03 – Events

In this chapter you create, edit and move events and set up recurrences.

Creating an event

Switch to a calendar view (e.g. Week, see Chapter 06).
Use the arrow keys to navigate to the day or time you want.
Create an event: Quick add event (Ctrl+N) opens the quick dialog, New event (Ctrl+Shift+N) the full form — or via the context menu. The currently selected time is suggested as the start.
In the dialog, enter at least a title.

In the event dialog you can also set:

Start and end (or All day),
the calendar the event is stored in,
location and description,
a color label (with a color dot in the picker),
a reminder (see Chapter 07),
attendees (name and/or email address),
a recurrence (see below).

Start and end are linked: moving the start slides the end by the same amount, so the duration is preserved — across midnight and across several days too. Changing the end only resizes the event; an end before the start is pulled back to the start. New events begin at the next half hour (09:00 on another day) and run for one hour. This is identical on the desktop and in the mobile app.

Custom color: Next to the color-label picker there’s a “Custom color…” button. Use it to compose an arbitrary color on the fly (hex value or swatch) and apply it directly — no detour through the settings. You can optionally save it as a named label in your palette at the same time. The sidebar offers the same thing via the Color → Other… context menu on calendars and lists.

Recoloring a single event: Besides the dialog, you can recolor an event directly from its right-click menu (the Color submenu) — handy for a quick tweak without opening the full form. Where the calendar’s provider can store a per-event color (local calendars and color-capable CalDAV servers), the color travels with the event and shows up in other clients too. For iCloud, Google, Exchange/Outlook and subscribed feeds, the color is kept locally on this device instead (so it never triggers a sync error), and it stays applied just the same.

Subscribed calendars: If a calendar you subscribe to (an iCal feed) sets its own per-event colors, those now show through as well — read-only, since a subscribed feed can’t be edited.

Save creates the event; a live region confirms “Event saved”.

Notify attendees: When you organize an event, someone else is invited, and the calendar supports server-side scheduling (iCloud, Google, Exchange/Outlook, Microsoft 365), the provider can tell the attendees – Aperio itself never sends email. On Google and Exchange/Outlook a Notify attendees checkbox appears (on by default); when ticked, the provider sends invitations or updates on save. iCloud and Microsoft 365 inform the attendees of every change on their own and cannot save one silently, so instead of the checkbox the dialog says so, for example “iCloud informs the attendees of every change”. That sentence is a stop Tab reaches, and it is announced when it appears while you edit, say when you add the first attendee.

The organizer never counts as an attendee: an appointment you made in Outlook, which Outlook lists with you as its only attendee, has no attendees in Aperio. For a meeting someone else organizes, only they can send updates, so neither the checkbox nor the sentence appears there. If you remove the last attendee, the checkbox or the sentence stays, so the person you removed can get a cancellation. When you only change the title or the time, Aperio leaves the attendee list at the provider exactly as it is, their answers included.

When you delete a meeting you organize (with attendees, on an account with server-side scheduling), Aperio asks in one dialog what should happen — no hidden second step. For a recurring meeting the dialog has a Notify attendees / Remove without notifying radio group (default: notify) and, below it, a button for each scope: this occurrence, this and all following, and the whole series. So you can cancel a single occurrence (attendees get a cancellation for exactly that date), end the series from a chosen date onward (this and all following keeps the earlier occurrences and drops this one plus every later one), or cancel all of it — and the radio decides in each case whether an email goes out. A single event has just the notify/silent choice. On iCloud and Microsoft 365 deleting always sends the cancellation, so there is no radio group: the dialog says who informs the attendees, and every scope cancels. A meeting you were only invited to, or an event with no attendees, is deleted without asking.

An invitation somebody else organizes: On iCloud — and on any calendar server that schedules for you — the server takes only your own answer and your own reminders for a meeting you were invited to. Everything else it refuses, so Aperio shows such a meeting read-only: the title, the calendar, the times, the place, the description and the guest list are all there to read, each one a stop your screen reader reaches, but none of them can be changed. The dialog says so in a line above the fields.

What you can still do: answer (Accept, Tentative, Decline), set your own reminders — attached ones the calendar keeps, or private ones only Aperio rings — choose a sound, give it a colour, join a conference, check the attendees’ availability, and delete it. Answering no longer closes the editor, so you can answer and set a reminder in one visit.

