Here is the ICS file content:
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
PRODID:-//Test//Test 1.0//EN
VERSION:2.0
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
BEGIN:VTIMEZONE
TZID:Asia/Tokyo
X-LIC-LOCATION:Asia/Tokyo
END:VTIMEZONE
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTAMP;TZID=Asia/Tokyo:20190108T154626
UID:a0K1I000007ljAxUAI-a0D1I000007daO4UAI
RELATED-TO:a0K1I000007ljAxUAI
DTSTART;TZID=Asia/Tokyo:20190123T080000
DTEND;TZID=Asia/Tokyo:20190123T200000
SUMMARY:XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX2
LOCATION:XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX2
DESCRIPTION:XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX2
TRANSP:OPAQUE
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTAMP;TZID=Asia/Tokyo:20190108T154626
UID:a0K1I000007ljAxUAI-a0D1I000007daNzUAI
RELATED-TO:a0K1I000007ljAxUAI
DTSTART;TZID=Asia/Tokyo:20190110T080000
DTEND;TZID=Asia/Tokyo:20190110T200000
SUMMARY:XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX1
LOCATION:XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX1
DESCRIPTION:XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX1
TRANSP:OPAQUE
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR
In Thunderbird and Gmail I able to see only first (by order) event. Is this normal behaviour for mail clients, should I create separate .ics file for each VEVENT then and send it with single mail? Thanks in advance for help!
Separate them. I don't know a calendar app that allows one to 'invite' someone to multiple events at the same time. One can of course send a multi event file and ask the user to import it (but for multi events sometimes subscribe is better). If one sends an ics file generated by google calendar, it does the same thing (along with option to download ics file), so nothing to do with your file.
If the need is to have a person see multiple events at a time, a better approach would be to offer them a personal subscribeable ics url. That way they see it separately in their calendar app and it will update/refresh when there are changes.
Related
I need an ICS-File for a allday event which includes a reminder, one day before the event takes plays.
The ICS-File generates the event without any problem. But the reminder is always set on 18hours, even if the trigger is set on e.g. "-PT15M"....
Can anybody help?
ICS Testfile:
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:Karabulut
BEGIN:VEVENT
CATEGORIES:Planing
DTSTART; VALUE=DATE:20200129
SUMMARY: Revenue
METHOD:PUBLISH
CLASS:PUBILC
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
BEGIN:VALARM
TRIGGER:-PT1D
ACTION:DISPLAY
DESCRIPTION:REMINDER
END:VALARM
END:VCALENDAR
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR
This may be the expected behaviour by the receiving application. The 18 hours may be the default set by you or the application.
Many applications do ot let ics files create alarms. I know I would not want the ics file to be creating alarms & notifications for me!
See also
Ical VALARM not registrering and
Sent email with iCal to outlook with valarm reminder and the links in the answers.
The RFC5545 specification See https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc5545#page-75 says:
Note: Implementations should carefully consider whether they
accept alarm components from untrusted sources, e.g., when
importing calendar objects from external sources. One
reasonable policy is to always ignore alarm components that the
calendar user has not set herself, or at least ask for
confirmation in such a case.
I am wondering about the BEGIN:VALARM value in ics.
I have set an alarm, but Outlook (PC) and Calendar (Mac) seems to ignore the alarm altogether. In eM Client (PC) the alarm is set but cannot be dismissed (pops up again immediately after dismiss)
Is this a known problem with the iCalendar/ics standard?
The format seems to be valid. Are any additional values needed for each client to understand/accept and handle the alert correctly?
I am subscribing to the .ics file via a https:// URL.
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
PRODID:adamgibbons/ics
METHOD:PUBLISH
X-PUBLISHED-TTL:PT1H
BEGIN:VEVENT
UID:-LovTg9y9HPDCHu8mVnD
SUMMARY:Purjolök
DTSTAMP:20191026T171500Z
DTSTART:20191024T080000Z
DESCRIPTION:En grönsak i lökfamiljen
URL:https://app.myapp.se/r/edit/-LovTg9y9HPDCHu8mVnD
STATUS:CONFIRMED
CATEGORIES:Matlista
X-MICROSOFT-CDO-BUSYSTATUS:BUSY
BEGIN:VALARM
ACTION:DISPLAY
DESCRIPTION:En grönsak i lökfamiljen
TRIGGER:-PT10M
END:VALARM
DURATION:PT30M
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR
There is most likely nothing wrong with your code and most clients will ignore those alarms by design.
Whether you receive an invitation via email or subscribe to a calendar via http, you don't want the organiser of the meeting/author of the calendar feed to dictate when/if you should be reminded. It is really up to the attendee/subscriber to set their own alarms.
If, on the other hand, you "import" the same ics file, the alarms will be taken into account (the client considers that the stream already belongs to you and that it is a "backup" of your own calendar).
I am trying to create a ics feed for users to subscribe via webcal. The feed's content comes from database and looks like the following.
When the database is updated, the feed changes and updates the subscribers' calendars. It works fine with google calendar and some calendar apps. However, I never observe updates in outlook.com (the web calendar) or Yahoo calendar. Is there something wrong in the feed so update fail?
