UPDATE Oct 23 2007: Information in this page is valid only for evolution <= 2.12 as Google calendar integration has made into Evolution’s source repository. It will be in 2.14 (Yes, no more readonly views. You can add/remove/modify events from evolution).For the brave ones .. you could compile from source code.
UPDATE Jul 31 2007: Google calendar integration is expected to be in 2.14 release.
UPDATE May 6 2007: Google SOC : Evolution Google Calendar Backend We will have better integration of evolution and google calendar soon !!
Looks like many people are looking for “how to add google calendar to ximian evolution” ( my blog registerd these keywords ) So i thought i’ll put a post wit screen shots on how to add your google calendar to evolution.
In your google calendar, click on “manage calendar” which opens a page listing all your calendars… In that select (click on) the calendar that you want to add in your evolution. Now in the “Private URL” section right click and copy the url (link) of ICAL (yup the green one) or click on it and it will popup a window with the url (link) in it..
Its time to add this calendar to Evolution… Now in evolution switch to calendar and right click on any existing calendar and selcte new calendar …
In the New calendar dialog box select type as “On the web”. The dialog box changes .. Paste the URL you copied onto the field “URL”.
Choose other options …. and Click OK…
And now you can view your calendar in evolution … This will be a read only calendar and you cannot add any events from evolution…
I guess this explains how to use your online calendar in evolution… If you have any questions or suggestions .. put it in the comments…
Johnny [Life & Code] 
Hi,
Excellent tutorial. Have you been able to successfully export your evolution calendar as well?
thanks,
philip
Note to Ubuntu 6.06 users: this also requires package `evolution-plugins`
Hi,
I have Ubunt 6.06 installed on my machine. The evolution-plugins package is installed but in the “new calendar” dialog there is no way to choose “on the web” calendars. All I have is CalDav but it doesn’t work.
Can you help me with this problem?
thanks
alfredo
Alfredo
You need to enable ‘HTTP Calendar’ and ‘Caldav Sources’ plugins. YOu can do that in Edit->Plugins.
Excellent post. It’s always nice when you Google for the answer to something and are met with a perfect and well presented answer. Cheers.
You should mention that evolution needs to be restarted in order for the change to take effect. This took me about 15 minutes to figure out.
I like this a lot, but started woundering if there will be a need for a calendar software in my machine at all. Could somebody help me to see what I miss in stopping using a calendar software as Evolution?
My default Ubu 6.06 Install needed no extra packages, and I also didn’t need to resart evolution for any changes to take effect. Great tutorial… now if only we could add from Evolution.
I successfully added my Evolution (desktop-based) calendar to my Google calendar with a few easy steps:
A. Export Selected Evolution Calendar to Disk
1) In Evolution, under the Calendars button in the left hand navigation frame, highlight and right-mouse click the the name of the calendar you wish to export to google.
2) From the pop-up menu, select “Save to Disk”.
3) Within the Save dialog window, select the “iCalendar format (.ics)” from the list of file types at the bottom of the window.
4) Enter a name for your calendar export file. **Be sure to append the file extension (.ics). Evolution will not add it automatically.
5) Select filesystem location easy for you to remember and click Save As.
B. Select or Create Google Calendar to Receive Import
6) In your Google Calendar account, if the calendar you wish to receive the import already exists, skip to the next numbered step. If you do not have a calendar to which you will import the new calendar file (see step 5), follow the appropriate links or help instructions on the Google Calendar site to create your receiving calendar.
7) Click the “Manage Calendars” link at the bottom of the Calendars nav box in the left-hand navigation column.
8) Click “Import Calendar” tab (link)under Calendar Settings.
9) Click “Browse” button next to “Step 1: Select File” field and navigate to the calendar file you created in step 5.
10) Use the select box in “Step 2: Choose Calendar” to select the Google calendar to which you will import the new file.
11) Click “Import” button next to “Step 3: Complete Import”. If successful, the page will refresh with a message saying “X events were imported into ______ Calendar”. (not a direct transcription of actual message, but the gist of it nonetheless.)
C. Check Your Work
12) If successful, go to the Calendars box in the left nav and make sure that check box next to the calendar name is checked.