Deleting it tells the organizer: the dialog says “The organizer gets a decline” before it happens, and the button is called Delete and decline. Skipping a single occurrence says the same sentence, above the usual scope buttons. Ending somebody else’s series early is not offered, because the server would refuse it. Dragging such a meeting to another day or time is refused too, and Aperio says so; moving it to another calendar still works, and the copy has no attendees.

The repeat rule is read out as a sentence — “every Monday, 5 times” — since there are no controls to read. Aperio says plainly when a rule is one it cannot put into words.

Check availability: When an event has attendees on a calendar with server-side scheduling, a Check availability button appears, below Notify attendees when that is shown, and also for a meeting someone else organizes. It looks up, for the currently entered time window, which attendees are free or busy, and shows the result per attendee with a summary (announced via the live region). If a provider can’t answer (missing permission), that attendee reads as “free/unknown”.

Responding to invitations (RSVP): When you open a meeting you were invited to (iCloud, Google, Exchange/Outlook), Your response appears at the top of the dialog with Accept, Tentative and Decline buttons — your current reply is highlighted. Your answer is sent to the organizer automatically. If you are the organizer, you instead see each attendee’s response status; the organizer is not among them.

Editing, moving and deleting events

Edit: Select the event and open it with Enter, double-click it, or choose Edit from the context menu.
Move: Change the times in the dialog – this works reliably and is screen-reader friendly. With a mouse you can also drag an event onto a different day in the week or month view, which keeps its time of day and duration, or into the hour grid of the day or week view, which gives it the time you drop it on. Dragged onto a calendar in the sidebar, it moves to that calendar. For recurring events Aperio asks whether to move just this occurrence or the whole series. The whole series moves every occurrence by the same number of days, so “every Monday” becomes “every Tuesday” and the end date moves along. Some rules cannot move that way, such as “the second Sunday of every month” or a day after the 28th; Aperio then says why and offers to move just this occurrence. See also Single changed or deleted occurrences below.
Delete: Select the event and choose Delete (default: Delete). You are asked to confirm before deletion.

Recurring events

Under Recurrence in the event dialog you choose a pattern:

daily, weekly (with weekdays), monthly, yearly,
an end (never, after X times, until a date).

When editing or deleting a recurring event, Aperio asks up front whether the change should apply to only this occurrence, this and all following, or the whole series — the same three scopes other calendars (Google, Outlook) offer. This and all following splits the series at the chosen occurrence: the earlier occurrences stay untouched, and this one plus every later one are changed (on edit, a new series takes over from here) or removed (on delete). The new series repeats the way the repeat field says: change the rule there and the new series follows it, leave it alone and the pattern simply continues. Move the occurrence to another day and the repeat field moves with it right away: every Monday becomes every Tuesday, every 10th of the month becomes every 11th, and an end date moves along so that the new series ends on the occurrence in the place of the old last one. Change only something else, and the repeat stays as it is. Some rules cannot move by days without meaning something else, such as the second Tuesday of the month or every 30th, or a rule that names its own times when the time changes: the field keeps the rule and says why, and saving says so too. Choose the repeat yourself then, or edit just this occurrence. When nothing comes before the chosen occurrence — you picked the first one, or every earlier one was deleted — there is nothing to keep: an edit changes the whole series, which stays the same entry, and a delete removes the series. Aperio says so when it happens. On an edit, Aperio first creates the new series and then ends the old one before it. If ending the old one fails, Aperio deletes the new one again, and nothing has changed. When it cannot tell whether the old one was already ended, for example after a lost connection, both stay: your change counts as saved, and the editor stays open with a note naming the day from which the series may show twice, until you close it. If deleting the new one fails as well, Aperio says so too, and asks you to check the calendar before saving again. Aperio leaves the occurrences you deleted out of the new series, and ones changed in another calendar app stay in it, at their usual time and with the new series’ content. Deleted occurrences follow your change: move the occurrence to another day and each deleted one moves with it by its place in the series, so a deleted third Monday becomes a deleted third Tuesday; switch between all-day and a time of day and it stays on the day you saw it on. Give the new series another repeat rule, and a deleted occurrence stays deleted only on a day the new rule still has; a new end alone is no new rule, and neither is setting by hand the rule the new date gives anyway. A monthly or yearly series that the new date makes skip other months or years, such as one moved from the 31st to the 30th, moves its deletions by their place only as far as the two versions still line up; if a deletion lies beyond that, they all stay on their day, where a deleted occurrence can show again. Not every calendar keeps those deletions yet: CalDAV calendars do, but on Exchange and on Google a deleted occurrence can still come back for now. On Google, Aperio also knows deleted occurrences only about a year ahead, so one deleted further out comes back in the new series. And in an all-day series on Google or CalDAV, an occurrence changed in another app also stays in the old series for now, so that day shows twice. The whole series opens the series itself, with its own start and end, even when you opened it from a later occurrence. A new time applies to every occurrence. A new date moves the series the way this and all following from its first occurrence would: every Monday becomes every Tuesday, deleted occurrences move with it by their place, and an end date moves so the series stays as long as it was. The repeat field shows the moved rule right away, and a rule that cannot move says so there and when you save. Switching the whole series between all-day and a time of day keeps a deleted occurrence on the day you saw it on, and an all-day series that gets a time of day gets your device’s time zone with it. When you carry such a change to the other copies of the appointment, each copy that repeats moves the same way. The editor’s title names your choice, such as Edit this occurrence only, and is read out when the editor opens. On the desktop the form repeats it as the read-only field Apply to, which Tab reaches like every other field.

