[CalendarServer-users] how to create a new calendar from a client app

[Stroller]

On 11 Aug 2009, at 10:02, maxbobzien at mac.com wrote:

> This is maybe a stupid question, but why would you do that?

Uh, lots of reasons.

> For my understanding, you set up the server in a specific  
> environment, for example your office.

 From my understanding, adding additional calendars is a basic part of  
calendaring functionality. Surely all calendaring servers should have  
this.

> And every employee has it's own office calendar, where all his  
> entries are stored. So why would you want an additional calendar?

Typically, each user might wish to have a "work" and "home" calendar.

A consultant who works out of two hospitals might wish to have  
separate calendars for each one, so that the appointments show in  
different colours in iCal client. Thus he would have a total of 3  
calendars, including home. That would also allow him to delegate work  
calendars separately to a different administrator at each hospital -  
the admin staff would subscribe to all three of his calendars, but  
appointments allocated to the "home" calendar or the calendar of the  
other hospital would show simply as "busy" with no details shown; the  
admin assistant at each hospital would only see full appointment  
details (patient name, ward number, notes, other attendees &c) for  
events in the calendar pertaining only to their own hospital.

The consultant might decide to host a medical convention, and thus  
wish to create a separate calendar for that - in this case there are a  
bunch of reasons it should be separate from his private calendars. For  
a start, he might be organising events for this convention that he  
might not have time to attend himself - he may have an appointment  
with sales reps for a pharmaceutical company whilst another doctor is  
speaking in hall 2 - and thus having the convention's schedule all  
mixed up with his private one would only cause confusion. Furthermore,  
he will want to export the calendar or host it so that attendees can  
see the details of each convention event, but not his own private  
schedule. Anyone should be able to subscribe to this calendar, but no- 
one else should be able to add events (whereas his assistant should be  
able to add events to his main work calendar(s) and his wife should be  
able to add to his home calendar).

This is not a bunch of contrived examples. The receptionist may wish  
to create a new calendar for the meeting room or for another shared  
resource - one should be able to subscribe to its calendar & see when  
the meeting room is free without having to phone the receptionist to  
find out (most of the time managers will wish to hide this calendar in  
iCal client by unticking the box next to its name, but it is always  
available to them instantly). Busy receptionists, like everyone else,  
are glad of tasks they can delegate & automate.

If we make calendars a resource which must be "deployed" by IT, we  
inhibit their flexibility. If we give users the power to create &  
control, then they'll find their own ways to use them to get their  
jobs done better. This encourages users to actively use calendaring,  
creates a stronger organisational culture surrounding it and there are  
fewer "i didn't put that in my calendar because... " excuses.

I'm actually just a n00b on this mailing list - I've been subscribed a  
long time, but I haven't yet deployed iCal server. I basically just  
want it to synchronise my own diary between my desktop & my laptop,  
and maybe to allow a secretarial service to add appointments in the  
future. So I hope other list members will forgive & correct errors or  
omissions. However, this kind of use I've described seems "obvious" to  
me.

I was nicotine deprived when I originally posted and read your "why  
would you do that?" as a criticism of the previous poster; reviewing  
it, I now interpret your post as a genuine request for clarity ("this  
is may be a stupid question" is phrasing that I would use myself if I  
really didn't understand something). Apologies if my first two  
paragraphs seem blunt.

Stroller.