Building a Top-Level Container Calendar in 25Live Publisher


A top-level calendar is composed of one or more sub-calendars. To create a top-level/sub-calendar framework, the sub-calendars all have to be published as sub-calendars in the feed publication process in 25Live. A top-level calendar can either be created as an empty container or it may be its own feed of events. 

Example: An Athletics calendar is one of the best examples of a potential top-level/sub-calendar framework. You could publish a feed of overarching Athletics division events that cross athletic teams as the top-level calendars. Then, you would publish individual sub-calendars for each of your intercollegiate athletic teams. Taken together, they represent the entirety of event scheduling for athletics and the relationship is represented by the top-level/sub-calendar framework.

Tip: Combining the Top-Level Calendars with Mix-ins

If you only wanted to publish the top-level calendar on your web page, you could use the Publish Settings in that calendar to mix-in all of the sub-calendars. Then, when you place the calendar view spud on your webpage, you get the top-level calendar and all of its sub-calendars in one calendar view spud. This works great in the example of our Athletics calendar where the top-level calendar would go on the main Athletics web page and then the sub-calendars might go on team specific pages as stand-alone calendars.

Building a Top-Level Container Calendar

To build an empty top-level container calendar in 25Live Publisher:

  1. Locate the Tasks options and click Create Calendar.
    Create calendar link under Tasks
  2. The Create a New Calendar window will open where you will build the container calendar for your mix-ins.  (Open the Configurations panel below for a description of each setting.)
    Create a new calendar settings
  3. When you are satisfied with all of your choices, click the OK button to create your new empty container calendar.
    OK button

    25Live Publisher will return you to the main window with your new container selected.  You will see that there are no events to display.  Remember, this is a container, there will never be any events on this calendar because it is not attached to a 25Live event feed.
    Sample top level calendar example in publisher


Configurations (Click to Expand)

Calendar Name

Calendar name settings

Calendar name (required)Enter the name you want to give to your new mixed-in container calendar.  

Web name: Enter the web name which is used by the spud code when you Publish the calendar.  This field is optional, but if left blank a web name will be auto-created for you upon publishing this container calendar. 

  • Best-practice naming convention:  Your database instance name-campus-master-calendar (replace Your database instance name with the name of your 25Live instance.)  This identifies this calendar as part of your calendar feeds.

Event Templates 

Remember that event templates are created in Publisher as your events cross from 25Live to Publisher via the feed.  So, each event type becomes its own event template. 

Event template settings

Available templates: Leave this setting as Exclude Sample Templates.  Only events and their associated event types will have templates.  And since this is a mixed-in calendar container, it will contain no events of its own.

Default template: Can be selected from any event template currently available in Publisher.  However, since you will not be creating events on this calendar, choose Standard Event.

Relationship To Other Calendars 

This group contains settings denoting whether this calendar is a top-level calendar or a sub-calendar.
Relationship to other calendars settings

Top-level calendar: Controls whether or not this container calendar will be treated as a top-level calendar.  Since this container calendar will function as our top-level calendar we'll set this to Yes.

Sub-calendar of: Set to None - This is a top-level calendar.  You will notice that the option of altering this is grayed out.  That is in keeping with the fact that this is a top-level calendar rather than a sub-calendar.

Mix In to Publications 

This group contains a list of all your current calendar publications.  You could choose to mix-in the calendars that will be on this container at this time or you may wait until you Publish the container calendar.  As a best practice, it is better to perform your mix-in operations during the Publish Settings phase.
Mix in to publications settings

Enabled Features

Enabled features setting

Allow event registration.  Since the event registration module is not turned on in 25Live Publisher, select No for this container calendar.

Default Event Settings 

This group contains settings controlling both event registration and event creation in 25Live Publisher.  Since you cannot create events for this calendar in 25Live Publisher, you may simply accept all the default settings.
Default event settings

Display Options

Display options settings

Time zone: Controls the time zone used for events on your calendar.  You should go ahead and set the time zone to whichever time zone your campus resides in.  Multi-campus implementations may need to create separate container calendars for events making use of different time zones if they have campuses in multiple time zones.

Week display settings: Determines what day of the week on which the calendar entries will begin.  Since users are accustomed to calendars beginning each week on Sunday, it is a best practice to leave this setting.

Day display starts: Determines when events for each day will appear on the calendar.  Set the earliest hour you want events to be displayed.  For instance, if you have events that start at 6:00 AM, you will want to alter this value.  This can be revised later when you publish the container calendar.

Day display ends: Determines when events for each day will stop appearing on the calendar.  So, events after 11 PM would not display on this calendar.  Again, you can revise as needed when you publish the container calendar.

Creating a Sub-Calendar to Top-Level Calendars

Now that you have identified and created your top-level calendar, you need to create one or more sub-calendars.  Creating a sub-calendar begins in 25Live.  Sub-calendars must be published as sub-calendars in the feed publication process.

