Calendar Software

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This page contains a list of software and/or solutions used to manage calendar information on UU congregational websites.

CalendarScript

Advantages: Powerful script, easy to install, allows multiple views, search features, templates, user authentication, multiple calendars, and SSIs. You can configure your home page to be automatically updated with new calendar information. Plug-ins extend the feature lists.

Disadvantages: Requires duplication of efforts to maintain an online calendar and one for your newsletter and/or order of service, though it's possible to save the "Printable Calendar" as HTML and bring it into Word to manipulate if you have added the Printable Calendar template available from www.much2.com. This Perl script requires the ability to execute cgi scripts on your server, which not all churches may have. Fairly slow to update for those with dialup access. Individual instances of recurring events cannot be changed without an additional plug-in from www.much2.com. An event cannot begin and end on different days (e.g., a party that lasts from 8 p.m. to 1 a.m. cannot be entered).

Cost: $50 for non-profit license. NOTE: UUism Networks has a license for UUN members that want to share a single installation on uuism.net. Each calendar is separate and can be administered by a single user with a password. Additional users are available. - Jim Hermann

Examples:

• First UU Church of Austin
• Fellowship X
• First Unitarian Church of St. Louis
• Unitarian Universalist Church of Elgin

ServiceU/EventU

Advantages: Integrates multiple workflows : event management, resource scheduling, volunteer management, registration for events, donations, and newsletters. This is an ASP which means it can be used by anyone with access to a browser.

Disadvantages : Compared to the other options, this is the most expensive. There is a risk of interrupted service if the company experiences technical or financial problems. Exit strategy (i.e. switching to an alternative) may be difficult.

Cost: Start-up fee of $199. Monthly charges depend on the number of features used, but can range from $45 to $145 per month.

Examples: First Unitarian Society of Madison

LoCalendar.com

Advantages: FREE & it provides FREE PUBLICITY for your events (if you want it can put your events in a public search where people can find your events on a zip code search, though events like meetings can be left off the public search); it can be edited by anyone who has the username and password anywhere with no special software or web editing knowledge (just ability to fill out a form on the internet)

Disadvantages : Like all free services, it is subject to change without notice; site goes down occasionally; it may not remain free; some customization features are Windows compatible only; if you want your neighbors to know about the LoCalendar zip code search function, you have to do the PR for it, including adding the information in the footer or header; it has a feature that warns you if the subject line is too short for the public calendar, though you can add anything & then go back & edit it & it then will publish; it takes a little longer to edit than other calendars because you're editing it online instead of on your computer so you have to deal with internet speeds

Cost: FREE

Examples: Davies Memorial UU Church Calendar - do a public search on our zip code 20748 to see which events are on the public calendar - you might need to do a search for the month instead of the week since we don't have public events every week, especially in the summer (well, we do have services, but sometimes the sermon is not listed). A search also found that these churches use it.:

• Unitarian Universalist Church of Jacksonville
• Unitarian Universalist Church of Rockville
• Unitarian Universalist Society of Martha's Vineyard
• Unitarian Universalist Area Church Calendar
• Bowie Unitarian Universalist Fellowship
• Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Fairbanks
• Unitarian Universalist Church of Las Cruces

WebCalendar

Advantages:

• Full-featured, widely used, well-documented, free web-based calendar system.
• Can be configured as an event calendar viewable by visitors, and also as a single-user calendar or a multi-user calendar for groups of users.
• Calendar privileges can be defined differently for the public and the authorized users.
• Supports views, reports, log-in security, search, recurring events, import/export to ical, vcal, palm, ODBC, etc.
• The flexibility of the "reports" feature allows it to be used to post and display a clean view of upcoming Sunday Services, etc.
• Free on-line demo at the web site.
• This is free open source software software (GNU General Purpose License) written in PHP and using MySQL.
• Current release is mature and stable
• has very high "activity/usage/ranking" - 99.95% / >500 downloads per day / ranked 9th most active project on SourceForge.net.
• Upcoming ver 1.1 release adds full timezone support, two-way iCal client syncing, user ACL, remote iCal subscriptions, showing & recording the location for events, and lots more.

Disadvantages :

• The latest full release is version 1.0.4 (which gets basic security updates) and the improved development version 1.1 seems on the slow track (some have taken to risking using the development versions and have had few problems).
• The visual appearance of the calendars looks rather primitive by 2006 standards (no rounding of corners, few color blends, no transparency, etc.) The appearance isn't theme-able or otherwise amenable to refinement beyond some color changes (the update version offers little improvement in this area).

Cost: FREE

Examples:

• Aiken Unitarian Universalist Church From AUUC - This program is very easy to use, has some great features and seems very flexible. The color options are wide open so we are still experimenting there. It definately solves our problem with getting information on the web in an easily accessible format.
• Auburn Unitarian Universalist Fellowship AL
• Fox Valley Unitarian Universalist Fellowship (under construction)
• May Memorial Unitarian Universalist Society, NY is using both a full calendar view (with style elements tuned for site) and using the calendar content to produce a short listing of upcoming events on their home page.
• Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Centre County PA
• Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Falmouth MA
• Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Harrisonburg VA Just recently installed the calendar with an instruction page [1]. The latest version of this calendar allows custom headers and footers so that you can make it look a part of your site and add links.
• Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of La Crosse WI (under construction)

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VCalendar

Description: VCalendar (Virtual Calendar) is an open source Web calendar application with related tools, for posting and maintaining events and schedules online, in calendar format. This is an excellent and free solution for use by online Web communities and any commercial and non-commercial organizations. Unlike any other online calendars, VCalendar comes with source code in multiple programming languages: PHP, ASP and ASP.NET (C# and VB.NET); with potential for adding more technologies in the future.

Some of the advanced features of VCalendar include:

- Localization features, with initial Internationalization in English and Russian, with language selectable by end-users - Dynamic CCS (stylesheet) styles, selectable by end-users - Annual, monthly, weekly and daily calendar views - Multiple categories for classifying calendar events - Recurring and all-day events - Role-based user permissions and calendar configuration

Cost: FREE

Demo:

• VCalendar Demo

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Google Calendar

Description: Calendar for individuals or organizations. Includes support for the iCalendar standard, location-specific searches, easy for people to subscribe or copy events to their own calendars, an API for custom software, support from third parties for syncing to handhelds and desktops, RSS feeds, and lots more.

Cost: FREE

Examples:

• Search for "unitarian" to find a bunch of UU congregations that use it in one way or another.

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More Calendar Software

See the Scheduling and Calendars page for lots more information on standards, calendar servers, and client programs.

- The iCal standard is particularly important.

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