Mamta
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Downloaded the latest Collaboration Calendar HERE.

Latest features on the Collaboration calendar

One-View

  • The one-view is a consolidated one stop shop for all your events and  calendars. Create and Manage events from one-view
  • Designed to bring all your calendars together for better visual and event management
  • Catch conflict resolution, which becomes apparent, with an aerial view of your entire event landscape
  • You can filter the calendars out and in just like you would the events
  • A drop-down with a list of all the calendars that you own and those shared with you
  • All Out of Box features are available on the one-view continuing the experience of a single calendar

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Create a calendar from a ServiceNow Table

  • Create events from data, on a ServiceNow table
  • Just point the calendar to a table and set the default fields
  • Select a field as the title, start date and end date from the ServiceNow table
  • Automate all events from the data of the chosen ServiceNow table to create a read-only calendar

find_real_file.png

Share a calendar with the entire company

  • Just flip a switch, the public button, and share a calendar with everyone in your company
  • Holiday calendar , Company All hands and so many more!

find_real_file.png

 

INTRODUCTION 

A VISUAL ONLINE COLLABORATION CALENDAR FOR TEAMS TO DRIVE EFFECTIVE COLLABORATION AND PROVIDES A SINGLE VIEW AND CAN BE SHARED WITH EVERYONE.  

 

Calendar App is an enterprise collaboration tool to plan, organize and share events, resources, assets and anything else that has to be organized across a group of people and time. You can share the calendar with your team and group of people so that there is one destination where everyone can come for their collaboration needs.  

 

What is the problem and how does the Calendar app solve these problems? 

Most calendars are designed for individual use and there is a need for groups and teams to be able to visualize work at a team level. Moreover, individual calendars are not visible to team members, and it becomes difficult to plan shared resources/content at a team level. Also, sharing information about events and assets with teams does not scale with existing calendars  

Solution: Collaboration Calendar App by ServiceNow 

Using the collaboration calendar available on ServiceNow platform, teams can now visualize, manage, and share calendars across teams, individuals and groups. The calendar is fully customizable and users can add and configure using custom fields and assign color coded categorize to visuals several different calendars. Easily share a calendar with an individual or a group of users from within the app. Invite them to collaborate on your calendar. There is also an easy link that can be used to share. 

What are some popular applications (use cases) for Calendar 

Here are some of the scenarios where the Calendar app can help  

  • Do you have trouble managing teams and resources on a project? 
  • Holidays are around the corner, and you don’t know who is OOO when? 
  • You work with Content and need to organize and plan across geos, themes, and leaders? 
  • You are in workplace services, and need to deploy resources, or need a tool to book assets? 
  • Best of all, need one source to share and collaborate across all your team members? 
  • Build a Release plan across multiple projects 
  • Plan for reserving Assets (projectors, printers) 
  • Events and Communications planning and organizing content for social media or communication

What value proposition and benefits does it deliver 

  • Employee Productivity and Collaboration
  • Employee experience: Manage admin functionality with ease in a visual tool (coming soon)
  • Ease of use and organization: Centralized portal for all collaboration calendars  

Key Features 

  • A Dashboard view to manage and view all calendars
  • Create events using front end tool for flawless experience 
  • Tag events with categories
  • Color code calendar events for easy visualization 
  • Time-zone option
  • Share Calendars
  • Quick access link to calendars
  • Hide/Unhide calendars (coming soon)
  • Filter, Search and Sort on topics and calendars 
  • Front end GUI interface for admin functionality – Coming soon in next release 
  • Create custom fields to configure calendar
  • Tag your events with user defined categories and custom fields (example, geographic, projects, departments, etc.)
  • Connect to your ServiceNow eco-system to create customized events using other data residing on the platform.

HOW TO USE THE CALENDAR 

Calendar App –building blocks 

Common Terminologies 

Calendar

Categories

Events

Custom Fields 

A calendar will have categories which can be color coded to distinguish between different categories. An event has to be tagged to at least one category.  An event will have default out of the box fields and you can add custom fields on the event. 

