Plea for Customisation Options/Info for Widget

  • Resolved OldClicker

    (@oldclicker)


    8 years, 5 months ago

    Like a number of other users I was caught out by the upgrade and have now reverted to GCE. Having already put some comments into another more general thread, I thought I’d start a new one specifically on the widget.

    I use the widget in the sidebar on a couple of sites. My preference with items in the sidebars is for compactness. Too much formatting or spacing and they’re soon pushing other widgets too low to be visible. The previous GCE did this very well with minor tweaking:

    http://www.alresfordgolf.co.uk/
    http://stpetersropley.org.uk/

    Simple Calendar has really only two options, grid (totally unsuited to sidebar use) and list which adds very space consuming formatting that can’t be turned off.

    With custom CSS I can probably get Simple Calendar close to what I have now, but I’m not fluent with CSS and it’s heavy going. It would be great to have options to remove the standard styling/formatting – or, second best, information on which CSS to modify to remove it ourselves.

    And lastly, the GCE widget allowed more than one feed (used in the second site above to combine two church diaries) – although it’s not a complete showstopper, it would be nice to have this back.

    I know this is a free plugin and don’t want to sound too ungrateful… paying via donate or one-off payment for a customisable version is a possibility – but not at the level of the Pro version.

    https://wordpress.org/plugins/google-calendar-events/

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
  • Plugin Contributor Nick Young

    (@nickyoung87)

    8 years, 5 months ago

    Thank you for starting this as a new thread.

    Trust me when I say that we are paying attention. We are taking as much of this in as possible so we can make plans regarding what we think needs to be addressed. So your feedback is valuable.

    I will talk with Phil about the widget stuff since this is being mentioned a lot of the last day. I am not sure what will happen but it will at least get us talking about options.

    grid (totally unsuited to sidebar use)

    Could you maybe elaborate more on why you think this? I am just curious. We spent some time trying to make the widgets work better for responsiveness etc. so I would love to hear your thoughts on why you think it is totally unsuitable.

    And lastly, the GCE widget allowed more than one feed (used in the second site above to combine two church diaries) – although it’s not a complete showstopper, it would be nice to have this back.

    You can still add multiple calendars. You need to create a new calendar feed and set it’s type to “Grouped Calendar” for the Event Source. Then you can choose multiple calendars to mash together into one.

    Hope that is helpful. And again thank you for the feedback it is valuable. We can’t determine what people want if they don’t show their voice 🙂

    Lyndka

    (@lyndka)

    8 years, 5 months ago

    I’m not sure that it’s appreciated that not all of us are happy when the response is “use CSS” to make things look like they were – certainly the widget (clumsy though it may have been) was configurable to how we wanted

    (http://www.cheese-dispensers.net and look on the right) for our site.

    I’m using WordPress as a platform specifically so I didn’t have to use CSS to get simple but stylish site running.

    Thread Starter OldClicker

    (@oldclicker)

    8 years, 5 months ago

    Nick – thanks for the update.

    I was being a bit harsh (was grumpy) about grid mode in the sidebar. For what it is, it works well within the space constraints. Obviously at that compaction, only dots are initially displayed which I personally don’t find very appealing.

    I’ll play with the grouped calendar feed to see how it turns out.

    Don’t be too discouraged by the barrage of wails from the this end of the wires… you were very unlucky with the initial transfer script. I have already found things I like about Simple Calendar – e.g. easy definition of views by calendar month, I use that elsewhere on one of my sites to provide a printable monthly calendar and missed it when it dissapeared in GCE.

    Plugin Contributor Nick Young

    (@nickyoung87)

    8 years, 5 months ago

    I’m not sure that it’s appreciated that not all of us are happy when the response is “use CSS” to make things look like they were – certainly the widget (clumsy though it may have been) was configurable to how we wanted

    I am saying that right now because there is not another option at the moment.

    I’m using WordPress as a platform specifically so I didn’t have to use CSS to get simple but stylish site running.

    I understand what you mean but your link kind of contradicts you since you added CSS to the old calendar widget also.

    I agree that things need to be as easy as possible for even less tech-savvy people and that is definitely our end goal.

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
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