Calendars

Three ways to get events onto the wall. Pasting a calendar link is the quickest and works with almost every calendar service. Signing in with Google or iCloud takes a few minutes longer and gives you a picker with every calendar on the account.

Which one should I use?

Rule of thumb: start with a calendar link. Move to the Google sign-in only if you want Google's colours or the picker. For Apple calendars the iCloud sign-in is nicer than public links, because nothing has to be made public.

Paste a calendar link

1. Get the link from your calendar service:
   • Google Calendar: on a computer, open Settings, then Settings for my calendars, pick a calendar, and copy the Secret address in iCal format (Google's guide).
   • Apple iCloud: in the Calendar app, right-click the calendar, choose Share Calendar, and turn on Public Calendar.
   • Outlook / Microsoft 365: open Settings, then Shared calendars, then Publish a calendar, and copy the ICS link.
   • Schools, sports teams, holidays: look for "subscribe", "iCal" or "ICS" on their calendar page.
2. In the editor, open Settings > Calendar and click Add Feed under iCal / ICS feeds.
3. Paste the link, give it a name and a colour, and save.

Repeat for each calendar. Every calendar module shows all of them together, and each feed can be switched off with its tick box without deleting it.

Sign in with Google

Google asks every app to bring its own sign-in credentials, so this takes a one-time trip through Google Cloud:

1. Open the Google Cloud console and go to APIs & Services > Credentials.
2. Click Create Credentials > OAuth Client ID. For the application type, pick TVs and Limited Input devices, and name it anything, such as "Home Screens".
3. Copy the Client ID and Client Secret into the Google card on Settings > API keys in the editor.
4. Still in the Cloud console, open APIs & Services > Library and enable the Google Calendar API.
5. In the editor, open Settings > Calendar and click Sign in with Google. You get a short code and a link to google.com/device; open the link on any phone or computer, enter the code, and approve.
6. Tick the calendars you want on the wall.

The sign-in happens on your phone or laptop, so the Pi never needs a keyboard. Hide events you declined skips invitations you turned down; it applies to Google calendars only.

Sign in with iCloud

Apple lets you make a password just for Home Screens, so your real Apple ID password is never stored:

1. Go to account.apple.com, open Sign-In and Security > App-Specific Passwords, and create one. Name it anything.
2. In the editor, open Settings > Calendar, click Add iCloud account, and enter your Apple ID email and that new password. You can add more than one account.
3. Tick the calendars to show. Apple's colours carry over.
4. Turn on Birthdays if you would like a calendar built from the birthdays saved in your contacts.

Who is who

Add your household under Settings > Family (see Family), then return to Settings > Calendar > Whose calendars? and pick which calendars are theirs. The Full-Screen Calendar's family grid and free time views draw one row per person from this list. A calendar you do not give to anyone counts as shared by the whole house.

Taking a calendar away (removing a feed, unticking a Google or iCloud calendar, or signing out) also takes it off whoever it belonged to, and out of any calendar module's own list of calendars to show. A module that showed only that calendar goes back to showing them all. Switching a feed off with its tick box keeps its owner.

The same list drives three options on both calendar modules, under What shows in the module's settings:

• Name tags puts each person's initials, in their colour, where the calendar dot goes, so two events called "Practice" read as Ella's and Noah's. Calendars nobody owns keep a plain dot.
• Color key can list calendars, people or groups. With groups, five kids collapse to one "Kids" row drawn as a stack of their avatars, then anyone in no group, then Everyone for shared calendars and holidays. Only people and groups with an event in view appear.
• Show only these people points a screen at a few people or a group. It follows the family list, so adding someone to "Kids" adds them to every screen that shows the Kids. Shared calendars and holidays stay visible unless you untick Also show shared calendars and holidays. It applies together with the calendar tick boxes above it.

Public holidays

Public Holidays adds a country's holidays to every calendar module. Pick the country and they appear alongside your own events, styled a little differently so they are easy to tell apart.

How much to show

Days Ahead at the top of the page is the furthest any calendar module looks. A module can narrow it further in its own settings, but not widen it.

API keys

Most of Home Screens needs no key at all. Keys that are needed live on Settings > API keys, one card per service, each showing whether it is set up. The two exceptions: weather keys go on the service's card under Settings > Weather, and the iCloud sign-in lives here on the Calendar page.

Next steps

• Modules: the calendar module's five views and the full-screen calendar's eight
• Calendar not syncing if events stop arriving
• Chores and rewards to set up the family next