Category: A way of organizing calendar, as well as categorizing and color-coding events 

Event Fields: Information you need to create an event 

Out of Box- Default fields 

Custom: User-defined fields 

A calendar must have at least one category

An event has to be assigned to at least one category

You can assign multiple categories to an event

 

Getting Started on HOW TO USE THE CALENDAR

Step 1: Create Calendar using your ServiceNow platform instance

 Login to the Platform and search for ā€œCalendarā€ in Filter Navigator 

 Click on ā€œCreate Newā€. New Calendar record form is displayed 

 

image        image 

 

Name - Calendar Name that will be displayed on the top left of calendar front-end 

Language - Default Language in which the calendar is displayed. Currently, the only supported language is English 

Time Zone - This is the time zone for your calendar and all its events 

Color - Choose a color for your calendar. This Calendar will be displayed on Dashboard with this color code 

Owner - This defaults to the calendar creator. More users can be assigned this role 

Set multiple categories per event - If this feature is enabled, the event modal allows the assignment of multiple categories to one event. 

Use default table - This enables the users to save all calendar information in the set of default tables.  

 

Step 2: Create Categories 

Open your calendar and click on ā€˜Load Related List’. Now you will see all the other tabs you can use to complete your calendar set-up. 

Click on Calendar Categories tab, and then ā€˜New’ to create a new category 

image 

Name – Enter the name of the category, ex- Project-1, EMEA Comms, Sales Team 

Color - Choose a color for this category. All events associated with this Category will be displayed in this color on the Calendar 

Order- This allows you to control the order in which the categories will be displayed in the left pane of the calendar. Display is in ascending order. 

 

Step 3: Manage Out of the Box Event Fields settings (if needed) 

 

You can rename, disable, mark as mandatory and reorder the Out of Box Event fields 

image 

Mandatory - If true, an event cannot be created or edited without this field being populated. 

Active -If true, the field shows on the events modal page     

Show on Event Title - If true, the contents of the field will be shown in event pop-up 

Order- Can be used to determine the display position on Event Modal 

 

Step 4: Create Custom Events (if needed) 

You can create your own custom fields for any specific needs by clicking on ā€˜NEW’ 

image 

image 

Name – Event field Name 

Label- Event field Name that will be displayed on the Event Modal 

Internal Name - can be same as ā€˜Name’ but with no spaces 

Type- Event Field type. For this Pilot it can be text, choice (dropdown) or True/False 

Order- can be used to determine the display position on Event Modal 

 

Customer Field Choices: 

If you have created a choice type custom field, you can define the values (dropdown values) by clicking on ā€˜New’ Event Field Choices related lists 

imageimage 

Enter all the information and click on Submit. Create as many options as needed. Order will determine the order in which these are listed in the dropdown 

 

Step 5: Create/Edit events 

Access the Calendar through the URL or Dashboard 

image 

Calendar Front-End 

image 

            Create an Event 

You can create an event by clicking on the date or clicking on ā€˜New Event’ button 

image 

Enter all the applicable values in Out of Box fields 

If you had created any custom field as active, it will be displayed on this modal 

It is mandatory to assign a category to an event. 

You can assign multiple categories to an event 

You can create an All day, recurring or a single timed event 

Click on Save to create your event 

Edit an Event 

image 

Search for an Event 

You can search the calendar with a keyword within a given duration 

By default, the start date is six months in the past and the end date is six months in the future 

 

image 

Select/Deselect Categories and Filter Events 

You can deselect the categories you don’t want to see on your calendar. Events associated with that category will not be displayed. 

You can filter the events. Filtering applies only to the events currently on your screen. 

All Out of Box and Custom fields can be filtered on. Only the events that match the keyword(s) entered in the field will be displayed 

You can also use a combination of filters (AND condition) 

image 

 

Step 6: Share  

 To share your calendar, click on ā€œCalendar Available Forā€ tab, then click on ā€œNewā€ 

image 

You can assign 3 types of permissions here: 

Can read: Provide Read-only access to all events 

Can contribute: Allow others to create/edit/delete all events  

Can manage: Allow others to manage categories, event fields and all other attributes of the calendar 

This can be done by selecting a user criteria or creating a new criteria for specific users or groups 

If you don’t create a record here to provide explicit permission, others cannot view your calendar. 

 

Step 7: Access Calendar Dashboard 

You can navigate to Dashboard from Platform view to access all Calendars created and shared with you. 

image 

 

What else do I need to know? 

