Calendar

Liferay's Calendar portlet is a complete calendaring solution. You can schedule any number of events of different types, receive alarms via email or text message, import and export your calendar, and much more. Additionally, you can import and export the calendar to the popular iCalendar format for use in other applications.

In a similar way to the Blogs portlet, you can use the Calendar portlet as a shared calendar on a community or organization's web site, or you can use the Calendar portlet as a personal calendar—or both.

Illustration 59: The Liferay Calendar PortletConfiguring the Calendar Portlet

Go to the Configuration option from the menu in the portlet's title bar. You have three tabs there which allow you to configure three different categories of options: the "From" field in event reminder emails, the template for event reminder emails, and display settings for the portlet itself.

Event From

Setting the Event From name and email address allows you to define the From: field in the email messages that you receive from the Calendar portlet. This can work well in conjunction with mail rules in your email client that can operate on these messages. By default, the name is set to Joe Bloggs and the email address is set to test@liferay.com.

Event Reminder Email

This tab lets you customize the email message that you receive from the portlet when you have an event for which you have configured a reminder. It contains the same rich text editor that you see everywhere else in Liferay, and this allows you to format your message so that you will be able to easily recognize it. Additionally, there are several variables which allow you to insert runtime values into the message, and these are listed underneath the text editor so that you can use them in the appropriate place in your template. For example, you might want the event start date and time and the event title included in the email reminder that you receive. Inserting the variables that correspond with those values into your template will allow you to do that.

Display Settings

Display Settings for the calendar allow you to define which tab in the calendar is the default when the portlet is first displayed. By default, the summary tab is displayed, but you may want the daily, weekly, or monthly view to be the default.

There are additional settings for the summary tab: you can select whether it has a horizontal or vertical layout, select whether it shows a mini month, or select whether it shows today's events.

Using the Calendar Portlet

The Calendar portlet generally works the way you would expect a calendar to work. It inherits its interface from the rest of Liferay's portlet library, so you should find common tasks in the same place that you find them in other Liferay portlets.

To get started, you may want to click the Permissions button. Here you can find a list of roles with check boxes denoting whether the role has the Add Event or the Export All Events permission. By default, only the owner has permissions to do these things, which means that by default, the Calendar portlet is set up to be used in one's personal space. Out of the box, Liferay defaults to putting a Calendar portlet on all users' private pages, so this is expected. If you are going to be using the Calendar as a shared calendar, you may want to modify some things here.

First, create a portal, community, or organization role and add the users to whom you wish to grant access to the calendar to the role. Then come back to the Calendar portlet and click the Permissions button. Select check the boxes next to the role(s) that should have access to one or both of the functions (Add Event or Export All Events). Then click Submit.

Now you are ready to begin using your calendar. Click the Add Event button. You will see a form that allows you to fill out all the information for your event.

Start Date/Time: The date and time the event starts.

Duration: How long the event will last.

All Day Event: Check this box to disassociate time from the event and make it last all day.

Time Zone Sensitive: Leave this box checked to make sure that the portal keeps track of the event regardless of time zone.

Title: The title of the event.

Description: A description of the event.

Type: Select from a number of pre-configured event types. You can change these in the portal-ext.properties file.

Repeat: If the event repeats on a schedule, select the schedule.

End Date: If the event repeats on a schedule but there is an end to the set of meetings, enter the end date.

Reminders: Select whether to send a reminder, how long before the event to send it, and through what medium (email, text message, or instant message) to send it. Note that this feature is integrated with your profile on the portal, so you will need to fill out your mobile phone number and / or instant messenger IDs in order to use those features.

When you have finished adding your event, click Save.

You can view calendar events by day, week, month, year, or in a simple list.