Date iCal

This module allows users to create iCal feeds in Views, and import iCal feeds
from other sites using the Feeds module. Any entity can act as the source of
events for an iCal feed, as long as that entity contains a Date field. Date 
iCal creates a new iCal "view mode" for all entities, which is used to format
the Description field of the events in the iCal feed.


INSTALLATION

Date iCal has several required dependencies, and an optional one: 
- The Views, Entity API, Libraries API (version 2.0), and Date modules are required.
- The iCalcreator library is required.
- PHP 5.3 is required by the iCalcreator library to properly handle timezone
    data. Date iCal *might* work with PHP 5.2, but that configuration is 
    untested and unsupported.
- The Feeds module is optional, but it's needed to enable import of iCal feeds
    from other sites.

To install the iCalcreator library, download it from 
http://kigkonsult.se/downloads/index.php#iCalcreator and extract the zip file.
Inside that file you'll find iCalcreator.class.php. Copy that file to a folder 
in your Drupal site named "sites/all/libraries/iCalcreator".
Then clear the cache on your site, by using either "drush cc all"
or logging in to your site and going to Configuration -> Development -> 
Performance and click the "Clear all caches" button. This is necessary because
libraries are cached, and you may see confusing behavior from Date iCal if the
iCalcreator library gets cached at a bad time.


To confirm that iCalcreator is installed correctly, log in to your Drupal site
and navigate to the admin/reports/status page. If the row titled "Date iCal" is
green, Date iCal is ready to go. If it's red, the iCalcreator library is not
properly installed. If it's missing, you'll need to enable Date iCal and then 
come back to this page. 


HOW TO CREATE AN ICAL FEED

- Go to the Manage Display page for the entity you want to export in an iCal
  feed. You will see that there is a new view mode for all entities, called
  'iCal'.
- Set up the iCal view mode to contain whatever should be exported as the
  'Description' field for the iCal feed. You can trim the text to the desired
  size, include additional information from other fields, etc.
- Create a new View that displays the entities that you want to include in the
  iCal feed.
- Add a "Feed" to the view. Change the Format to 'iCal Feed'. When you click 
  Apply from that dialog, you'll be given the option to name the calendar. This
  name will appear in your users' calendar clients as the calendar's title.
- Change the Show setting to 'iCal Entity' (rather than 'Content' or 'Fields').
- In the settings for iCal Entity, select the date field that should be used 
  as the event date for the iCal feed. Make sure that you choose a field that
  is a part of every entity that your View displays. Otherwise, the entities
  which don't have that field will be left out of the iCal feed.
- You may optionally choose a field that will be used to populate the Location
  property of events in your iCal feed. This field can be either a text field
  or a Node Reference field, in which case the title of the node will be used.
- Give the feed a path like 'calendar/%/export.ics', where you have a
  '/%/' for every contextual filter in the view.
- Attach the feed to a page view.
- Make sure the Pager options are set to "Display all items".
- Add date filters or arguments that will constrain the view to the items you
  want to be included in the iCal feed.
- Navigate to the page view. You should see the iCal icon at the bottom of the
  view. If you click on the icon it will download an .ics file with the events
  that matched the view criteria.


HOW TO IMPORT AN ICAL FEED FROM ANOTHER SITE
- Install the Feeds module, which acts as the framework around Date iCal's 
  calendar import functionality.
- Login to your Drupal site and navigate to the admin/structure/feeds page.
- Click the "Add importer" link, and give it a name and description.
- Clicking "Create" will bring you to the general Feeds importer settings page.
  This page displays some general information about makign Feeds importers, 
  which you should familiarize yourself with.
- In the left sidebar, you'll see "Basic settings", "Fetcher", "Parser", and
  "Processor". The Parser and Processor settings are what we're interested in.
- In the Parser section, click "change". This will bring up the Parser 
  selection page, on which you should select the radio button for "iCal Parser"
  and then click Save.
- Now, under Processor, click the "Settings" link. Most of the time, you'll 
  want to use the "Update existing nodes (slower than replacing them)" setting.
  Then select the Content type of the nodes you'd like to create from iCal
  events. You can leave the other settings as their defeaults, or change them
  as you need. Click Save.
- Now click the "Mapping" link at the bottom of the left sidebar. This page is
  where you'll define how iCal event properties get mapped into your nodes'
  fields. Expand the "Legend" for a detailed description of each source and
  target field. Sources are the attributes available in iCal event objects.
  Targets are the fields in your nodes.
- Most of this setup is going to be dependant upon how your content type's 
  fields are configured, but there are some universal requirements:
  1) You must map the "UID" source to the "GUID" target. Then, after clicking
     "Add", click the gear-shaped button that appears in the new table row, 
     and check the "Unique" checkbox. Then click "Update", and then before
     you add any more mappings, click "Save" at the bottom of the page.
  2) If you're going to map both the "Date start" and "Date end" sources, you
     MUST ensure that the "Date start" mapping is above the "Date end" mapping
     in the table. This is because of an implementation detail in the parser. 
  3) It's a good idea to map the "Summary" source to the "Title" target, and
     the "Description" source to whatever field is the "body" of the node.
- Once you've completed all the mappings, click the "Save" button on the 
  bottom left side of the page.
- Now you can import the iCal feed into nodes by going to the /import page of
  your site (e.g. http://www.exmaple.com/import). Click the link for the 
  importer you just created, and enter the URL of the feed you'd like to 
  import into the "URL" field. Click the "Import" button, and observe the 
  progress.
- Once it's done, you should see a green message saying "Created X nodes." If
  you do, you've successfully set up your iCal importer. If you get some other
  message, you'll need to tweak the importer's settings. 



Additional Notes:
The Feeds plugin was originally written by ekes, for the "iCal feed parser"
module (http://www.drupal.org/project/parser_ical). It was modified and 
improved for Date iCal by coredumperror.

At this time, Date iCal supports outputting iCal calendars only through Views.
To put an "Add to calendar" button on individual event nodes, try the 
<a href="http://drupal.org/project/addtocal">Add to Cal</a> module, or follow
the instructions created by the estimable nmc at:
http://nmc-codes.blogspot.ca/2012/11/creating-ical-feed-for-single-node-in.html

Developers who wish to implement more powerful manipulation of event data can
read the date_ical.api.php file to learn about the various alter hooks that 
date_ical exposes.
