How can I send an invitation from iCal to a Google Calendar user?

May 10, 2013 9:37 AM

When Mr. Corpse and I were both using iCal I could send him an invitation to an event; if he accepted it it blocked off the time in his calendar. Now that he's switched to Google Calendar this system doesn't work.

The invitations I send from iCal look, on my end, as if they've gone through, but he doesn't get the invitations any more. They don't show up in his calendar (even though I'm sending them to his gmail address) and they don't show up as e-mails.

I want a solution that will show up in his calendar for him to accept or decline, and for me to be able to see if he's accepted or declined it. Please advise.

posted by The corpse in the library to Computers & Internet (4 answers total)

yes. mostly.

AND, sometimes it depends on their email client software and or browser.

This used to be a big pain in the ass, but now it (mostly) works.

see this
posted by bobdow at 9:44 AM on May 10, 2013

You've probably thought of the obvious stuff like for him to check his spam folder. Check your spam folder to see if you're getting any weird bounce-backs?

What about his general calendar settings, does he have "Automatically add invitations to my calendar" selected? Does he have the "automatically decline" lab enabled? Does he have any add-ins/extensions/userscripts added that could be messing with his calendar functionality?

In the settings for that specific calendar, does he have event notifications set up on the "reminders and notifications" tab?

Maybe do some testing and try sending an invite to someone else who is using Gmail?
posted by desuetude at 10:56 AM on May 10, 2013

Response by poster: Testing was a good idea, desuetude. I invited three people other than Mr. Corpse to an event and their invitations were fine, although one person pointed out that in their invitation my address showed up as something along the lines of:
2_63b7jb3bjiikoucousqykovvgnhwdjgsalk;[e-mail]
...instead of the usual e-mail address.

If anyone has insight into that, I'd appreciate hearing it.
posted by The corpse in the library at 3:08 PM on May 10, 2013

Response by poster: We weren't able to resolve it, so we've set up a Google Calendar for shared events and I have that show up in iCal. This works, although not perfectly; it has a default reminder that I can't get rid of, no matter how many settings I check.
posted by The corpse in the library at 11:52 AM on May 18, 2013