The feed is provided through webcal://example.com/subscribe.php
and I put header('Content-Type: text/calendar; charset=UTF-8');
as the first PHP line
ics:
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
PRODID:-//Organisation//Roster//EN
VERSION:2.0
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
X-WR-CALNAME:Duty Arrangement
X-WR-CALDESC:Duty Arrangement
X-WR-TIMEZONE:Asia/Hong_Kong
REFRESH-INTERVAL;VALUE=DURATION:PT6H
X-PUBLISHED-TTL:PT6H
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART:20180218T020000Z
DTEND:20180218T033000Z
DTSTAMP:20180602T144036Z
UID:228Mip5LyZ5JqY5#organisation.com
DESCRIPTION:Task A
LOCATION:Office
SUMMARY:On Duty
TRANSP:OPAQUE
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART:20180304T020000Z
DTEND:20180304T033000Z
DTSTAMP:20180602T144036Z
UID:230Mip5LyZ5JqY5#organisation.com
DESCRIPTION:Task B
LOCATION:Office
SUMMARY:On Duty
TRANSP:OPAQUE
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR
You have the UID but ICS file events need a SEQUENCE number to indicate which update/version of the event is the latest.
See the specification https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc5545#section-3.8.7.4
For recurring event instances, they also need a RECURRENCE-ID of the instance being modified.
I'm trying to create an ICS file to add events to a Google calendar via email. In the end, the calendar will be sent to multiple users, from a desktop app. Ideally I'd like to be able to modify the calendar if the events change (just event times, I'm ignoring cancelled events)
Here is my ICS file
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//MY COMPANY//Calendar//EN
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
BEGIN:VEVENT
UID:shift-439-emp-128#mycompany.com
DTSTART:20180604T090000
DTEND:20180604T153000
DTSTAMP:20180519T081800
SUMMARY:Morning shfit
LOCATION:Morning Location
DESCRIPTION:Morning shift
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
UID:shift-446-emp-128#mycompany.com
DTSTART:20180605T153000
DTEND:20180605T233000
DTSTAMP:20180519T081800
SUMMARY:Night shift
LOCATION:
DESCRIPTION:Night
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR
When I email that file to my gmail account, I can see a "Add to Google calendar" button which I can use to add the events to my prinary calendar.
Now, say the events times changed.
Question : How can I create a new ICS file with the new times so that existing events will be modified in google calendar?
I used UIDs for events so that google does not create duplicate entries. But when I email a second ics file with modified events (with uids), the "add to google calendar" button does not appear. If I try to manually import the ics file from google calendar Import feature, then I get this error message
Could not upload your events because you do not have sufficient access on the target calendar.
If I set different UIDs each time, the import process will work but duplicate entries will be created.
I also tried using REQUEST instead of PUBLISH method
Thanks
I was able to get this working with Gmail using the following:
METHOD: set to REQUEST
SEQUENCE: Set to 0 on first request and increment by 1 each time
ATTENDEE: Identify the Gmail user that is receiving the email by email address
Other variations would have non-desirable effects:
Only seeing 1 of the two events
Not updating existing event
Office 365 sends ICS files to Gmail that can be updated so it can be used to reference a commercial implementation. You can see the requests Outlook 365 sends by using "Show Original" in Gmail to retrieve the base64 encoded calendar body. Outlook 365 uses many other fields so it's instructive to examine.
I have a test script in Go using SparkPost so if you have any questions or would like to use it, just let me know. SparkPost has a free tier but you still need to configure your outbound sending domain to use it.
Here is an example modified request. I just increment the SEQUENCE and change the time to update the request in Gmail.
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//MY COMPANY//Calendar//EN
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:REQUEST
BEGIN:VEVENT
ATTENDEE;ROLE=REQ-PARTICIPANT;CN=example#gmail.com:MAILTO:example#gmail.com
UID:shift-1807-emp-128#mycompany.com
DTSTART:20180807T010000
DTEND:20180807T020000
DTSTAMP:20180601T033455
SEQUENCE:0
SUMMARY:Morning shift
LOCATION:Morning Location
DESCRIPTION:Morning shift
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
ATTENDEE;ROLE=REQ-PARTICIPANT;CN=example#gmail.com:MAILTO:example#gmail.com
UID:shift-1808-emp-128#mycompany.com
DTSTART:20180807T130000
DTEND:20180807T140000
DTSTAMP:20180601T033455
SEQUENCE:0
SUMMARY:Night shift
LOCATION:Night Location
DESCRIPTION:Night
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR
Of note, when sending multiple events in a single ICS file, sometimes it takes Gmail a second or so to show both events with the correct time in my testing.
PART 1
I am working on an .ics file which generates an event/appointment in Outlook:
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
BEGIN:VEVENT
STATUS:TENTATIVE
.....
..........
DESCRIPTION:Absence Request
SEQUENCE:0
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR
The user gets the email with the .ics file attached.
When opened, the user gets the following details:
Screenshot of the ics file
Question:
How to disable the .ics so it does not allow to make multiple entries when the exact appointment (date) does exist?
PART 2
Is it also possible to delete an entry from the Outlook Calendar via the .ics file? I have tried with the following code but it does not work:
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
BEGIN:VEVENT
METHOD:CANCEL
STATUS:CANCELLED
.....
..........
DESCRIPTION:Absence Request
SEQUENCE:1
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR
The cancel meeting button responds but does not actually remove the entry from the Calendar. Yes, the user can go manually and delete it from the calendar - which works fine but thought there may be an option to do via the .ics file.
I also read about the UID having to match the event but this is where I am also lacking of expertise of how to pull it from there.
Any ideas or suggestions ?
Bucki, This is the difference between importing events and subscribing to a calendar (even one with one event only).
When people click on an actual ics file, calendar apps will 'import' the event/s. I think these days some have the smarts to check the UID and not duplicate but many do not. It depends on the app how well they attempt to detect a duplicate. Strictly speaking one is just importing the data into one's own event in a calendar which one can then edit as one pleases.
If an ics URL is sent (not the actual file) most apps will 'subscribe' to the URL. IE: they will create a separate calendar in the individuals calendar app. The app will check for updates on that ics url regularly. In that case the UID and SEQUENCE can be used to indicate a later update. These are not editable by the user.