Automators 01 Numbers & Fantastical for Batch Events

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This is wonderful! Have you shared the Numbers template and Keyboard Maestro macro anywhere? If so, I would love to steal them! :slight_smile:

Yes! Theyā€™re on my blog:

Found it on your website!

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@RosemaryOrchard, Iā€™ve used this wonderful automation a few times. Currently, Iā€™m trying to add an entire school year worth of class schedules at our school, and Iā€™m running into a question about the Fanastical parser. Do you know if there is a way to set an end date for a repeated event using the natural language parser? Thanks so much for sharing this awesome tip.

Also, there is a pretty neat app I discovered for exporting events and converting them to a spreadsheet. Itā€™s called Export Calendars Pro ($14). Itā€™s great for exporting existing events and then adding them back with some adjustments using the KM trick.

Try using ā€˜untilā€¦ā€™

Thanks for your reply!

Hereā€™s an example of where Iā€™m struggling:

Eighth Grade Study Hall 10 Jun 2019 9:00 AM 45m every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday until 17 Jun 2019 /hcs eighth grade

For some reason, Fanastical doesnā€™t like this syntax. It repeats until June 10.

Iā€™m trying to use a start date and an end date.

Any thoughts on what syntax to use?

Thanks much.

I think you just need to put the start and end dates together like this. That worked for me at least.
Eighth Grade Study Hall 10 Jun 2019 to 17 Jun 2019 9:00 AM 45m every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday /hcs eighth grade

Iā€™ve been looking at variations on syntax for this one and I havenā€™t been able to get any combination to work for all aspects. Some, yes, but so far, all no. At least not yet all.

When I previously tried using to, it gave me 10 June as the end date, just as @steinmanal got. Trying ā€œEighth Grade Study Hall 10 Jun 2019 9:00 AM 45m every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday until 17 Jun 2019ā€, from above I got the same incorrect end date as before (Fantastical 2.10.5 on IOS).

@tjwyman - what version and OS are you using to get the correct parsing? Iā€™m assuming that must be another factor to consider.

Yesterday I was using an iPad running iOS 12.1.4 and Fantastical 2.10.5. When I just tried it again it also isnā€™t working so either I messed up and looked at the wrong field or itā€™s just not working today. Iā€™d normally lean towards I messed up but when I added the event today the title of the event looked slightly different than it did yesterday too so who knows :man_shrugging: Either way itā€™s not working for me now.

I did try the following though and even though itā€™s not exactly the same as specifying an end date for repeat-end it works for this particular scenario I think.

Eighth Grade Study Hall 10 Jun 2019 9:00 AM 45m every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday for one week /hcs eighth grade

Thanks to both of you for trying!

I reached out to Flexbits. The problem was somehow related to the ā€œ45 minā€ syntax.

So, hereā€™s what does work:

Eighth Grade Study Hall 6/10/2019 9:00:00 AM - 9:45 AM repeat every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday until 6/17/19 /hcs eighth grade

Hope this helps someone else!

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Wanted to check in to ensure this still worked. I have my work calendar dates that I want to put into my Family Events shared calendar.