Single changed or deleted occurrences: When a whole series moves to another day or time, by dragging it or in the dialog, some single occurrences stay tied to their old date: occurrences changed on their own in an external calendar (iCloud, Google, Exchange), and occurrences deleted in a Google calendar, also when you deleted them in Aperio (possibly in Exchange too). After the move a deleted occurrence can come back, a changed one can show up twice, and another occurrence can be missing where the old one was. Aperio cannot repair this. Check the series afterwards in the calendar’s own app, where such single changes can be undone.

Changing an occurrence that was already changed: An occurrence changed on its own in the calendar’s own app (iCloud, Google, Exchange) stays part of its series when you change or move only this occurrence again: in the event dialog on the desktop and in the mobile app, and by dragging it on the desktop. An occurrence you changed on its own in Aperio already is an appointment of its own. Exchange is the exception: there such an occurrence may not move onto or past another occurrence of the same series. Aperio then makes it an appointment of its own at the new time, as it does with any other occurrence you move on its own.

Tip: Recurring events from external calendars (e.g. iCloud) expand correctly in every view – even when the first occurrence lies in the past.

Screen-reader note: When you create an event, focus moves to the dialog’s title field. Use Tab/Shift+Tab to move through the fields; Esc cancels without saving. In a view, events are announced with title, time and calendar when selected.

The same appointment in several calendars

One commitment often exists several times over: in the work calendar so colleagues see it, copied into a private calendar because that is the one a voice assistant reads out, and again in a colleague’s calendar Aperio also reads. To every provider those are unrelated events — Aperio can be told otherwise.

Open an event’s context menu (right-click, Shift+F10, or long-press on the phone) and choose Belongs together with…. The dialog lists the other events of that day; pick the twin and confirm with Group. The list reaches into switched-off calendars as well — a colleague’s calendar is often off precisely because it is noisy, and that is where the third copy sits. Those entries carry a “(calendar switched off)” note, so no event turns up out of nowhere. The same dialog takes an event back out (Take this event out) or drops the whole grouping (Dissolve group). Its members are a list, and each one opens: you get from the group straight into the editor of whichever copy you mean, and back again. On an event that is already grouped the menu entry reads Manage grouping…, so its name says there is something to manage.

Nothing reaches the provider. Grouping two events changes neither of them, and ungrouping leaves both exactly as they were — the calendars keep their own copies, Aperio just knows they are one appointment. The grouping travels between your devices with everything else.

If the second copy is the obvious one — same name, same time, another calendar — it is already picked when the dialog opens, with a line saying why. Confirming is one keystroke; disagreeing is choosing something else. Aperio never groups anything on its own: in an office full of “Team meeting” at 10:00 that would declare two different meetings one appointment, and a wrong group hides a real commitment behind a copy of something else.

If both events already belong to different groups, Aperio refuses rather than guessing: merging two claims about what an appointment is would be a decision you never asked for. Take one of them out first.