13) Click the calendar’s name and navigate through the calendar to make sure the new “events” have been added. **I’ve noticed it can take a minute or two for new entries to update. Refreshing the page or switching your calendar view seems to refresh the page and reveal the newly added data.
D. Comments and Caveats
– I noticed that the times in my entries shifted back 3 hours. I’m on EDT and the site is hosted in the Pacific timezone. Google’s import code is probably adjusting the time displayed to the server’s timezones. It’s the same data, just assuing that you want to see it in California People Time – CPT 😉
– I haven’t completely troubleshooted the transfers I’ve made so far, the items I have checked seem to have come over almost perfectly. There’s some occasional wierdness in the formatting or character selection in the Comments section (e.g. a pair of TAB characters from Evolution were converted to lowercase letter “t” on import). Not sure if it’s the Evolution export or the Google import that catches the blame for that one.
– Several events on my exported calendar were recurring (repeating over a given date range daily or weekly). I’m happy to note that they carried over into Google as recurring events. In which case you are able to update or delete one and Google will ask if you wish to do the same for the repeats.
– Finally, so far so good as far as all fields and event properties (e.g. location, show time as, privacy level…) appear to have carried over from Evolution to Google (individual and repeat events alike).
E. Additional Testing and Follow-Up
– Haven’t tested this yet, but would really like to know what happens when you update your Evolution calendar, create a new export file, and import the newer file to Google. Does Google prevent double entries for the same event? Will it prompt you to overwrite (or not) the existing event with the event info from the latest copy?
– I have successfully made changes (e.g. correcting the event times) in the imported events. However, I have not tested uploading an updated event from Evolution to Google. Will Google do a “diff” between the data file and the data on their site? If so, will it choose the authoritative version automatically (which one)? Will it prompt you to choose? Will they give you an option to merge the data from both where possible?
– This is a workaround, obviously. Despite looking clunky and laborious from the instructions above, I was surprised with how relatively quick, easy, and painfree it turned out (managed this quicker than syncing my WinCE phone to Evolution – still struggling with that one ). That said, the standard protocols and an API for Google Calendar
already exist making it seem as though it should just be only a matter of weeks for an update of Evolution to start appearing in our respective package management systems. If not, then I challenge all the sharp hackers out there to turn away from Unreal Tournament and WoW for 10 minutes and cobble something together to solve such an easy problem. The love and admiration of the world (both meat and virtual) will be yours!
Peace & blessings.
Hi,
Thanks for the tips 😀 Tutorial worked wonderfully.
TzeYing
Here are some links that I believe will be interested
This round 3D calendar-item design is really .. worth improving. Looks like drug pills or something 🙂 Plain GNOME look and feel might fit better.
Matthias :
afaik .. you could disable cairo effects if you are compiling from source.
drop a comment here : http://blogs.gnome.org/view/sragavan/2006/07/19/0
😉
hi,
i’ve a little “problem”. exactly i don’t know if this is a problem, but when i try to write something to my google calendar i get the error message, that the calandar is reda only.
i don’t know much about this protokol, but is there a way to synvhronize your calendar with a google cal?
yes itz only a readonly calendar. so u cannot edit it from evolution.currently there is no way to sync your cal with google cal in evolution.
I’ve attempted this with Ubuntu 6.06.1 Dapper running Evolution 2.6.1.
I’ve followed your instructions to the letter, as well as verifying that the evolution-plugins package is installed, and the HTTP and CALDAV support is enabled in the Plugins section.
When I add the calendar, I get the following message.
Error on : cannot resolve hostname.
Any help?
linuturk at gmail dot com
Can Evolution work with remote callendar (ical) but read-write?
Just what I was looking for. Thanks!
@trevor : thank u .. encouraging 🙂
Thanks for this great explanation, Jonny!
Just what I was looking for and found this site with Google’s “I am feeling Lucky” button 😀
How can a calender be edited on Evolution and automatically the changes applied to google calender. Something like evolution mail for calenders…
@ravi : The URL u add in evolution is readony. So you cant change and sync back. If you have server, then u cud publish your calendar from evolution
Edit -> prefs -> Calendar -> Calendar Publishing.
Johnny, I am confused, what do I put for “publishing location?” I don’t know what you mean “if you have server.” I want to be able to have write access through evolution, do I need another server ASIDE from gmail’s hosting of my calendar?
