Summary
Following our 1.51 Release on the 28th February, we now have our new Resource Calendar available which is an improved calendar view of our Facility Calendar. Please find details relating to the Resource Calendar from our company release notes below. We have also created an additional article on the Introduction to the Resource Calendar here.
Resource Calendar - Feature Detail
This is the first of our Activities V2 features and provides a much-needed upgrade to how activities are represented and managed in a calendar view. Overall the new calendar aims to provide more information on activities and customers, and present this in a much cleaner and more flexible format than previously.
How to access the new feature
It can be accessed in one of two ways:
- Front of House > Facility Calendar > Select 'Resource Timeline' icon on the top right of the Facility Calendar screen.
- Facilities Module > Scroll down to the list of Facilities > Click ‘Resource Timeline’
Please note that staff users who currently have access to the Facility Calendar will therefore have access to the Resource Calendar, there is no requirement to update Staff User Roles for this new feature.
Timeline-view
To maximise the information we can display on one page, we have switched to a timeline view, with resources listed on the left.
Users can easily switch between days, by clicking on the respective arrow buttons (< >), or by selecting another date by clicking on the calendar icon. If needing to return to the current date, users can click on the ‘today’ button.
To show more or less granularity, users can further zoom in and out of the calendar using the ‘+’ and ‘-’ magnifying glass icons.
Collapse/Maximise View
For Resources
If a facility has parent and child resources, the user will be able to collapse and maximise the view by clicking the ‘minus’ or ‘plus’ symbols listed next to the parent resource. By default, the calendar will be showing a maximised view i.e. all child resources will be listed underneath the parent resource. This is one of the ways in which the calendar view can be adjusted to show only what is relevant to the user.
For Overlapping Activities
A similar collapse/maximise feature is available for any overlapping activities. When the view is collapsed, the activity bar on the calendar collates all the information and displays the overall number of slots and spaces available.
Different Colours/Accessible Colour Palette
To further help with differentiating all the activities that might be happening on a given day, every activity category is now displayed in a different colour. These are assigned randomly, however once a colour has been applied, it will stay the same for that activity category.
We have chosen an accessible colour palette, meaning that the text an icons will always be displayed clearly and readable regardless of activity category’s assigned colour.
Capacity Visualisation
To view capacity information at a glance, all activity bars on the calendar now give an indication of the capacity available.
In the example below you can see the activity bar fill up with a darker shade to represent the percentage of booked vs available spaces. The actual number of spaces is also listed.
Similarly for any overlapping activities (in the collapsed view), a horizontal line indicates how busy an activity is.
When maximising the view, all individual slots become visible with the same capacity visualisation as above.
Hover panels
When moving your mouse cursor across any of the activities in the calendar, a hover panel will appear. This outlines key information, such as activity name and time, location, spaces available, name of coach/instructor, or whether an activity is cancelled.
All activities are now visible
With the Facility Calendar, any unbooked activities (f.e. overlapping ad-hoc slots which had not been booked yet) were not represented in the calendar. This could lead to confusion when facing empty spots in the calendar, and prevented members of staff from getting a holistic overview of what is booked and still available at their centre.
To overcome this, the new facility calendar will display ALL activities including:
- Booked
- Cancelled
- Clashing
- Available
- Unavailable (due to another activity booked on this resource - this would only be relevant to ad-hoc bookings)
These will all be represented with slight design/colour/icon variations for easy understanding.
Please note: we have since released a toggle on the top right of the calendar which will allow users to change the view from all activities scheduled to only ones that have a booking. As a default the toggle is set to only show booked activities.
Configuring Calendar View
To ensure your default calendar view is not cluttered with any information not relevant to your queries, we are introducing the option to configure your view flexibly.
You can do this by clicking the configuration icon (see video demo below), which opens a slide-out window.
Users will be able to adjust the following:
- Show activities which haven’t been booked yet (this will be turned on by default)
- Select resources to be shown in the calendar (option to select by parent category, or individually)
- Save their selection to be the new ‘default’ view This means that the next time the calendar is opened, it will only show your selected configuration
Users will always have the option to reset their filter by clicking on the respective icon.
Please see all these actions demoed in the video below:
Activity Detail Slide-Outs
To gain further information on a given activity, a user will be able to click onto each individual or collapsed view of overlapping activities. This will open a slide out window displaying the following information (if applicable to the selected activity):
Future Activities:
- Activity name, time, date, description, resource
- Spaces booked/available
- Customer list, including associated number of attendees (in case of a ticketed activity)
- Links to view customer profile
- Option to edit/cancel activity (outlined in further detail below)
- Option to cancel a customer incl. their attendees (outlined in further detail below)
Past Activities:
- Activity name, time, date, description, resources
- Spaces booked/available
- Customer list, including associated number of attendees (in case of a ticketed activity)
- Links to view a customer profile
- Option to mark customers as attended or absent (outlined in further detail below)
See video demo of a few examples:
Marking Attendance
For any activities in the past, users will be able to click into an activity and mark customers as either attended or absent. This can be done individually or by bulk.
Whether customers are marked as attended or not attended by default depends on the clients settings in System Configurations (Setting called: ‘Auto mark bookings as attended’).
Cancelling Customers
For any upcoming activities, users will be able to cancel customer bookings, either individually or in bulk.
This can be done by clicking into an activity (as demonstrated in the section above). There are tick boxes next to each listed customer which can be ticked for an individual selection. A multi-action tool bar will also appear to help you easily select all customer if needed.
When actioning the cancellation, the user will be prompted with a confirmation screen.
Following this, the facility calendar will update - in this example the Block Booking will be shown as cancelled.
Editing Activities
Any future activities in the calendar can be edited. Again, to access this functionality, a user would have to click into the activity detail page.
Users will be able to edit the following:
- Move activity to another resource
- Changing the duration of the activity
If either of these result in a clash, the user will be notified with information on why they cannot proceed with their change(s).
- Changing the maximum capacity of the activity (if applicable)
- Changing the last entry time (if applicable)
Cancelling Activities
Finally, users will be able to cancel any future activities through the new calendar. Doing this opens another slide-out window which allows you to review any details of the activity before proceeding.
Users can select their cancellation reason from a dropdown menu, which will send the appropriate notification email to any customers affected. A confirmation screen will appear to confirm your action, and the calendar will update automatically.