In Scope

Out of Scope

Ability for learners to sync educational schedules with personal external calendars.

Interactive Calendar Layouts: Proposals for daily, weekly, or monthly interactive calendar views within the app are considered future enhancements and are not part of the initial development phase.

Implementation of app-level settings enabling users to control calendar synchronization preferences, course deadline visibility, and ability to automate removal of past courses from the calendar view.

Ability to view and manage course-specific deadlines and events, including the option to enable or disable calendar syncing for individual courses, providing a more granular level of control over calendar content.

App level dates view presenting users with all deadlines across all enrolled courses.

Ensuring that any changes made in the course schedules, user preferences, or app settings are immediately reflected in the user's personal calendar and the app's calendar page.

Feature

Requirements

App Level Date Settings View

The "App Level Dates Settings" is a centralized feature allowing users to manage various aspects of their dates / calendar experience within the learning platform. This includes syncing preferences with external calendars, visibility controls for course deadlines, and archival settings for course calendars post-completion.

Requirements

• Access Point: Users can access date settings from their account settings. This ensures easy navigation without cluttering the primary interface.

• Sync Preferences (Setting 1): Upon enabling calendar syncing, users should be prompted to select their sync destination (e.g., Google Calendar, Apple iCloud) and name their calendar for easy identification. This setting is crucial for personal organization and cross-platform consistency.

• Preemptive Calendar Cleaning Setting (Setting 2) (Updated for proactive action): Within the settings, users encounter a toggle or checkbox labeled "Automatically remove course calendar upon completion." When this option is enabled, the system will automatically remove a course's calendar data from both the app-level calendar and any synced external calendar once the course is marked as completed. This automatic action is based on the user's preference set in advance, streamlining the management of course-related calendar entries and keeping the calendar updated with current and future courses.

Experience Suggestions / Notes

• Intuitive Controls: The calendar settings should be designed with clear, easy-to-understand toggles or checkboxes. Tooltips or help icons can provide users with instant information on what each setting does, enhancing the user experience.

• Visual Indicators for Sync Status: If a calendar is successfully synced with an external system, display a visual indicator (like a checkmark or sync icon) next to the calendar's name. This feature reassures users that the sync is active.

• Prompt for Archival Action: Use non-intrusive yet noticeable prompts (like notifications or pop-ups) when asking users to decide on archiving or cleaning calendar data post-course completion.

Calendar Syncing

This control is accessible from the date settings page, and initiates the workflow for students syncing course / learning product level dates into a calendar of their choosing. Current focus is on adding events to a new calendar that can be renamed in either an iCloud / Google / OS level account.

• Authentication Prompt: Selecting the sync option triggers an authentication process to ensure secure data handling. Users confirm their identities through a secure login or biometric verification, depending on their device capabilities.

• Destination Selection: Destination Selection: Users are then asked to choose where they want their new calendar integrated. Operating system linked accounts (focus on iCloud + Google to start) should be selectable, and a new calendar will be created within this account initially named: “{Learning-Site-Name} Dates”

• Calendar Naming and Setup: After successful authentication, users are redirected to their native mobile calendar app. Here, they can choose to add the educational events to an existing calendar or create a new one specifically for these events.

• Note - ability to sync events into an existing calendar is likely too complex to justify presenting as an option for learners. Keeping as a reference here for now.

Automatic Sync for New Courses

After the initial sync setup, the system automatically recognizes the user's sync preferences for future course enrollments. This means:

• When users enroll in new courses, the system automatically triggers a sync for these new course calendars with the user's personal calendar, based on their established preferences. There's no need for users to revisit the sync settings or re-initiate the sync process manually for each new course.

• The 'sync' toggle in the settings doesn't reset to the 'off' position after the initial setup. Instead, it remains 'on,' indicating that the automatic sync feature is active. Users can choose to turn off automatic syncing at any time if they prefer to sync manually in the future.

A setting should be added to app level settings for Automatic Date Syncing that is default on but can be turned off, keeping new enrollments not syncing their dates unless they are added manually from app level settings or the course level dates tab.

Calendar Sync Toggling

If a user decides to toggle the app level calendar sync off, this action temporarily halts the automatic synchronization of course calendars with their personal calendar. Events and deadlines from courses enrolled during this period will not be synced to the user's personal calendar until they re- enable the feature. When the user toggles the sync back on, the system behaves as follows:

• Re-initiation Prompt: The system recognizes that sync wa