- Sync App-Specific Data with Online-Based Apps
- Sync App-Specific Data with iCloud
- Get Acquainted with the Calendar App
- Use the Contacts App to Keep Track of People You Know
- Create and Manage Lists with the Reminders App
- Take Notes or Gather Information Using the Newly Redesigned Notes App
- Sharing Notes
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
Get Acquainted with the Calendar App
With its multiple viewing options for keeping track of the scheduling information stored in it, the Calendar app is a highly customizable scheduling tool. In the Calendar app, any appointment, meeting, activity, or entry that you create and store within the app is referred to as an event.
Because the Calendar app can manage and display multiple color-coded calendars at once, when you create a new event, be sure to choose which calendar it gets stored in. For example, you can maintain separate calendars for Work, Personal, Family, Travel, and/or for whatever organization you volunteer for and allocate time to.
From within Calendar, you can also share some or all of your schedule information with colleagues and maintain several separate, color-coded calendars to keep personal and work-related responsibilities, as well as individual projects, listed separately, while still being able to view them on the same screen.
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When you turn on iCloud’s Family Sharing feature, a separate color-coded calendar labeled Family is created in the Calendar app. This calendar can be accessed by up to five other family members. Thus, your teens can add details about their after-school activities, sports practices, or drama rehearsals, while weekend family events can be viewed for all to see. Plus, everyone can keep tabs on upcoming vacation dates.
While the Family calendar data is viewable by anyone with Family Sharing access, events stored within other calendars remain private, or viewable only by people you invite to see the information.
More information about setting up iCloud’s Family Sharing feature can be found in Chapter 5, “Use iCloud and the iCloud Drive App from Your iPhone or iPad.”
Controlling the Calendar View
Launch Calendar from your iOS device’s Home screen, and then choose in which viewing perspective you’d like to view your schedule data. Regardless of which view you’re using, tap on the Today option to immediately jump to the current date on the calendar. The current date is always highlighted with a red dot.
What’s New
From the Home screen of the iPhone 6s or iPhone 6s Plus, press and hold your finger on the Calendar app icon to make an Add Event option appear (shown in Figure 13.1). Tap on this to quickly launch the Calendar app and access the New Event screen.
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Figure 13.1 Quickly access the New Event screen within the Calendar app by pressing and holding down the Calendar app icon when viewing the Home screen of the iPhone 6s or iPhone 6s Plus.
What’s New
If event-related information is displayed in an incoming email, such as an upcoming airline flight reservation or restaurant reservation, the Mail app displays an Add Event banner near the top of the email. Tap on this banner (which includes a tiny Calendar app icon) to import the event details from the body of the incoming email directly into the Calendar app as a new event.
On the iPad, switching between Calendar views is as easy as tapping on the Day, Week, Month, or Year tab displayed at the top center of the Calendar app screen.
On the iPhone and iPad, the Calendar app opens on the last view option that you were using previously. However, on the iPhone, you also have access to a detailed Day, Week, Month, or Year view, as well as a Listing view, which works with the Month or Day view.
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When the Month calendar view is selected, tap on the Listing icon (which appears near the top-right corner of the screen) to display a list of events for the current day (or the day you select). This information is displayed below the month view of the calendar (shown in Figure 13.2).
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Figure 13.2 The Listing icon in the Calendar app provides an additional way to format and view your schedule on the iPhone’s screen.
When you select the Day view in the Calendar app, the Listing icon shows you all your appointments, hour-by-hour, in a scrollable format that enables you to quickly see your schedule for the previous or upcoming days in addition to the currently selected day.
The Year view shows mini calendars for the entire year. To switch from the Year view to the Month view (shown in Figure 13.3), tap on any month in the Year view.
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Figure 13.3 Shown here is the Calendar app’s Month view on the iPhone.
From the Month view, switch to the Week view by rotating your iPhone from portrait to landscape mode. In other words, hold your smartphone sideways.
Also from the Month view, to switch to the Day view, tap on a day displayed in the calendar. From the Month view, any day that displays a gray dot in it has event details associated with it.
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On the iPhone, from the Month or Day view, tap on the Listing icon to view a more detailed and scrollable listing for the selected day’s events.
The Year, Month, Week, and Day views in the iPhone version of the Calendar app are switchable in a hierarchical order. If you’re in the Day view, for example, you can switch back to the Month view by tapping on the Back icon (a left-pointing arrow), which is displayed in the top-left corner of the screen.
Whether you’re using the Calendar app on an iPhone or iPad, your Calendar view options include the following.
The Calendar App’s Day View
This view displays your events individually, based on the time each event is scheduled. When using the iPad version of the app, this information is displayed on a split screen. On the left is an hour-by-hour summary of your day, and on the right is a synopsis of the events for that day.
