Timetable Calendars

A timetable calendar defines the operational schedule for an academic term on a specific campus. It holds the list of blackout dates — public holidays, campus closures, and other non-teaching days — that the session generator automatically skips when expanding meeting patterns into individual session instances. Every teaching allocation must be linked to a calendar before sessions can be generated.

How Calendars Work

Each calendar belongs to one academic term and optionally one campus. If no campus is specified, the calendar applies to all campuses in that term. Multiple calendars can exist for the same term — for example, a city campus and a regional campus may follow different holiday schedules and therefore need separate calendars.

When you generate sessions for a teaching allocation, the system checks the allocation's linked calendar and skips any session dates that fall on a blackout. If a meeting pattern has Skip Blackouts enabled (the default), those dates are silently omitted from the generated session list. If you add a blackout date after sessions have already been generated, you need to regenerate the allocation's sessions to apply the change — existing draft sessions are not automatically removed.

Note: Calendars do not affect published sessions. Blackout dates only influence the session generation step. If a session has already been published, it will not be removed by adding a blackout date to the calendar.

Calendar Statuses

Create a Calendar

1. Go to Timetable → Calendars.
2. Click New Calendar.
3. Fill in the calendar details:
   • Name — a descriptive name, such as "Semester 1 2026 – City Campus".
   • Academic Term — select the term this calendar covers.
   • Campus — optionally restrict the calendar to a specific campus. Leave blank to apply to all campuses.
   • Notes — optional internal notes visible to planners only.
4. Click Save. The calendar is created with a Draft status.

After creating the calendar, add blackout dates before linking it to any allocations.

Add a Blackout Date

1. Open the calendar from Timetable → Calendars.
2. In the Blackout Dates section, click Add Blackout.
3. Fill in the blackout details:
   • Label — a short description shown to planners, such as "Public Holiday – Labour Day" or "Mid-term Break".
   • Blackout Date — the first (or only) day of the blackout period.
   • End Date — optional. If left blank, the blackout applies to a single day only. Set an end date to define a multi-day range such as a mid-semester break.
4. Click Save.

Pro Tip: Add all known blackout dates before generating sessions for any allocation. This avoids the need to regenerate sessions later when holidays are discovered.

Manage Blackout Dates

To edit or remove a blackout date, open the calendar and find the entry in the Blackout Dates list. Use the edit icon to change the label or date range, or the delete icon to remove the blackout entirely.

Important: Removing a blackout date does not automatically add sessions back to allocations that were already generated. If you remove a blackout date and want sessions to fall on that day, you must regenerate the affected allocation's sessions manually. Regeneration is only possible while sessions remain in draft or confirmed status — it cannot be performed once any session in the allocation has been published.

Activate a Calendar

When you are ready to use the calendar for scheduling, change its status from Draft to Active.

1. Open the calendar from Timetable → Calendars.
2. Click Activate.
3. Confirm the action in the dialog.

An active calendar can still have blackout dates added or removed. Any allocations linked to the calendar will reflect changes the next time sessions are generated or regenerated.

To retire a calendar at the end of a term, use the Archive action. Archived calendars remain readable for historical reference but cannot be linked to new allocations.

Next: Teaching Allocations