This FAQ is to help explain the creation and use of events in a Plato web.

What are events for ?

Events allow the author to record a diary item with a date and time.

How do I define an event?

An event is defined in a similar way to other items, such as actions or documents. It can have a title and description and have up to 4 attached documents. There is a user-definable qualification - category. You can define its visibility. It has Date, Time and Time zone fields. It also has a pair of fields to allow for the creation of repeating events.

What is the category?

The category is a means for grouping classes of events. You may define new categories.

What is the visibility?

See the general FAQ on visibility.

What are repeating events?

When an event is created it can be set to repeat weekly, or every 2 or 4 weeks. The number of repeating events can also be specified. So a weekly conference could be created for the next 3 months. After creation these can be updated individually or as a set.

What appears on the home page ?

As usual, a maintainer can configure the number of events to appear on the home page. The section contains the date and time of any future events, sorted by date. The section header is a link to the summary page.

What appears on the summary page ?

By default only future events are shown. Events can be subsetted by category or a number of date ranges (future, past, next month etc.) or grouped by category. Sorting is by default by on date, but the column headings are links that allow the data to be sorted on different fields.

Why can I not archive events?

Unlike all other items, events are not archived but automatically deleted a preset period after their date has expired.

What is the alert checkbox for?

Most items allow the creator/updater to send a preset e-mail alert to the list appropriate to the visibility level. It contains identification of the creator/updater and a URL to view the item.

Chris French - 26 Feb 2004