Hi there! Currently we must add any new scouts to all future events on our SB calendar. Is there some plan to change this so new scouts are automatically added to calendar events? It’s a huge hassle and causes a lot of confusion for new scouts. Thanks, Tanya
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The Feature Assistant Extension for Chrome and Firefox has a function to make this much easier.
Automatically adding new scouts to the invite list is in the backlog for the new calendar.
Automatic addition of new scouts to events is actually a pretty complex problem. Some things (like unit meetings or sub-unit meetings) are pretty easy. However, from there it gets more complex.
For example, events of type “other” get used for all sorts of stuff, including unit-level announcements of non-unit events (our troop uses these for OA events to make sure our youth and adult OA members are aware of stuff). Adding everyone to such an event would be confusing, particularly for new scouts.
In a different vein, consider a campout for which sign-ups have already closed, but is occurring in the future. New scouts might get added, and think that they can sign-up for it, rather than them getting added to events that are still “available” to them using a semi-automated process.
It’s actually much easier to have human intervention to add folks to events periodically than it is to have to undo automated additions. A good method (via the Scoutbook interface) is to use the Feature Assistant Extension, which will allow a user to choose which events to add the new scouts to.
Thanks, Ed and Charley. We have Feature Assistant installed. How do we use it to add new scouts to events more easily? Thanks, Tanya
For what it’s worth (I’m aware volunteer extension and merging to IA). This does not appear to be functioning. Two different browsers and two different computers (1 virtual). It doesn’t pull the calendar list to be able to add invitees per the instructions.
The Feature Assistant Extension currently only works on the Scoutbook, not IA calendar. A version that works with the IA calendar is in review by Google.
I’m aware it only works with Scoutbook. The screenshot was Scoutbook. I was saying that I’m aware it is a volunteer created extension so I wouldn’t expect support from SUAC or the BSA developers and with the pending merge it may no longer work with SB either.
Odd. It seems to be listing the different calendars just fine for me in both Firefox and Chrome on Windows.
Has it worked for you in the past, but has stopped working recently, @TravisStephens? Do you have permissions that would give you access to all of the calendars?
I know there was an update to the extension released in the last day or so. I have updated, so I don’t think the issue is resulting from the update. Maybe there was a change on the back-end that the update addressed? @GaryFeutz, who maintains the extension, might be able to comment more on that.
I have no idea. I’ve never used it before. I just had a kid added to my Den. I knew there was a way but couldn’t remember and came here to find the solution.
I have Den Admin/ Den Leader. I created the calendar in question and it’s the only calendar our Pack is using (just my Den). I’ve been trying to get the Pack to use the calendar.
Hrm. I’m a Key 3 Delegate/Unit Admin, so I’ve never tried it when there’s only one calendar to which I have access.
Can you scroll the list to show any other calendars? I’m wondering if your den is “in there”, but hidden further down the list, and the “dashes” are the calendars to which you don’t have access.
What you see in the picture is what I get. I can’t scroll, can’t click the arrows up/down. It is just blank.
I tried selecting just blank and it errors saying no calendar selected.
@TravisStephens Try it again. Your profile had two simultaneous Den Admin positions open for the same Den. I ended one. It is possible that it was causing a conflict.
The release I published to the Chrome Webstore yesterday is still pending review by Google (therefore not publicly available) so it is unrelated to that.
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Thanks for fixing the positions issue. I’ve been wondering about that causing me other issues for awhile.
Unfortunately, that did not fix this issue.
@TravisStephens Bummer. The extension is likely encountering an unexpected situation with something in your unit.
If you are willing to help me troubleshoot it - click Ctrl-Shift-I when you are on the calendar page, just before clicking Add Invitees. Chrome should open a window on the side or below the page. If the extension experiences a crash, there is typically an error message in red displayed in the console portion of the window. On the right side of the error is a filename and a line number- I would expect a crash for this feature to be in addinvitees.js That information would help me find the problem.
I did not locate addinvitees.js
Uncaught (in promise) Error: A listener indicated an asynchronous response by returning true, but the message channel closed before a response was received. calendar/:1
Once I select Add Invitees, that error doesn’t change.
Sometimes when I refresh the bowser, Add Invitees is missing.
For example this refresh it is missing and now I get this error.
Uncaught TypeError: Cannot read properties of null (reading ‘2023-11-3’)
at ze (mobiscroll.javascript.min.js:2:83224)
at mobiscroll.javascript
@TravisStephens Hmm, neither of those is an error with the extension.
What happens if you click the gear on the top right of the calendar? This opens the calendar selector almost the same way the extension does.
I wonder if there are other options available for the event type - as “other” is used when events don’t fit into the other options. Commonly, service events have to be entered as “other”. One would think Court of Honor would be a selectable option but that’s not in the dropbox list either. (Crew Admin/Calendar permissions - same list both SB and IA calendar)
Would seem there would need to be a more thorough list of event type options to support even a semi-automatic tool to add new registrants as invitees to [certain] event types.
