New GMBC Club Calendar App

Hi Folks,

As promised, we’re bringing you a shiny, new online club calendar – one that is accessible to all club members to post up rides or events that you’re sharing with the club.  It’s live NOW and here’s some more about it………

You’ll find the new calendar app by clicking on the Club Calendar menu.  The new app…

• allows all paid up members to share their ideas for rides or events.
• allows members to comment on events, just like a post
• shows date/time & location info, Google maps so you can identify the meet up point, organiser details, even photos!
• includes a widget in the sidebar showing the next 5 events
• allows event categories (so they show up colour coded)
• offers a tooltip with an excerpt of the event when you move the mouse over it
• is simple to use; allows easy navigation through the months, ability to see the events in either calendar or list views, provides the ability to filter events by event category (eg. just MTB rides)

How will it work?  The Committee will:

• make sure the regular club rides appear in the calendar (inc. weekly Tue/Wed/Sun local rides & monthly Sun away ride)
• post up organised activities, eg. club social events, planned weekends away, trail maintenance, training days, Alpine club nights etc.

We’d like you to fill in the blanks!

• Post up any rides you want to do (eg. munroes/epics, carvery rides, CX, road, trail centres, sportives!)
• Post up events you’re entering (eg. SXC, GT7, 10@KT, Strathpuffer Lite)
• Post up any weekends away you’re planning
• If you fancy a social night out and there’s nothing there then post it up!
• Fill in the 3 Sunday’s a month that are blank (which we’ve managed every weekend so far this year!)
• NB: if you can write posts on WordPress just now you should be able to add events to the calendar.  If you cannot write posts or add events we may need to update your WordPress user role to do this – assuming you’ve paid your subs for this year to gain publishing privileges!  The reset of user roles was done as part of the upgrade of WordPress back in January and there was an email from Ryszard about what to do to re-instate your login with authoring privileges.  If you have problems let me know and I’ll investigate.

Based on the Plans for 2012 thread there’s plenty of ideas out there so why not make them happen and guarantee a great time by sharing it with your clubmates?!

Before you start adding events, here’s some guidance on using the new calendar app…….

• Before you plan an event, as far as is possible, please check there’s not a clash with an existing event.  It won’t always possible to avoid a clash but please be considerate if someone else has already gone to the effort of entering/organising an event.
• Please include details of the ride, including an event name (eg. Dumgoyne Loop), duration, short description including how technical, terrain and some humour, if any specific kit is needed (eg. body armour, food for long rides, bothy gear) and specific details about the meet point – if in doubt please refer to the sort of info that was in the old style club calendar.
• Please remember to select an event category type – this will colour code your event
• Please make sure the “Excerpt” box has some brief details in it as this is what the tooltip shows up in the calendar.
• Before you publish the event check it over and make sure you’ve got all the details correct as the free version we’re using doesn’t store venue details for events so if you go back in to edit the event you will need to re-enter those details.
• NB: If you include your contact details as an organiser please be aware that this will be visible on a public website.

How Do I Add Events?

Under the Club Calendar heading you’ll now find the calendar itself and a few notes on how to use it.  Please read these to help you post your first event.

Hopefully it’s all straightforward.  If you have any issues please let either Ryszard, Grant or myself know about it and we’ll try to resolve them.  However, we’re limited to the functionality in the free app.

It’s quite a change from how we used to administer the calendar but with the new webpage and a growing desire to plan and share exciting rides to suit everyone this tool gives us the chance to do just that.  We hope you jump in with both feet and enjoy it!  And finally, my thanks to Ryszard and Grant for their invaluable help in getting this up & running.

cheers, Graham (on behalf of your GMBC Committee)