Calendar feeds

A calendar feed is a private link that your own calendar app checks for your tasks. Every task with a date shows up in your calendar, next to your appointments, and moves along when you change the date in Taskstand. You pick per feed which tasks go in, so you can have one feed with everything and another with only what is assigned to you.

Calendar feeds come with every plan.

What a feed does and does not do#

• It only publishes. Tasks go from Taskstand to your calendar. Moving or deleting an event in your calendar does not change the task. Change the task in Taskstand and the calendar follows the next time it checks.
• Tasks never mark you as busy. A task in your calendar does not block time, so it does not get in the way when someone plans a meeting with you.
• A task is never a meeting. There are no guests or invitations on the events.
• Only tasks with a date show up. Tasks without a date stay out.
• Only what you can see. A feed holds only tasks from projects you are a member of, and only the ones you may see there.

Create a feed#

1. Go to Settings, tab Calendar.
2. Click New feed.
3. Fill in the form and click Save.

You can have up to 10 feeds.

The settings of a feed#

Setting	What it does
Feed name	The name you see in the list, for example "Everything" or "Only mine".
Show tasks assigned to	Everyone's, Assigned to me, Mine or nobody's or Assigned to others.
Minimum priority	All tasks, or only tasks from a certain priority up: Low and up, Medium and up, High and up or Urgent only.
All projects	On: every project you are in, including projects you join later. Off: tick the Projects you want.
Reminder	No reminder, At the due time, 15 or 30 minutes before, 1 hour before or 1 day before.
Move overdue tasks to today	An open task past its date stays on today instead of disappearing into the past.
Show tasks with a start date as a whole period	Off: a task shows on the day it is due. On: it runs from its start date, which fills the days in between.
Include completed tasks	Also shows tasks that are done.

To change a feed later, click Edit next to it.

How tasks look in your calendar#

• A task with a time is an event at that time. It lasts as long as the estimate of the task, or 30 minutes without one.
• A task without a time is an all day event on its date.
• A task moved to today (with Move overdue tasks to today) is an all day event on today, and gets no reminder.
• A task with a start date is one day by default. With Show tasks with a start date as a whole period on, it is an all day event over the whole stretch, and its due time is in the description. A task that was moved to today is never shown as a period.
• A recurring task shows its next date only. The description says that it repeats.
• A reminder on an all day task goes off at 9:00 on that day, in your own time zone.

The description of each event holds the text of the task, the project, who it is assigned to, the priority, and a link back to the task.

The feed covers tasks due from about three months ago up to a year ahead. Archived tasks and tasks in archived projects stay out.

Add the feed to your calendar#

Click Show link next to the feed. You get the Feed link with a copy button, a Subscribe button that opens your calendar app directly, and Add to Google Calendar.

Always add the link as a subscription, not as an import. An imported file is a one time copy and never updates.

Google Calendar#

The quickest way is Add to Google Calendar: it opens Google Calendar with the feed filled in, and you confirm there. By hand:

1. Go to calendar.google.com.
2. Next to Other calendars, click the plus and choose From URL.
3. Paste the link and click Add calendar.

Google checks a feed about once a day, and there is no way to make it check sooner. New tasks can take a while to appear.

Apple Calendar#

• On a Mac: File, New Calendar Subscription, paste the link and click Subscribe. Set Auto-refresh to Every hour.
• On an iPhone or iPad: Settings, Apps, Calendar, Calendar Accounts, Add Account, Other, Add Subscribed Calendar, and paste the link.

Outlook#

• Outlook on the web: Add calendar, Subscribe from web, paste the link, give it a name and click Import.
• Outlook on Windows: File, Account Settings, Internet Calendars, New, and paste the link.

Apple Calendar and Outlook can be set to check more often than Google.

The same steps are under Steps for each app when you open the link in Taskstand. The menus of these apps change from time to time; if a step looks different, look for "subscribe" or "add calendar from URL".

Keep the link private#

Anyone with the link can read the titles and dates of the tasks in that feed, without signing in. Treat it like a password: do not paste it in a chat or a shared document.

Did the link end up somewhere it should not be? Take it back:

1. Click ... next to the feed and choose Generate new link.
2. Confirm. The old link stops working immediately.
3. Subscribe again in your calendar apps with the new link. Calendars that used the old one stop updating.

Your settings for the feed stay the same.

Check if a feed works#

Under each feed you see when a calendar last fetched it (Last checked), or Never checked yet if nobody has used the link so far.

A feed that no calendar has fetched for 6 months is switched off, so a forgotten link stops working by itself. The list then says it was switched off. Click Generate new link to bring it back, and subscribe again with the new link.

Delete a feed#

Click ... next to the feed and choose Delete feed. The link stops working and every calendar that uses it stops updating. Remove the subscription from your calendar app yourself to clear the old events.