ics export issues (links, quotation marks, alert datetime)
Posted: Sun Oct 20, 2024 9:41 am
I created a new EPIM database with the event below:
Quotation marks
When I export the calendar as ics then the quotation mark is exported \". According to the https://icalendar.org/validator.html validator this is not necessary. \" is imported like it is in Thunderbird for example (displayed as \" in the UI). I tried replacing \" with " manually in the exported ics file and it looked correct in Thunderbird after importing there.
Links
Another issue I found is that urls of links are not exported. In the screenshot you can see "Link" has a hyperlink defined. In the exported ics it is just text without url (see below). It would be good to keep the information somehow, for example using braces or brackets: Link [http://essentialpim.com]. There is also the ATTACH field in the ics standard, so maybe use [1] [2] ... to reference the attached links?!
Otherwise you would need to go through all the events and change the links to contain the url als text.
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
PRODID:-//Astonsoft//EssentialPIM//EN
VERSION:2.0
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
BEGIN:VEVENT
DESCRIPTION:
UID:249401463899392981
SUMMARY:Test with Link and \"quotation marks\"
DTSTART:20241020T090000Z
DTEND:20241020T093000Z
CLASS:PUBLIC
DTSTAMP:20241020T082947Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20241020T082853Z
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR
Alarm-Section
There is also an issue with the way the reminder time is handled.
I set it to 5 minutes before the event in EPIM and exported as ics. There the fixed date is exported:
BEGIN:VALARM
TRIGGER;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20241020T085500Z
ACTION:DISPLAY
END:VALARM
When I export using Thunderbird, the relative time is exported. This is the prefered way, since otherwise, if the calender entry is moved to a different day/time then it doesn't match the alert datetime value anymore.
Thunderbird:
BEGIN:VALARM
ACTION:DISPLAY
TRIGGER:-PT5M
DESCRIPTION:Mozilla Standardbeschreibung
END:VALARM
(EPIM Version: 12.0.5 Pro)
When I export the calendar as ics then the quotation mark is exported \". According to the https://icalendar.org/validator.html validator this is not necessary. \" is imported like it is in Thunderbird for example (displayed as \" in the UI). I tried replacing \" with " manually in the exported ics file and it looked correct in Thunderbird after importing there.
Links
Another issue I found is that urls of links are not exported. In the screenshot you can see "Link" has a hyperlink defined. In the exported ics it is just text without url (see below). It would be good to keep the information somehow, for example using braces or brackets: Link [http://essentialpim.com]. There is also the ATTACH field in the ics standard, so maybe use [1] [2] ... to reference the attached links?!
Otherwise you would need to go through all the events and change the links to contain the url als text.
BEGIN:VCALENDAR
PRODID:-//Astonsoft//EssentialPIM//EN
VERSION:2.0
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
BEGIN:VEVENT
DESCRIPTION:
UID:249401463899392981
SUMMARY:Test with Link and \"quotation marks\"
DTSTART:20241020T090000Z
DTEND:20241020T093000Z
CLASS:PUBLIC
DTSTAMP:20241020T082947Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20241020T082853Z
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR
Alarm-Section
There is also an issue with the way the reminder time is handled.
I set it to 5 minutes before the event in EPIM and exported as ics. There the fixed date is exported:
BEGIN:VALARM
TRIGGER;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20241020T085500Z
ACTION:DISPLAY
END:VALARM
When I export using Thunderbird, the relative time is exported. This is the prefered way, since otherwise, if the calender entry is moved to a different day/time then it doesn't match the alert datetime value anymore.
Thunderbird:
BEGIN:VALARM
ACTION:DISPLAY
TRIGGER:-PT5M
DESCRIPTION:Mozilla Standardbeschreibung
END:VALARM
(EPIM Version: 12.0.5 Pro)