Syncing Calendars with External Calendar Programs

Overview

Finalsite Enrollment the Calendars can feed into external calendar programs like Microsoft Outlook, Apple Calendar (desktop, iPhone, or iPad), or Google Calendar. Finalsite Enrollment uses the common format known as iCal to provide these feeds. Changes within the Finalsite Enrollment calendar will be updated within the external calendar program.

Please note: ALL changes to appointments MUST be made within Finalsite Enrollment. If they are made in your external calendar, they will not update in Finalsite Enrollment.

Refresh Rates: Depending on the mail program you sync with, refresh rates vary as defined below, and are determined by the mail provider.

• Apple Calendar by default refreshes weekly, however, the refresh rate can be adjusted to as frequently as every 5 minutes in the calendar settings when you add the iCal feed.

• Google Calendar refreshes daily only

• Microsoft Outlook for PCs refreshes daily only.

• Microsoft Outlook for Mac does not support calendar feeds. We unfortunately have no control over this, unfortunately.

Calendar Feed Setup Instruction

First, you will need the calendar feed URL. Within Finalsite Enrollment, click on  Scheduling, then select Calendars and select the Calendar you wish to subscribe to.

Then click on Calendar Settings in the upper right, highlighted in green and select Sync with an outside calendar.

A pop-up dialog box will open with the iCal Feed URL at the bottom. Copy the link shown.

Now that you have the iCal Feed URL, review the steps below based on the type of calendar you would like to sync with.

Apple Calendar

To set up a calendar feed in the Apple Calendar application, select File – New Calendar Subscription from the menu application’s bar.

In the pop-up dialog box, paste the Finalsite Enrollment iCal link (Command+V) in the Calendar URL field and click Subscribe.

Once the calendar is done processing, you can name the calendar, set the default location, set refresh dates, or remove alerts and attachments.

Note: For Auto-Refresh, settings we recommend making it the interval every 5-15 minutes so that you always see the latest changes.

Once you click “OK”, all of the filled spots will show up on your calendar.

Google Calendar

To set up an iCal Calendar feed in Google Calendar, go to calendar.google.com or log into your account and click on the Google Apps menu in the upper right by your name and then click on the Calendar App icon.

Along the left of the page, select the plus sign next to the Other Calendars section and then select Add by URL.

 Paste the Finalsite Enrollment iCal link into the URL Field and then click Add Calendar.

Important: If you plan to sync your Google Calendar with another calendar, like Outlook, be sure to select the Make the calendar publicly accessible option before adding the calendar. This will allow the Finalsite Enrollment calendar events to be displayed in the calendar outside of Google (like Outlook.)

Google will now grab the names and dates out of the calendar feed. Please note that Google only checks for updates every few hours. This is not user-customizable.

Important note: Google Calendar does not provide user control over the refresh setting like many other calendar programs do (for example, Apple Calendar). This means the calendar feed will only update once per day with new appointments or changes to existing appointments.

Microsoft Outlook Windows

You can use the steps below to add your Finalsite Enrollment calendar to Outlook. 

• This works in both the new and old versions of Outlook and works in both Desktop and Browser versions. The only difference you should encounter is the location of the Add Calendar option.
• Only dates that have someone registered will appear on the calendar in Outlook. 
• It's a one-way sync. Nothing you add in Outlook will pass to Finalsite Enrollment.
• Typically, the calendar will refresh to pull in your Finalsite Enrollment signups every 3 hours, BUT it's possible that it could take 24 hours for the calendar to sync when new sign-ups are added.

Add the calendar to Outlook on the web:

Step 1: Grab the ical link from Finalsite Enrollment

• Open the Finalsite Enrollment calendar.
• Under the Calendar Settings menu, select Sync with an Outside Calendar.
• Copy the iCal Subscription link. This will be the link that you will paste into Outlook when it asks you for the Calendar URL.

Step 2: Add the link to Outlook to sync the calendar

• Open Outlook.
• Go to the Calendar view.
• Click Add calendar.
  
  

• Select Subscribe from web.
• Paste the link you copied from your Finalsite Enrollment Calendar
• You can also give the calendar a name and choose a color for it.
  
  
• Click Import or Save.

You'll see a success message within the Add Calendar pop-up to show that it's been successfully synced. 

Your Finalsite Enrollment calendar should now appear in your Outlook.com calendar view. Only appointments that families have booked will appear in the calendar view.

You can toggle its visibility on and off in the left-hand calendar list.

Microsoft Outlook Mac

Microsoft does not support subscribing to WebCal standard feeds in Outlook for Mac.

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A quick note about internal email notifications

If you would like to receive internal email notifications for when an appointment is booked or rescheduled within a calendar, navigate to your User Notifications page (Username Menu > User Notifications) and, under the Immediate Calendar notification section, select the name of the calendar you wish to enable notifications for. Read more within this article: User Notifications