Format` function as documented at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/office/ff869597(v=office.14).aspx, section Date. Note also that I was using Python 3.3, so you might have to use different functions to create the dates. In any case, for testing purposes, you can use a hard coded expression like `"[Start] >= '02/03/2014' AND [End] <= '03/05/2014'"`

To get a shared calendar, the following code should work - This is the usual sequence found in the API documentation, however I was not able to actually get it working, but this could be due to a different backend server (not using an Exchange server):

recipient = namespace.createRecipient("User Name")
resolved = recipient.Resolve()
sharedCalendar = namespace.GetSharedDefaultFolder(recipient, 9)

To show all available folders as a tree, you can use something like

def folderTree(folders, indent = 0):
    prefix = ' ' * (indent*2)
    i = 0
    for folder in folders:
        print("{0}{1}. {2} ({3})".format(prefix, i, folder.Name, folder.DefaultItemType))
        folderTree(folder.Folders, indent + 1)
        i = i + 1

...
folderTree(namespace.Folders)

To look up a folder by its path (e.g. to find the calendar folder "Norfeld@so.com" below the "Internet Calendars" folder), you can use something like

def findFolder(folders, searchPath, level = 0):
    for folder in folders:
        if folder.Name == searchPath[level]:
            if level < len(searchPath)-1:
                # Search sub folder
                folder = findFolder(folder.folders, searchPath, level+1)
            return folder
    return None

...
sharedCalendar = findFolder(namespace.Folders, ["Internet Calendars", "Norfeld@so.com"])

See also:

- Outlook Object Model Reference

- Some more samples how to use the COM API (as part of my "Python samples" project)

- A standalone Python script to show the folders tree and to lookup folders by path name

Problem

Original source