Update: Feb 2016. Just exported Term 1 timetables from the chatswood parent portal and imported carefully into google calendar. It seems ok, but still not subscribeable, so remember any changes will not show up, and of course next term we will have to look export/import again. But hey it's better than nothing!
Excitement: May 2015. It's an improvement. Your children's timetables are exportable!
They are still not subscribeable.
With the new portal access you can now export their current timetable. Every time their timetables change you will have to re-export and re-import into your calendar application, but hey this is better than nothing!.
Instructions further below
For school and year events there are no options to export or subscribe. Export would be kinda useless actually as the events are continually being added to. The ideal situation is to be able to subscribe to the 'school wide' and the 'class of'/year events. 'Class of' would be amazing - do it once in Year 7 and you are set till end Year 12! With a 'year x' view we'd have to resubscribe each year.
At the moment we have to remember to have a look at the calendars every now and then. They are viewable here: http://web2.chatswood-h.schools.nsw.edu.au/webcal/. Yes I know that page says 'subscribed calendars' but it doesn't mean we can.
Sentral the providers of the software do not yet provide an ics file to subscribe to. although they have functionality that is very nearly there.
I think this is important. I'm stunned anyone has calendar software without this and I think it would greatly help parental engagement and awareness of what is going on in the school. If you think it's important too, you can try contacting them at help@sentral.com.au
CHS school calendarsOther useful calendars:
| NSW Government School Holidays | These are available as multiple separate files. Sadly google doesn't seem to like the files. Be nice if one could chose one file that was always updated wouldn't it? Even if it had to be an eastern/western zone version. |
|---|---|
| NSW Public Holidays | Subscribe |
Timetables:
Want your child's timetable on your smartphone by day - no more guessing - is it week A or B? Ideally we would be able to 'subscribe' to their calendars and our calendar applications would automatically update any new events. This is not yet possible with the Sentral system. The next best option is to import. If you have access to the school portal it is now possible. If their timetable changes, you will have to repeat this process.
Instructions
Summary
- Logon to the school portal and export the ical for the timetable. Save as on your pc. Do NOT allow your browser to import this file into your main calendar.
- Create a separate calendar in your calendar application.
- Import this ics file into your new calendar. Do NOT import the ics into your main calendar!
Details and Screenshots
- Logon to the school portal.
- Choose one of your kids.
- Hover over the top dashboard where you should see a "My Timetable" option. Click it.
- RIGHT click on the export as ical link.
- Choose save and save on your pc.
- If you click directly on the export as ical, then what will happen depends on your browser and pc settings. Most likely it will try to load the events into your calendar. Avoid loading into your main calendar as it will clutter things up. Use a separate calendar so you can click these timetable events on and off.
- From the right click options, Choose save and save the ics file on your pc. If you have multiple kids, rename the file meaningfully (keep the .ics)
- Open your calendar application. In this example we use google calendar.
- In the "My calendars" section there is a dropdown arrow. Click that and click "Create new calendar".
- Give the calendar a name and share it appropriately - partner, siblings etc
- If you already have a calendar for that child, you may want to choose a matching colour for the events:
- Now click the dropdown arrow next to "other calendars".
- Click the import calendar option.
- BEFORE you browse to the ics file, CHOOSE the newly created timetable calendar for your child.
- Now you may browse to where you saved the exported ical file and select that file.
- Double check you selected the new calendar and click "Import":
- You should see a successful import message
- To see just the new calendar and check that it's kinda done the right thing, click the drop down arrow next to the new timetable
- Click the display only this calendar.
- Remember to click the other calendars back on afterwards. Google calendar on the smart phone thinks you want the same view on your phone and will appear to 'lose' the other calendars. They are still there, you just need to click them on again.
- It's wonderful when timetables, schedules, calendars are well setup and can be used in one own's won applications. See how the classses drop away during the holidays:
Accidentally added 250 events into your personal calendar?
Didnt read my careful instructions? too much of a rush ? Don't panic. It is slightly painful, but you can do mass deletes with http://www.gcaltoolkit.com/