You need to have calendar admin role to be able to create a calendar 

It is recommended to create a new user criterion to assign viewing or editing permissions 

 

Examples of how to use calendar app for popular use cases

Team Members vacation planner

Add each team member as a category. All events for vacation or out of office will be displayed in a unique color for each team member

Schedule Resources 

To schedule resources across projects, add one category for each worker, and share the calendar with the team so that they know their assignments 

Book engineering resources across projects and catch any possible overlapping and conflicting priorities (Future Release) 

Building a Release plan across multiple projects 

To manage multiple projects with the detailed plans of each project while keeping an overview of all projects, create a category for each project. You can also use custom fields to visualize the various attributes within each project. 

Availability of Assets – Book projectors, equipment, and any bookable resources 

add a category for each resource so to easily identify when it is available, and members can book the available slots  

Events planning (similar to employee comp) 

If you want to organize events and need to present the program in topics to your audience, add a category for each topic so that people can filter to see only the topics of interest. 

 

 

Comments
Jerry kk Wong
Kilo Sage
Kilo Sage

@Krishna Nagara1 - I will DM you and arrange a time to speak with you next week. I appreciate you coming back to me.

Churchillsonpr
Tera Explorer

The idea of a Collaboration Calendar for teams sounds incredibly useful. Having a single view to manage online collaboration schedules can greatly enhance efficiency garage and coordination. Thank you for working on this – I'm eager to learn more about it!

Jaime Wilensky
Tera Explorer

When Creating a New Field or using existing fields - are there any that'll work with hyperlinks? or plans to add a hyperlink option in the future?  We have a lot of events that require registration and want to be able to provide that link.

Thanks!

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Hi @Jaime Wilensky ,

 

Thank you for reaching out. Currently we dont support hyperlink. We will take this as feedback.

 

Thanks

Krishna

CarmenSanDiego
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Hello @Krishna Nagara1 , 

Do you have a one-page instructions on how to create and manage events on the calendar please? 

GChanner
Tera Guru

Great work building this and I hope it makes it as part of the general release. Better than the current OOTB calendar.

I installed the calendar and the only issue I found is that the filtering is not working.

I selected event tile and nothing happens

I selected a category and nothing happens

 

I was expecting the calendar to dynamically refresh base on what I specified in the filter.

 

Has anyone else seen this behavior and how to resolve it.

PaulSylo
Tera Sage
Tera Sage

Hi All,

 

I am trying to create a solution for the calendar. but my ask is can we include a feature like drag and drop ( similar to we have in the FSM module for Dynamic scheduling) can be added?

lawrencemgann
Tera Guru

Good morning!

I've deployed collaboration calendar in our DEV instance and it looks great!  Running into a small hitch however--I can't seem to share or modify the available for of the calendar.

lawrencemgann_0-1710942887875.png

 

My user has both user_criteria_admin and sn_collab_calendar_admin roles.

I can see that Omit Edit is toggled on by default for the Available For related list:

lawrencemgann_1-1710942947344.png

 

However, if I go to the calendar and choose the Share option, these links aren't functional -- they only respond like plaintext

lawrencemgann_2-1710942968998.png

 

Has anyone encountered this behavior?  I've reviewed the installation instructions and this thread, perhaps I missed activating a scheduled job or missing a cross-scope permission (not seeing any errors to that effect however)?

 

Tagging @Mamta and @Krishna Nagara1 for visibility šŸ™‚

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Hi @lawrencemgann ,

 

The configuration file/installation details that is on the product page here has all the steps to enable sharing. Please check that out. I would happy to set up a call if need be.

 

Thanks

Krishna

GChanner
Tera Guru

Hi krishna,

 

I am having the same struggle with setting up sharing. I can do it via the backend (SN) but not the portal page. I would suggest setting up a general zoom meeting of those of us that are struggling and invite us all so we all can learn from your insight.

 

Thanks

Garfield

lawrencemgann
Tera Guru

Thanks @Krishna Nagara1 -- I believe I have followed the installation steps to completion:

  • my user has collab_calendar_admin and user_criteria_admin roles
  • both system properties are enabled

lawrencemgann_0-1710962132517.png

 

If you have any other guidance, or if you're available to meet tomorrow or Friday I'd really appreciate it!

lawrencemgann
Tera Guru

Good morning!  I'd be happy to schedule a call to discuss if you have availability this week šŸ˜Š

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Hi @lawrencemgann  and @GChanner,

 

Sure thing! Can meet this friday ( 03/29 between 10 and 1PM PST. Please let me know if this works for you.