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On the iPhone, the Day view (shown in Figure 13.4) displays a week’s worth of calendar dates near the top of the screen. Below that, the selected date is displayed, followed by an hour-by-hour rundown of your events.
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Figure 13.4 The Day view of the Calendar app lets you see your schedule broken down one day at a time in one-hour increments.
On the iPad, the Day display is split into two sections. The selected date, along with a week’s worth of calendar dates, is displayed at the top of the screen, followed by a summary listing of appointments and/or events displayed on the left side of the screen. Details about one selected appointment or event are displayed on the right side of the screen by tapping on it.
Use the Day view of the Calendar app to see a detailed outline of scheduled events for a single day. Swipe your finger to scroll up or down to see an hour-by-hour summary of that day’s schedule.
Swipe right or left along the week’s worth of calendar days to see upcoming or past dates, and to view another day’s schedule. Tap on a specific day to switch to that date’s Day view.
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To quickly find an event, tap on the Search icon, and then enter any relevant text to help you find the item you’re looking for that’s stored in the Calendar app. This can also be done using Spotlight Search, or a verbal request can be made using Siri. In the Search field, enter a date, time, name, business, meeting location, or other pertinent information. Tap on a search result to view that event listing in detail within the Calendar app.
The Calendar App’s Week View
The view uses a grid format to display the days of the week along the top of the screen and time intervals along the left side of the screen (shown in Figure 13.5 on an iPhone). With it, you’re given an overview of all events scheduled during a particular week (Sunday through Saturday).
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Figure 13.5 The Calendar app’s Week view.
Scroll along the dates displayed near the top of the screen to quickly view your schedule for past or future weeks.
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To fine-tune this or any other Calendar app view, tap on the Calendars option that’s displayed near the bottom center of the screen. A listing of the separate color-coded calendars that the Calendar app is managing is displayed. Tap on a listing to add or remove it from the Calendar view you’re looking at.
When you remove a calendar from the calendar view, this does not delete any data; it simply hides the events that are stored in that particular calendar from the display.
The Calendar App’s Month View
This view enables you to see a month’s worth of events at a time. On the iPhone, tap any single day to immediately switch to the Day view and review a detailed summary of events slated for that day. From the Month view, use your finger to scroll up or down to look at past or future months. On the iPad, use the Day, Week, Month, or Year tabs, located at the top of the screen, to switch Calendar views.
The Calendar App’s Year View
The Year view enables you to look at 12 mini calendars (with minimal detail displayed).
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Tap on the Inbox option, displayed near the bottom-right corner of the screen, to view invites for events from other people that you might want to import into one of your calendars.
How to Enter a New Event into the Calendar App
Regardless of which calendar view you’re using, follow these steps to enter a new event:
Tap the New Event icon (which looks like a plus sign) in the upper-right corner of the screen. This causes a New Event window to be displayed (shown in Figure 13.6).
Figure 13.6 Add a new event to the Calendar app from the New Event screen.
- The first field in the New Event window is labeled Title. Using the virtual keyboard, enter a title for the event.
If a location is associated with the event, tap the Location field located below the Title field and enter an address or location. Entering information into the Location field is optional. You can be as detailed as you want when entering information into this field.
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By entering a location, your iOS mobile device can calculate travel time to this event from your current location and give you ample warning related to when you need to leave. The Maps app can also use the location information to provide directions to that event.
If you ask Siri a question related to an event’s location, such as “Where is my next meeting?” or “How do I get to my next appointment?,” the event’s location information is used.
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Many of the fields within the New Event screen are optional. In other words, only fill in the fields that are relevant to the new event you’re creating. However, the more information you include, the more useful Maps, Siri, and Spotlight Search will be later when you want to refer to event information.
- If the event lasts for the entire day, turn on the All-Day virtual switch. Otherwise, to set the time and date the event begins and ends, first tap the Starts field. Use the scrolling Date, Hour, Minute, and AM/PM dials to select the start time for your event.
After entering the start time, scroll down and tap on the Ends option, and again use the scrolling Date, Hour, Minute, and AM/PM dials to select the end time for your event.
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If the new event you’re creating repeats every day, every week, every two weeks, every month, or every year, tap the Repeat option, and choose the appropriate time interval. The default for this option is Never, meaning that it is a nonrepeating, one-time-only event.
- Turn on the virtual switch associated with the Travel Time option to add between 5 minutes and 2 hours of travel time to that event by tapping on one of the listed options. So, if this event turns out to be one hour away from your previous event scheduled on the same day, one hour’s worth of travel time can be added to your schedule. However, if you have a specific location entered in the Location field, your iPhone or iPad can calculate the travel time from wherever you happen to be prior to that event.
- If you’re managing several calendars within the Calendar app, tap on the Calendar option to select in which calendar the new event will be placed. The default calendar is called Home, but you can change this from within Settings.
