EMC Events Calendar
Help: General Assistance

HELP!

Click here for help on entering new events into the calendar Click here for help setting up repeating events and duty rotas Click here for the FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) list Click here for the wishlist Please advise any errors, omissions, or questions arising from this "help" by email to EmcHelp@macfarlane.biz

1. About the Events Calendar
2. Privacy
3. Public Users
4. Members-Only Users
5. "Administrator" Users
6. Special notes for "Duty Rota" participants
7. "It's Not Working!"

The EMC online events calendar is intended to meet the following needs:

• to improve our "calendaring", giving better advanced notice of events
• to externally advertise club events that are of "public" interest
• to provide a single "master" calendar of club events: updated centrally, and the source from which other calendars (such as that published in our newsletter, "AirWaves") are created
• to allow all club members (with Internet access) to update the calendar by adding events
• to make the calendar available in a variety of formats: simple listings, calendars that you can pin on the workshop wall, or download for loading into other calendar software, PDAs, pocketPCs and so forth
• to publish the duty rotas, with the ability to "swap" rota days when necessary, making it clear who is supposed to be on duty, and when!
• to make available "personalised" duty rotas, with several ways to help circulate the rota both by eMail and by post.
• and, as a side-effect to automatically schedule the duty rotas when necessary, and to issue "reminder" notices by e-mail.

There are three kinds of user for the EMC online events calendar:

• Public Users: The general public
• EMC Members: Members of Elmbridge Model Club, who can access additional features and information after logging-in using a username and password known only to the members of the club.
• Administrators: "administrators" are more privileged users, who log in using a different username and password, and can then update existing events in the calendar, set up duty rotas, and repeating events.

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The online events calendar is covered under the Data Protection Act consent form that all members sign when they join the club; this allows their information to be used in order to administer the club's business.

Events in the online calendar are marked either as "public" or "private". Those that are "public" may be viewed by the general public, without first logging-in to the website. These events are shown within the online calendar with an unlocked padlock symbol to their left.

"Private" events are only visible to club members, after logging-in with an appropriate username and password. All "duty rota" events are "private", visible only to other club members, and cannot be seen by the general public.

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Public users can access limited features of the online events diary without having to log-in first. Public users are able to:

• View "public" events in the diary
• Optionally, restrict the range of events displayed, according to a limited range of criteria:
  • Date range
  • Section, location and event type
  • Display the calendar as a list, as a "calendar", or download as a CSV data file for use in other applications, such as PDAs

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In addition to all the features that are available publicly, further features are available to members after logging-in using an appropriate username and password:

• View duty rotas in a similar variety of formats, plus:
  • as letters, individually addressed to each participant in the rota, detailing their rostered participation over the coming months. These are formatted for printing and then mailing to rota participants using "window" envelopes, catering for those members who cannot pro-actively access this online events diary.
  • Note that this implies that contact details for duty rota members are available online. This information is not available to the public, and requires the user to have logged-in. That is, this information is only available to other members.
• View the definitions for the duty rotas - for example, who takes part in the rota, which days the rota works on, and so forth
• Swap duty rota days - intended for use by duty rota participants, so that if it is necessary to agree a "swap", you can record this in the calendar.
• Create new one-off events in the calendar (and, for the duration of that browser "session", edit or delete those new events)

Note: Members can create new events and then update them until you close your browser. You won't be able to alter or delete the events you created earlier, if you close your browser and then open a new one. This is (admittedly) a fairly crude mechanism, but it prevents other members from altering events that you have created. If you made a mistake, or need to change an event that you created earlier, contact someone on the committee and ask them to correct it for you (the committee members all have access as "administrators").

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In addition to all the features that are available to the public and to members, further features are available to "privileged" users ("administrators") after logging-in using an appropriate username and password:

• Change or delete events in the diary, regardless of when the event was created, or who by.
• Change or delete events that were automatically inserted into the calendar as "recurring" events
• Create, change and delete duty rotas
• Create, change and delete definitions for recurring events
• Create, change or delete club "sections", "locations" and "event types"

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The online events calendar contains a number of features that are intended to make life easier for the duty rota participants, and for the section secretaries and their delegates. Currently, the only people authorised to alter duty rotas are the section secretaries, and other members of their section to whom they have delegated "rota" responsibilities.

How does it work?

• Duty rotas are defined in terms of days-per week, weeks per month, months per year. For example, "1st and 3rd Saturdays and Wednesdays each month, from June to January". This is then matched against a list of people who have agreed to make themselves available for that rota - for example "Saturdays only" or "any day". From this, a schedule of events is generated and added into the events calendar.
• Rotas can also be defined to "skip" an instance when the rota events would clash with other listed events.
• Rather than schedule the rota for an indefinite period into the future, just the next few months are scheduled at a time. When it comes to within a few weeks of the end of the current schedule, another few months will be automatically generated up, going further into the future.
• If, like the Air Section Duty Officer rota, the rota operates for more than one day each week (Saturday and Sunday), the rota will be scheduled so that each day is fairly and evenly distributed - in particular, it tries to avoid the situation where people are assigned "always on a Sunday".
• People can participate in more than one rota (or none at all), and it is perfectly ok to participate more than once in the same rota. If you do, you'll just get more duty days than anyone else!
• It is also legitimate to be on the list of participants for a rota, but not available on any day of the week. You won't be scheduled as taking part in the rota, but you're effectively "in reserve", on-call in case someone else can't make their duty day. For example, there are more people in the Air Section duty rota than are currently tasked with a duty day, including the "keyholders".
• If you can't attend your duty day as-scheduled, please agree with someone else that they will take cover from you (or, perhaps, agree a swap). Log-in as a member and you can then update the rota to show that you have agreed with someone else to cover your duty. Note, however, that if the duty rota for that period gets re-scheduled (for example if someone joins or leaves the rota), then you will have to enter this "swap" once again - if, of course, you still need to.

When will I receive e-Mails?

Having this information on a computer that is running 24 hours every day means that we can use eMail to communicate changes to the rota. You can expect to receive e-mail messages under the following circumstances:

• When the current schedule of duty days is close to coming to an end, new days will be automatically scheduled into the future. This will be typically about once every 3-4 months, depending on how things are set up.
• When the rota is updated - for example, if anyone joins or leaves the list of participants. This is pretty rare.
• If the rota is re-scheduled - for example, if a new event is added to the diary that has to be scheduled around, so that the rota doesn't clash with this date (e.g.: Sandown, perhaps).
• If you (and another participant) agree to cover each other's duty, you will subsequently receive an e-mail confirming the new arrangement.
• You will receive "reminder" e-Mails 5-days and 3-days before each date that you are scheduled to be on-duty

In each case, the e-mail will include all future duty dates, plus a separate section detailing those that are specifically assigned to you.

I don't have an e-mail address...

If you don't have an e-mail address, the online events calendar caters for you by allowing the section secretary (or whomever is in charge of your rota) to print the same information in the form of personalised letters that can then be posted to you.

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If your security settings are not correctly configured, you may find that you can enter data on the website, click buttons, and so forth - - but it won't seem to do anything for you!... Assuming you are using MS Internet Explorer (preferably version 6 or higher), you can adjust your security settings as follows:

1. Click on the "Tools" drop-down menu option, then on the choice labelled "Internet Options..."
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7. Close and restart your browser in order that these changes take effect.

If that didn't fix it...Norton Internet Security 2003 ("NIS 2003") has been reported as causing some problems - try disabling that when using this website (at your discretion), or follow Symantec's own instructions, here.

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