 

Thanks

Krishna

 

 

GChanner
Tera Guru

Hi Krishna,

 

Friday 3/29 anytime is good for me. Please send invite once confirmed.

Thanks

Garfield

lawrencemgann
Tera Guru

10a PST sounds great, thank you!

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Does 1PM work?

GChanner
Tera Guru

1pm PST works for me

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Thanks @GChanner . @lawrencemgann ?

lawrencemgann
Tera Guru

Sorry that's not going to work for me unfortunately.  Monday?

GChanner
Tera Guru

I can be available Monday if that works for everyone.

Jaime Wilensky
Tera Explorer

Is there a limit on the #of calendar events you can add to a calendar?  Also, what about OneView?

 

We imported calendar events from another calendar and the calendar has slowed down quite a bit and OneView does not work when trying to view this many events.

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

@Jaime Wilensky ,

 

There is no limit per say. What is the number of events approximately that is being loaded?

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Hi @GChanner and @lawrencemgann ,

 

I can set up something for 11:30 AM PST or between 2 and 3 PM. Will that work?

GChanner
Tera Guru

Hi @Krishna Nagara1,

 

Any of those times will work for me.

lawrencemgann
Tera Guru

Thanks @Krishna Nagara1 !  Any of those times on Monday works for me.

GChanner
Tera Guru

@Krishna Nagara1 @Mamta 

 

Yesterday we deployed the Collaboration calendar to all our users and the feedback so far has being a resounding success. So I want to pass this on to you guys and thank you for this build. Hope the build will make it to the general product.

 

Below is the feedback from one of our directors:

 

This calendar display is great and better than the default one that come with SN. Here are some thoughts I had in testing. But no errors found so great job!

  • Is there an easier way to enter the time fields? That is the only place where I found I needed to spend more of an effort.
  • Is it possible to limit the event owner filter to IT employees?
  • Recommend adding a location field and sync it to the locations table

Thanks for the effort your team put into this providing this to us.

Jaime Wilensky
Tera Explorer

@Krishna Nagara1 - we have 3 separate calendars:
1st has 4000+ events, 2nd has 5000+ events and the 3rd has 11,000+ events

 

If I display the first or second one by themselves, OneView will show all events.  If I combine the 1st & 2nd, OneView will error out.

If I try to view the 3rd calendar by itself in oneview, it will error out. Then of course trying to view all 3 is an error too.

That's why I was asking about a limit.  We're going to add more calendar items daily so I've disabled OneView, but curious if there's a workaround or some details that could help!

 

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Hi @GChanner and @lawrencemgann ,

 

Please join me at 1:30 PM PST on Monday Apr 1st. Here is the invite

https://servicenow.zoom.us/j/97926525323?from=addon

 

and @GChanner thank you so much!, I will pass this on to my team. We can discuss the points you have highlighted during our call. 

 

Thanks

Krishna

Jaime Wilensky
Tera Explorer

@Krishna Nagara1 

We created 3 calendars:

1. 4000+ events

2. 5000+ events

3. 11000+ events

 

Calendars #1 & #2 work on OneView when viewed separately.  If I tried to view both 1&2 at the same time, there's an error.

Calendar #3 will not work in oneview on it's own, it gives me the same error.

All 3 will also give the same error.

 

The calendars are all very slow to load compared to when we only had a few hundred events in our testing environment.

 

That's why I was asking about a limit to the number of events.  We are creating more and more events daily so we need to know about limitations and workarounds if possible.

GChanner
Tera Guru

@Krishna Nagara1CS7157201 is the case I had opened with HI support regarding the filtering not working. Not sure if you can assign it to your team.

