Shared online calendars - any suggestions?

[MrH]

We have a new online booking calendar and obviously it has an ical link so i can sync it with other systems. However, i seem to be coming into problems as i want an online calendar running on a desktop that staff can enter holidays, days off, appointments etc on, which also is linked to the bookings calendar via ical feed, so both bookings and staff then appear on the same calendar.

I was going to use google calendar, but this only seems to sync once a day with no manual sync available. So looked at icloud calendar, however the desktop/web version doesn't allow ical feeds nor does it show ical feeds if added from an ipad etc. So thats useless too. Tried a couple of others, including Outlook.com but same problems. I'm amazed its so hard to achieve

Any suggestions on anything that might actually sync within a short time rather than days, and therefore might actually be of use?

Cheers

Mark

[marshalla]

Google should work - my iCal is currently set to refresh at 15 minute intervals.

[MrH]

Oh ok interesting, how do you change the settings on refresh?

[marshalla]

MrH said:

Oh ok interesting, how do you change the settings on refresh?

In MacOS iCal - Preferences -> Accounts -> Accounts -> select account and it should have a "referesh every..." option.

[Bikerjon]

I think google calendars are usually the most flexible so would be surprised if you can't get that to do what you need. iCloud is particularly good for apple gear as it's "push" enabled so it updates almost instantly.

[MrH]

marshalla said:

In MacOS iCal - Preferences -> Accounts -> Accounts -> select account and it should have a "referesh every..." option.

Youve confused me now, are these setting in the Mac somewhere or in google calendar? I'm on a PC rather than mac and viewing in Chrome web browser..

[marshalla]

MrH said:

marshalla said:

In MacOS iCal - Preferences -> Accounts -> Accounts -> select account and it should have a "referesh every..." option.

Youve confused me now, are these setting in the Mac somewhere or in google calendar? I'm on a PC rather than mac and viewing in Chrome web browser..

Well, iCal is an Apple program. I'm viewing my Google Calendar in iCal on a Mac. It's the client that needs to refresh regularly, whatever you're using. (and as soon as I put a new entry into iCal on my Mac it appears in the Google Calendar web view so seems to synch. new data straight away).

[Bikerjon]

Are you sure this isn't more of a problem with your online booking calendar? I use an online booking system with full google calendar integration and it updates within 15 minutes. However I also have a CRM system that uses a different kind of google calendar "feed" and that only updates once every 24 hours.

[marshalla]

Bikerjon said:

Are you sure this isn't more of a problem with your online booking calendar? I use an online booking system with full google calendar integration and it updates within 15 minutes. However I also have a CRM system that uses a different kind of google calendar "feed" and that only updates once every 24 hours.

This sounds most likely. OP - what software is running the booking calendar ?

[MrH]

I'm using a system called Checkfront. Checking their FAQ's i found this

"Q: How often is the data in my calendar refreshed?
A: This is configured by your calendar client. It can be a little as 5 minutes, or as long as 1 month. If you have a lot of bookings, you may want to have a longer refresh time to avoid performance issues with your calendar."

But as i'm aware, there is no option to change the refresh period in Google calendar!

[marshalla]

Right - if I read that correctly, Checkfront is a third-party service that you've signed up to and you've subscribed to it from your Google Calendar ? Is that right ?

[MrH]

Indeed, Checkfront runs the online booking system, and has its own calendar. I have got the iCal feed from Checkfront, and subscribed to this via Google Calendar

I put a booking in for tomorrow which shows on checkfront, but not in google. Calendar is in correctly and shows on the left hand side.

[marshalla]

MrH said:

Indeed, Checkfront runs the online booking system, and has its own calendar. I have got the iCal feed from Checkfront, and subscribed to this via Google Calendar

I put a booking in for tomorrow which shows on checkfront, but not in google. Calendar is in correctly and shows on the left hand side.

You've hit a limit of how Google handles subscribed calendars. It seems to expect them to be relatively static so only refreshes slowly - typically in 12-24 hours. There's no (simple) way to force it to pull the calendar feed more regularly.

However - you might be able to use the iCal notifications module in Checkfront to email appointments to the Google Calendar's email account as soon as they're set up. That would create appointment entries in the calendar automatically.

Edited by marshalla on Friday 20th February 16:04