What changes once events are grouped

One row instead of four. Every view shows the appointment once, and the row says what it stands for: “one appointment with 2 others, in Work, Private”. The count is of the group, so a copy in a calendar you have switched off is counted too — it matches what you know you keep.

You can see it too: a folded row carries a small mark — “3×” for the appointment and its two other copies.

There is one exception, and it is deliberate: if the copies have drifted apart — one was moved and the others were not — they are NOT folded. Each stays visible and says so, with a highlighted mark (“3× ≠”). The group has stopped being true, and that is the one thing you need to see.

One edit instead of four. After saving a change to a grouped event, Aperio asks whether the other copies should follow, names each one it will write, and names each one it may not. A colleague’s calendar is read-only, and skipping it quietly is how a group ends up meaning two different times. The copies are named by their calendar: the title is the same on all of them — that is what makes them a group.

If something goes wrong along the way, the dialog stays open and says which calendars could not be written; Try the rest again retries exactly those. Half-carried is the one state you have to see. A copy whose series may now show twice from the cut is different: its new part was created, so it is not offered again, and a note names its calendar and the day instead. When only such notes are left, the dialog stays open with them and without Try the rest again.

Only what the appointment IS travels: title, when, where, and the description. Reminders stay with each copy — the private copy usually exists precisely because it carries a reminder the work one does not. Colour, calendar and attendees stay per copy for the same reason.

The question comes after the save, never before, so your own change is never at stake and cancelling costs nothing.

Series too, at every scope. Change this occurrence only and each copy gets what your event got: the occurrence cut out of its series and a standalone event put in its place. Choose this and all following and each copy’s series is split at the same point — the earlier occurrences stay untouched, the later ones carry the change. A copy running to a different pattern (fortnightly against weekly) is split at its OWN next occurrence; a copy with none left from there on is named rather than quietly skipped, and a copy with nothing before that point is changed as a whole instead of split.

The dialog says which occurrences it is about. And because both scopes create NEW entries, those are tied together afterwards — otherwise the appointment you had just made one row would be four again from that point on.

The meeting belongs to the appointment. A meeting link hangs on exactly one event, and which one is a coincidence of the moment it was attached. Inside a group, Join appears on whichever copy you happen to be looking at.

Copies are found again. Event ids belong to the provider and change underneath Aperio — a re-sync remints them, moving an event between calendars remints it. A group remembers each member’s name and start, so when an id stops resolving the copy is looked for and the group repairs itself silently. If nothing matching is there, nothing is changed: it may be a copy you deleted, and dropping it on suspicion is not Aperio’s call.

Time steps

Under Settings → General, Time steps decides how far one press of the arrow keys moves a time field: 1, 5, 10, 15 or 30 minutes (15 by default). A time that does not sit on that grid keeps stepping minute by minute, so nothing you already saved becomes unsavable, and typing an exact time always works.

On the phone the same setting works differently, because the platform gives no choice: the native picker’s wheel always moves a minute at a time. There, the setting decides which minutes the Minutes button beside a time field offers — one tap instead of thirty swipes to reach half past.

Signatures

A signature is a named block of text that goes at the end of a description — a room’s join details, a standing note, a department’s dial-in. Under Settings → Signatures — on the phone via Signatures in Settings — you write them. WHICH one a calendar carries is set on the calendar itself, beside its default reminders, and a calendar that has one puts it on new appointments by itself: no press at all in the ordinary case.

The binding is a default, not a restriction. Every signature stays pickable in the editor whichever calendar the appointment is on, and the Signature button beside the description is there for those exceptions — including taking one back out. Change the calendar and the block is swapped for the new calendar’s; text you wrote yourself, or a block you deleted, is left alone.

Inserting is repeatable: a second press replaces the block rather than adding another, and switching to a different signature swaps it. The text you wrote above it is never touched — a signature is an addition at the end, not a rewrite. It is separated by a line containing -- , the same marker mail clients use, which is also how Aperio finds its own block again.

Plain text only, and that is not a limitation we chose. A sent invitation travels as iCalendar, whose description field is defined as plain text — HTML put there arrives as visible tags in every client that renders it literally. Put a link on a line of its own and virtually every client will make it clickable, which is all the formatting an invitation needs.

Summary

You can create, edit, move, delete and repeat events. Next we’ll handle tasks.