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

@GChanner thank you. We are looking into the issues. Will get back soon

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Screenshot 2024-04-04 at 4.45.58 PM.png 

 Hi @GChanner and @lawrencemgann  

To enable sharing the calendar from the front end please make sure the user criteria table has the can read, can edit and delete enabled at the Application Access tab. The steps is outlined on page 9 of the configuration document. Please let me know if you have any further questions. We will look into the filter issue and get back

lawrencemgann
Tera Guru

Thanks @Krishna Nagara1 -- I've enabled application access to the user criteria table and still do not have the option to set available for on neither the back end nor portal view -- any other ideas?  I'm happy to grant a product member access to the instance to take a look if there's time for a support meeting.

 

lawrencemgann_0-1712338535274.png

 

lawrencemgann_1-1712338699709.png

 

lawrencemgann_2-1712338713655.png

 

 

GChanner
Tera Guru

@Krishna Nagara1  On the user criteria table I checked and found I already had can read, can edit and delete enabled. Like I mentioned before I have no problem setting up sharing in the backend. The portal is where it is not working for me.

Bala27
Tera Explorer

Hi  Team,

For Collaboration Calendar Dashboard by default Timezone US/Pacific, Is there any way time zone should not be dependent on Calendar but based on User location?

Please let us know  at the earliest as this is a priority delivarable

 

Abhishek Akkata
Tera Expert

@Krishna Nagara1 The filters seems not be functioning. the which shows up on left when the source events are pointed to table. in my case its change requests. can you point me to direction where i can look for to fix this ?

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Hi All,

We have a opened a defect on the filter issue. We will keep you posted by end of this week.

 

Thanks

Krishna

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Hi @GChanner and @lawrencemgann,

I would request for 15 mins of your time to debug the issue. criteria issue. Please let me know your availability.

 

Thanks

Krishna Nagaraja

Jaime Wilensky
Tera Explorer

@Krishna Nagara1 - do you have any update at all on my calendar limits from my previous comments?  Or an ETA of when you may be able to look into it? I have some folks looking for answers about the calendar since they are trying to use it.

GChanner
Tera Guru

@Krishna Nagara1 I will make myself available at anytime just send me an invite

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Hi @Jaime Wilensky,

 

Apologies for the delay. We are still looking into that.

  • We currently have set no limits. 
  • The current loads during our testing showed 5-8 second load time with events 5000+ depending on number of concurrent users and instance performance.

I would glad to set some time up and look a bit deeper into your environment. Please let me know a convenient time that works for you. I am in the PST time zone.

 

Thanks

Krishna Nagaraja

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

HI @Bala27 ,

 

You can set the timezone while creating the calendar. Due to security reasons we cannot query the user's location. However you can add that feature to the app.

 

Thanks

Krishna

lawrencemgann
Tera Guru

@Krishna Nagara1 Same here, I will make myself available any time you all can meet!

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Hi All,

 

Please join me at 12:30 PM PST on 4/9. We will cover any issues you have been facing and other feedback on collaboration calendar. Thank you!

Invite Url : https://servicenow.zoom.us/j/94350003510?from=addon

 

Thanks

Krishna Nagaraja

Jaime Wilensky
Tera Explorer

@Krishna Nagara1 - I can meet these times:

Monday 4/15 from 11am-2pm PST

Tuesday 4/16 from 12pm - 1:30pm PST

Wednesday 4/17 from 11am-1pm PST

 

Let me know if there are any times that work for you and feel free to send a meeting invite.

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

Hi @Jaime Wilensky,

 

I have set up time for 4/15 at 12pm PST.

Here is the invite https://servicenow.zoom.us/j/96591546389?from=addon

Thank you!

Krishna Nagaraja

GChanner
Tera Guru

@Krishna Nagara1 In PRD, I was able to create a new calendar then import it's 3 user criteria xml then add it to the pre-existing calendar. Now we can manage the sharing of the calendar from the portal as it should be per the document. Huge thank you for your assistance getting this working for us.

Krishna Nagara1
ServiceNow Employee
ServiceNow Employee

HI @GChanner ,

 

Glad to help! 

 

Thanks

Krishna

lawrencemgann
Tera Guru

Thank you again for the assistance @Krishna Nagara1 !

Abhishek Akkata
Tera Expert

@Krishna Nagara1 Any update on filters issue? we are very keen to use collaboration calendar but filter bug. 

Is there a working previous version we can use for time being ? if so where can i get it from ?

Version history
Last update:
ā€Ž11-11-2021 11:33 AM
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