*** NOTE: This guide is very outdated and does not work at all any more. The University has redone the whole calendaring system. See my new guide instead. ***
Many people at school have asked me about the SMS-reminders I get about upcoming lectures at the university. Fifteen minutes before every lesson, lecture, or any other activity in the school calendar I get an automated reminder sent to my mobile phone.
The message I receive contains information like where the lesson is, what type of lesson it is, which course it is about, start time, duration etc. It has proved to be an invaluable system for not only reminding myself that the lunch break actually is over, but helps me remember which one of the hundreds of rooms I have to go to.
The beauty of the system is that all changes to the global calendar system are reflected in the messages I get. If you would print the schedule every week and keep it in paper form some lecture makes a last-minute move to another hall or whatever, and you will end up in the wrong location. The text messages show only the latest and greatest information, even if the professors would try to lure you to the wrong room. Above all, it is completely free, and it doesn’t cost a single Öre.
This guide is specific to students at the University of Linköping/Linköping Institute of Technology, but anybody using some kind of imported calendar in a Google Calendar system should be able to something similar by reading the second half of the guide.
It should be noted that the steps are no way trivial. It will take you 15-30 minutes to complete all steps, but a system like this is worth the trouble since it will save you from missing any important lectures.
The heart of the system is the new integrated e-mail, calendar etc. suite developed by Google that the University of Linköping recently started to use as their primary web-based communications platform. The system itself is really better than the old and ugly system that was used before. It seems Google know what they are doing, and they use modern web techniques in the right way, even though I less and less respect Google as a company. That last sentence was really only an opinion of mine and should not be considered a fact.
This new web-based system is called “e-GO”, which is a highly stupid name for a platform like this. Why, did the University of Linköping choose such an annoying name that has no real-life metaphor other than the pseudo-flashy “GO” which, I guess, is supposed to mean momentum and progress. I think it is quite egocentric, considered the fact that it is pronounced “ego” when you say it fast.
Anyway, e-GO is still quite a new system, so chances are that you are using the old e-mail system. On the 15th of October 2007, there will be a global migration, meaning that all accounts will use even if you want it or not. Before that day though, you need to perform a manual migration. The e-GO system is a prerequisite for getting SMS reminders, so you’ll have to migrade.
This document documents the necessary steps to use the e-mail system, you will find pretty much everything about getting e-mail up and running there, which is why I don’t repeat the information here. If you have not yet started the migration, do so! It takes a day or two for the automatic migration to finish.
When migrated, you create a password. Instructions can be found in the same document The above document discusses this as well.
All e-mail you receieve should now enter your e-GO inbox, and you can compose messages and have fun with your new system.
This is where the guide really starts.
The e-GO system can do much more than just e-mail. It has a calendar feature as well. Clicking on “Calendar” in the top left corner will make you disappointed, though. There is nothing to see except empty white boxes representing different days of the week. We will need to import the school calendar. The school calendar is a plain HTML calendar system that is quite dated, but perfect if you want something robust that works. I really hope that LiU will keep this system as an alternative to the e-GO calendar which, while flashy, doesn’t do well in print.
To begin with, you need to have your regular calendar set up, since we are still using this system, only using e-GO for presenting the information in a better way. Log on to the student portal with your LiU ID, click on Schedule, and follow the instructions. Remember to build your schedule by adding which program or courses you want to have.
Now we need e-GO to recognize your calendar. This is done by letting the regular calendar export an iCalendar file, which e-GO can import on-the-fly. When you are finished building the schedule with your courses and classes, click on “Settings” in the left-hand navigation.
You will now see the page “Settings for your web schedule”. Scroll down the document and find “External iCalendar schedule”. Click the button reading “Publish iCalendar scheudle”. Your calendar has now been exported in another format for e-GO to read. Scroll down the document once again and review the iCalendar settings. I suggest setting all details to “Complete” for maximum information. What is important here is to note the URL of the exported file. You can find it written out just above the settings. For example; my username is “jonfo596″, my calendar is therefore at:
http://webbschema.student.liu.se/en/~jonfo596/ical
Keep the window open or write the URL down, we’ll need it again in just a minute.