To publish a search as a sub-calendar feed:

  1. Build a search for your new sub-calendar in 25Live.
  2. With that new search created, click the Search Actions box to open the drop-down and select Publish.
    Publish link under search settings
  3. If you have not previously logged in, you will be asked for your 25Live Publisher credentials.  Enter those credentials and click the Sign In button.
    Publisher sign in
  4. In the Send Events to 25Live Publisher window, accept the default Feed Options and make sure that the Create as a sub-calendar of box is checked.
    Create a new sub-calendar configuration
  5. From the drop-down menu, select the top-level calendar of which this calendar will become a sub-calendar.
    Selecting a calendar from the dropdown
  6. Enter the name you want to appear for this calendar in the Enter a name textbox and then click the Create Calendar and Send Events button.
    Create calendar and send events button
  7. When the calendar feed has been successfully published, the name of your calendar will appear in bold text in the Status box.
    Status showing the new sub-calendar
  8. Your new sub-calendar now also exists in 25Live Publisher and will be presented indented underneath its top-level calendar.
    Sub calendar displaying in Publisher
  9. Repeat this process until you have all of the sub-calendars published that make up this top-level calendar structure.

Publishing the Top-Level Container Calendar

After you have created your new empty top-level container calendar, you are ready to begin the work of publishing that calendar.  At this point, your calendar will only contain default styles.  You will use another calendar or a calendar stylesheet to deal with setting the styles for this new calendar.

With the top-level calendar selected in 25Live Publisher:

  1. Click the Publish Settings link to begin the process of publication.
    Publish settings button
  2. The Publish Settings will open labeled with the name of your calendar.  In this example, the container was called Sample Container Calendar, so the window is the Publish Sample Container Calendar.  The settings for publication are arranged in six groups:  Default Calendar View, Publish Settings, Mix-In Events From These Calendars, Search, Display Options, and Email Settings.
    Publish settings
  3. At this point, accept all of the defaults and click the Publish button.
    Publish buttons
  4. You will return to the Publishing Control Panel for your calendar where you need to locate the Copy All Publish and Spuds Settings From drop-down menu.
    Copy all publish and spuds settings from drop down menu
  5. From the menu, locate either your calendar stylesheet (if you have created one) or a calendar that contains the styling you want to apply to this new top-level calendar.
    Calendar stylesheet in the menu
  6. Once you click on a calendar or a stylesheet, you will receive an Are you sure message.  Click OK.
    Are you sure you want to replace all the publish settings of sample top-level container calendar with those from your calendar stylesheet?
  7. The styling and publish settings will be copied from your selected calendar or stylesheet and applied to this calendar.  Your next step is to review the Publish Settings.  Click the Edit Publish Settings button.
    Edit Publish settings button in publish settings
  8. In Edit Publish Settings, you will need to review a number of fields.
    1. Make sure that the Access Type is set appropriately.  Most calendars should be set to Public.
      Public access type radio button
    2. Check the Display unpublished fields and place a checkmark in the checkbox for any fields you actually want to appear on event details for this calendar.
      Display unpublished fields checkboxes
    3. Make sure that the Featured event field is populated with your Featured Events custom attribute.
      Featured event field setting
    4. Place a checkmark in the box beside your sub-calendar feeds you want to mix-in to this top-level container calendar.
      Checking the sub-calendar feeds

      Sub-Calendar Presentation on Mix-In Events

      Note how sub-calendars are presented in the Mix-In Events From These Calendars box.  A sub-calendar will be preceded by its top-level calendar and a double arrow head pointing to the sub-calendar.  In the accompanying image, you see what an athletics top-level and its sub-calendars would look like.

    5. Review the Search group of settings to ensure that a public facing calendar is Searchable and that it contains Search keywords and City and region information.
      Search settingsSearch keywords should be words that will be appearing in the event title or event description of the events appearing on this calendar.  You might also add search terms that you think potential visitors would use in searching the calendar.  Having appropriate search keywords will raise the relevance of your events to the search engine spiders and raise their prominence in web searches.

      Currently, you may leave the Include event schema setting to No as this functionality is not currently enabled for 25Live Publisher.

    6. Check your Display Options to ensure that the appropriate Time zone has been set and that the week and day display settings are appropriately set for this calendar.
      Display options settings
    7. Make sure that the Email Settings are set to allow Email subscriptions and Forward replies.
      Email settings
    8. Click the OK button to commit your changes.  You may want to add your mix-in of the sub-calendars beginning with two sub-calendars and then progressively mixing in the other sub-calendars to allow you to check for duplicated events.  This will require you to Edit Publish Settings, save your work by clicking OK and previewing then returning to Edit Publish Settings to add the next mix-in.
  9. Your published top-level calendar is now styled and ready for additional work.  Depending on how your stylesheet is structured, you may have to modify calendar spud settings, control settings, or promotion spud settings.  Unlike true mixed-in calendars, you will not want to hide the container calendar from the Calendar List Control.  The top-level calendar is representing that all the "indented" sub-calendars below work together to make this overarching calendar.