- To invite other people to the event, tap on the Invitees option and, when prompted, fill in the To field with the invitees’ names or email addresses. Use their name if they already have a contact entry in the Contacts app; otherwise, enter an email address for each person separated by a comma. The people you add as invitees are sent an email allowing them to respond to the invite. The Calendar app keeps track of RSVPs from event attendees and displays this information in the app.
To set an audible alarm for the event, tap the Alert option. The Event Alert window temporarily replaces the Add Event screen. In the Event Alert window, tap on the option for how much advance notice you want before the scheduled event. Your options include None, At Time of Event, 5 minutes, 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours, 1 day, 2 days, or 1 week before the event. Once you tap a selection, you are returned to the Add Event screen.
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A Second Alert option is also available from the Add Event screen. If you want to add a secondary alarm to this event, tap the Second Alert option and then set it.
- Tap on the Show As option to classify how you want an event to appear within your calendar. The default option is Busy. This is information others can see if you opt to share specific calendars with other people.
- Tap on the URL field to add a website address associated with the event.
- Tap on the Notes field to add text-based notes you want to associate with the new event. It’s also possible to paste content from other apps into the Notes field.
- Tap the Add option to save the event. Tap the Cancel icon to exit without saving any new information.
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As soon as you create a new event, that information syncs with your iCloud account and all other computers and/or mobile devices that you have linked to that account. If you have the Calendar app set up to sync with another scheduling app or online service, your new data syncs with that app.
This near instant data synchronization also applies if you delete an event.
Use Siri to Enter New Events into the Calendar App
Instead of manually entering event information into your iPhone or iPad using the virtual keyboard, or importing/syncing scheduling data from another computer or device, you always have the option to use Siri. Refer to Chapter 2, “Using Siri, Dictation, and CarPlay to Interact with Your Mobile Device,” for more information.
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Using Siri, say something like, “When is my next appointment with [name]?” You can also say, “Show me my schedule for Wednesday,” or ask, “What’s on my calendar for July 7?” to quickly find an event. If you enter information into the Location field as you’re creating events, you can later ask Siri, “Where is my next meeting?”
Viewing Individual Appointment Details
From any view in the Calendar app, tap an individual event to display the details related to it.
When you tap on a single event listing, a new screen opens (shown in Figure 13.7). Tap the Edit option in the upper-right corner to modify any aspect of the event listing, such as its title, location, start/end time, alert, invitees, or notes.
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Figure 13.7 Detailed information about each event stored within the Calendar app can easily be viewed.
At the bottom of an event listing, a map showing the event’s location is provided if the Location field has been filled in.
How to Delete an Event from the Calendar App
To delete an event entry entirely, tap the red-and-white Delete Event option found at the bottom of the Edit window. Or when you’re finished making changes to an event entry, tap on the Done option in the upper-right corner of the window.
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The Calendar app works with several other apps, including Contacts and Notification Center. For example, in Contacts, you can enter someone’s birthday into an entry, and that information can automatically be displayed in the Calendar app.
To display birthday listings in Calendar, tap the Calendars button displayed near the bottom center of the screen in the Calendar app, and then tap on the Birthdays option to add a check mark to that selection. All recurring birthdays stored in Contacts appear in Calendar.
There are also two options related to the Facebook app that enable you to display all the birthdays for your online Facebook friends, and/or all Facebook Events related to your account in the Calendar app. This can be found under the Facebook heading of the Show Calendars screen/window.
Quickly Find Appointment or Event Details
In addition to viewing the various calendar views offered within the Calendar app, use the in-app Search or Spotlight Search options to find individual events.
Customizing the Calendar App
There are many ways to customize the Calendar app beyond choosing between the various calendar views. For example, you can set audible alerts and/or use onscreen alerts and banners to remind you of events. You can also display Calendar-related information in the Notification Center and/or on the Lock screen.
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To customize the audio alert generated by the Calendar app, launch Settings and then select the Sounds option. Tap on the Calendar Alerts option and choose a sound from the menu. Choose the None option from the Calendar Alerts menu to set up Calendar so it never plays audible alerts or alarms.
From the Mail, Contacts, Calendars submenu within Settings, under the Calendars heading, determine how far back in your schedule you want to sync appointment data between your primary computer and your iOS device(s). Your options include Events 2 Weeks Back, Events 1 Month Back, Events 3 Months Back, Events 6 Months Back, and All Events. All Events is the default option.
Tap on the Time Zone Override option and then turn on the virtual switch associated with this feature if you want the Calendar app to always show event dates and times in your home time zone, regardless of which alternate time zone you’ve traveled to. After you turn on the virtual switch associated with this feature, tap on the Time Zone option to select a home time zone.