When you are finished reviewing your calendar settings, click on the “Save” button. Note that we are not using “Mobile telephone scheudle”. This is for browsing the calendar with a GPRS or 3G phone, not getting text message reminders the way we want to.
Now, login to e-GO.
Click “Calendar” in the top left corner. You will now be presented with an empty calendar window. Let’s import the calendar!
e-GO uses one calendar per import, meaning you have one separate calendar for the imported school schedule and one separate for everything else. You cannot modify the imported information, since it is stored on a different server at a different place. In the left-hand navigation, find the button “Add”, and then “Add by URL”.
In the box “Public Calendar Address”, enter the URL you got from the schedule export you hopefully still have. If not, it is something similar to “http://webbschema.student.liu.se/en/~user001/ical”, only change “user001″ to your LiU-ID. When you have entered the info, click on “Add”.
In the left hand pane, a red box should have appeared that reads something like “LiU schedule for <username>”. This is your new imported calendar. Just click on that box and you will be greeted with your school schedule, imported and ready! Browse around and play with this system, you will use it a lot.
We still haven’t got text messages sorted out, so let’s add the final magic touch to it. Click on the small arrow next to the box on the left-hand pane and select “Calendar Settings”. This is were you set all settings for this calendar. I would suggest that you change the name of the calendar to something more interesting, like “School schedule” or, if you like, “Grand Theft Walrus”. It is up to you. Click on “Notifications”, just above where you entered the calendar’s name.
Here is the control panel for the text messages. In “Event Notifications”, click “Add a reminder”. Here you can set reminders such as pop-up windows that alert you if you are logged in to e-GO when the reminder is fired, or you can choose to recieve e-mail reminders. Of course, what we are out to do here is to get SMS reminders, but we will need to setup your mobile phone for this first. At the bottom of the page, click on “Set up your mobile phone to receieve notifications”. A dialog box might appear, reminding you that your settings have not yet been saved. Just click “OK”, we will return to these settings later on.
Now you are at the phone settings dialog. Select your country and phone number and then click on the box “Send Verification Code”. A box will appear, telling you the verification code sent by you via SMS is to be entered in the verification box. Click “OK”.
In a few seconds, your phone should receive a text message. If it doesn’t, check your country and phone number settings. Enter the code you received in the verification box and then click “Finish setup”. Google has now verified your telephone number.
Now you can select to be reminded via SMS. Select this from the “Event Notifications” settings box. I have selected to be reminded 15 minutes before each event.
This is it! Click on “Save” at the bottom of the page. Now the notifications should be up and running. Now set your personal calendar to use SMS reminders as well, so you can receive reminders for these calendars as well. Then you can try adding a new event to your personal calendar (again, the imported calendar is read-only and cannot be modified) that occurs in, say, 35 minutes. Then wait and see if you recieve a reminder for the event when you get closer to the event.
This cool and sleek setup is really useful, and it doesn’t require any work now that it is up and running. All events on the calendars give reminders, as time goes on new events will be added to later weeks, and everything is automated. Just sit back and “relax” during lectures.
But what if it doesn’t work? Well, there is plenty of help pages to resort to if you don’t find a solution to your problem here. There is a vast resource of documentation built into e-GO, just click on “Help” in the top right corner. LiU also has documentation regarding migration, a FAQ about the new system and some other stuff.
You are also much welcome to drop me a comment in the commenting box below! If you found this guide helpful I gladly receive feedback. You probably have some new ideas, and I welcome them too. Also, drop a comment if you run into problems trying to set the system up. I will do my best to help you out!
You can also ask me in persona at the university. I study the first year at Engineering Physics (Teknisk Fysik, Yi-linjen), so if you see me, just ask me.
