One of my longtime clients has always complained about Daylite’s lack of a group calendar. It is the one thing for which he has tended to “ding” Marketcircle. Sure, each user has always been able to see his own calendar or view everything permissible in another user’s calendar — but what if he wants instead to see all the events intended for department consumption, whoever created them, and only those events?
It turns out that this has been possible in one form for a long time (and I set it up for this client in Daylite 4 & 5): for example, create a special “Department” user purely for “attending” department appointments. On both Mac and iOS, Daylite could view the appointments to which the “Department” user was invited. The trouble was that this required buying a license for that user. Ouch!
How might it be done less expensively and still view these appointments within Daylite on both Mac and iOS? My friend Amin Rahmani at Marketcircle suggested an answer to me while we were exploring cost-saving alternatives in the lead up to a client's Daylite Cloud migration. The key point is that in Daylite 6 for iOS, it is now finally possible to view the calendars, not just of Daylite users, but also of Daylite resources.
Resources are meant for managing company property that has a usage schedule, such as a meeting room, a projector, or a Gulfstream G650ER. However, the way resources work is just what a group calendar also needs - and it is built into Daylite 6 for Mac and iOS. This it a seamless feature across all your Daylite 6 devices! You don’t have to buy any extra licenses!
How does one set up a group calendar with a resource in Daylite 6, you ask?
1. In Daylite Preferences go to the Resources pane.
2. Add a new resource. Name it something like “Marketing Department.” Give it a color, if you like. Explain the details of how and why to use it.
3. Go to the Daylite 6 sidebar and select My Calendar. Click the “+” in the bottom left corner. Select New Calendar Smart List.
4. Select the user whose calendar is to be shown: specifically use the resource Marketing Department.
5. Make sure to name and share your new calendar smart list with the appropriate Daylite Teams of Users.
6. Have members of the department add the new resource Marketing Department to each appointment that should go on the shared calendar.
7. Now you will see together in one Daylite Calendar view all the shared events for the department, no matter who owns them.
Someone recently asked me why he should upgrade from Daylite 5 to Daylite 6. Here is one more good reason. And remember that you can save money if you buy soon!
Here are some live links for you:
There is a Daylite 6 Self-Serve upgrade promotion going on for the next five days (until October 31, 2016), and loyalty pricing for Daylite 5 users who move up to a Daylite Cloud subscriptions been extended until December 31, 2016.
