Calendaring and Scheduling component in Zimbra

[staufj22]

Hi,
I'm not very knowledgeable in this area, so please excuse my ignorance. I’m interested in learning more about how Zimbra does its calendaring and scheduling. Specifically, the process of creating a resource and then, allowing that resource to respond to scheduling requests.
The background for this, not related to Zimbra, or mail service at all, is that I’m looking for a component to use for an online visitor scheduling application. Basically, the resources would be visiting rooms, and I would have some front-end business logic that decides if people are allowed to visit, and gather information. This front end application would then send a scheduling request to actually reserve the resource.
If anyone can point me to the right direction, I’m looking to see if there’re some standards protocols for scheduling requests, if there’s an open source java component that handles the creation of resources and reservation of that resource.
Any information would be greatly appreciated.

-Jimmy