Public Build: Event Calendar - Misc. Updates

02/25/2009 05:22 PM by Chris Toohey

It's been a while since I've updated the Event Calendar Public Build project... more due to me being extremely busy than not working on the build. Since my last video, I've put some considerable work into the application. It's still Notes Client-only at the moment... and for good reason: we're far from done! See, one of my goals with this particular project was to show you how to take a Notes-based application and ready it for the web... and I wanted to build a pretty feature-rich and configurable (which is key!) before I jump into the web-build of this particular project.

So what have I been doing?

Well, for starters I've added a facility that will allow you to assign Groups (from an Admin-defined list) as an additional level of categorization... and read-access restrictions - all configurable at the UI level to the Event Author via a Restrict to Group? flag.

You'll also notice the Reservations Embedded View - pretty self-explanatory there: user's will be able to click-and-subscribe to events!

I've also done some considerable work with the Preferences engine: specifically adding more keywords (which was simple enough, and a given really), and the Admin-defined Color-coding... with a twist. See, I'm allowing you to define the Color Profile Formula in a Formula field - using placeholders for the font and background colors - and I then apply the Runtime Formula (which is a Computed and evaluated version of the Admin-defined Formula).

If that wasn't enough, I've also allowed you to define the default action of the New Event button via the Preferences document's Default Action. Selecting Event Form will wire the button to launch the simple single-entry Entry|entry Form Design Element, while selecting Event Wizard will wire the same button to instead envoke the New Events Wizard. This wizard, which is lifted from my Lotus Notes Client Wizard components example download, will allow the user to create multi-day event entries in the Event Calendar as well as drive the creation of the standard single-day event.

All of this resulting in a very simple, but very functional Lotus Notes Client application that can handle basic Event and Reservation management!

The next step, prior to the web build, is the C&S (Calendaring and Scheduling) integration. The intended goal is simple: click on an event, and a new Meeting invitation is sent from a simple standard Mail Database Application, containing all of the Event information, and putting those individuals with reservations into the invite list - where we'll leverage the built-in C&S functionality in the standard Mail Application Template... which is something I certainly don't want to hack around in or attempt to re-write!

I'm on the fence as to whether to public this particular design release yet, which is admittedly incomplete. See, I don't want someone to take this application as a finished product and start using it... because the finished product will kick this one in the nards!

... but if I get enough "gimme-gimme-gimme!" feedback, I'll post what I have so far for download and dissection!