I got the same problem that justin had. I don’t know how to help with this “cannot resolve hostname” error… I can copy/paste into my browser (webcal:// excepted) and I do get the binary ics file, but Evolution doesn’t want to find it… Got any idea about that ?
Thanks in advance for your help.
I think http:// instead of webcal:// may help but i just don’t have a clue about where to find that.
Works a treat in Ubuntu Edgy! Thanks!
This will work for personal (My Calendars) events.
When trying to link to a public (Other Calendars), the page can’t be found.
Do you how any work around?
Hi there,
AfroNaut, thanks for the manual, tutti works perfect!
mm.
I am behind a proxy which needs authentication. How do I pass the proxy/username and password information to the evolution calendar.
http://gcaldaemon.sourceforge.net/index.html
Try GCALDaemon.
Answer to (30)
> I am behind a proxy which needs authentication. How do I pass the proxy/username and password information to the evolution calendar.
> Comment by surya — March 3, 2007 @ 4:49 am
1. Run gnome-control-center
2. Set Network proxy settings
3. You may have to restart evolution.
Hope This Helps
Fantastic tutorial. So simple when layed out like that. Took about 2 minutes in feisty with no additional plus required. Thanks
I can’t get it working on feisty I got
(evolution-2.10:15882): calendar-gui-WARNING **: e-cal-model.c:1508: Unable to get query
at the console on calendar startup
Hi there. There seems to be a problem with your way in Evolution 2.10.1 which is included to Ubuntu 7.04. What Version of Evolution are you referring to ?! Ther is always the error message, that Evolution can’t find the .ics from the Link…
Any ideas ?!
working like a charm. thank you so much, i was looking for that… i hope one day we can edit web calenders from our lovely evolution 😀
I’m having a problem where the times for my google calendar are not correct. I have my OS (feisty), Evolution, and Google all set to west coast time. The values are correct in Google and my clock is right in feisty but Evolution puts everything off by 3 hours. Anyone know how to fix this. I tried just changed the time zone to something 3 hours behind but that caused Evolution to freak out and not display any of the calendars.
Thanks.
Great info- works nicely. However, for read-write access to calendar, could anyone please suggest a simple calendar server to run on Linux?
PPatil : you can use calendar publishing in evolution for this.
Thanks! Nice one!
Will the new plugin include support for publishing back to google calendar?
@Darrel : Yes. U can do that.
Works on KDE’s “Kontact” too, just Add>Calendar in Remote File> select read only, put the URL in the URL field.
Those having the problem with the hostname url, just remove the http from the address after you paste, so that the address starts with “webcal://www…”
instead of “webcal://http//wwww…”
That was my problem.
Is the plugin now available for download?
@Businessgeeks : It will be available as part of next evolution release .. (evolution 2.14)
Hi,
I am using evolution 2.12.0, but I keep on getting ”
Error on webcal://www.google.com/calendar/ical//public/basic.ics:
Not Found”
All plugins are installed. Any hint?
Hi, as pointed out by Johnny, the next release of Evolution 2.14 will have support for publishing back to Google Calendar. Any idea when 2.14 will be released? Will it be made available as an update through Ubuntu 7.10? I need to look for an application which allows me to subscribe and publish Google Calendar contents without using any third party servers.
Jay: Evolution 2.22 (2.14 version has been changed to be inline with GNOME) will be tentatively released on 13/03/2008.
Thanks, it helped me.
I look forward to the read/write stuff in newer Evo…should be cool! Great blog!
any idea why psp cant pull up the calendar site
Has anyone been able to get Evolution 2.22 to sync events from Evolution -> Google Calendar? I can Due from Google calendar but not the other way around… Thanks!
#60 I am having the same problem… glad it’s not just me
Nice Tutorial, I was able to add my Google calendar to evolution (Fedora 9) with ease, Thanx a lot.
—
SuBa
Hello!,
Thank you for the tutorial. There is not much information in Evolution help. Your post helped 🙂 Thank you
Thank you, I have been seeking for facts about this topic for ages and yours is the best I’ve located so far.
Please add capability to export from Evolution calendar all of the fields for a selected group of events in csv format.
eg. After you have generated a list of events using the event search/query tool, the next logical step would be to export that set of events, but no such capability exists.
Please….
I simply like Kalendar
I bookmark your site for future read