How to Use Google Calendar – for Scheduling

Google Calendar might look like a complicated for a first-timer trying to use it to schedule an event or interview.

However, our goal is to simplify these concerns and teach you how to use Google Calendar in general and for scheduling. The following steps will bring you up to date on how to use Google Calendar:

• To use a google calendar, you must have a google account which will grant you access to google calendar.
• Go to calendar.goole.com if you are using a desktop and sign in with your Google account or open your Google calendar app on your mobile phone. You will be given an option to create a google account if you don’t have any yet.
• When you are sign in, the calendar will give you a weekly view by default for your desktop and a schedule view on your mobile phone.
• To change the view, click on the menu icon on the left top of your mobile phone or the top right corner which say week on your desktop and select from the available options(which include day, three days, week, month, year and schedule). Any selected view will display dates, events and time of events and holidays. The schedule view displays all your scheduled events for the day. 
• To create a schedule on the Google Calendar, click on the create button on the left top corner on your desktop or the add icon on the right bottom corner of your mobile phone or click on the date. These will make a box to pop up and you can input the details of your event (event title, date and time).
• Click on more options to add more information and other settings for your event. You can click on All day button if it is an all-day event or set start and end time if it is not an all-day event. Click on the change time zone button to change your timezone.
• However, if You intend to repeat the event, click on repeat button to set the time when the event will be repeated and when it will end. Available repeat times in the options include every day, every week, every month, every year and custom. Click on custom to type in when the event will be repeated and when it will end.
• Click on Add people to invite other people to your event by adding their email addresses. This will make your calendar visible to others.
• You can click on Add video conferencing to add a video conferencing link for Google instant hangout.
• Click on Add location to include the location of the event. This will help in giving directions to the location/venue of the event.
• Click on Add notification to create notification/s for the event. The add notification button gives you the option of inputting the number of minutes, hours, days and weeks before the event that a notification can be sent to you. You can choose to receive your notification on your google calendar or as a mail. (You can choose to set multiple notifications)
• Click on default colour to change the display colour of your schedule. This will help you to differentiate your schedules.
• Click on Add attachment to add any document of your choice through Google drive.
• You can add the event to another calendar if you have created other calendars. This feature is available only on desktops (computers)
• You can also click on Busy to appear busy or free when an event you are invited to is  going on. This feature is available on computers only.
• Click on the visibility button to choose who gets to see your calendar.
• You can choose the permissions your guests have to your calendar such as permission to modify an event, invite other people or see the guest list.
• Once you are done with providing the necessary information and making necessary settings, click on the Save button. This will ask if you want to send email invitations to your guests. You can choose to send emails or not.
• Go back to the view page and you will see your events displayed. 

Note:

You can have multiple calendars on your google calendar but you can only achieve this on a computer.

• At the bottom left of your desktop screen, you will see a section called my calendar and another calendar called other calendars. My calendar section is specific to you and is automatically created when you create a google account. In this section, there’s the normal calendar where you create your schedules and have the holidays, birthdays which are linked to your contacts, tasks which are linked to your google tasks and reminders which are linked to your google reminders.
• The other calendar section includes all the calendars that have been shared to you and the calendars you have access to.
• To add a calendar, click on the add calendar button at the left side of your desktop screen under the monthly view and input an email address or Google account.
• To create a custom calendar, go to the left side of your desktop screen under the monthly view and click on the three dots towards the right. This will give you different options. You can click on import calendars if you want to import calendars from yahoo or outlook.
• Click on New calendar. This will give you a box where you will describe the new calendar and input the necessary information and click on create calendar. At the bottom, you will see the work has successfully been done. You can create multiple calendars using the same process.
• To share your calendar, click on the three dots rift to the calendar you want to share. This will give you options to change the colour of the calendar, settings and sharing, etc. Click on settings and sharing and you will have the options of sending the link to multiple email addresses or you can click on add people and add the email address you want to share calendar with, specify the permission they have on the calendar and send.
• To change your calendar settings, click on the setting icon on the right top corner of your screen.
• For events to be displayed on the calendar, check the boxes beside the calendars or you can remove the checkmarks by clicking on the checked boxes for events to disappear. This feature helps you to display events that are needed at the moment.
• You can delete any created or shared calendar by clicking on it and clicking on the X next to the calendar.

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