Sigh Facebook. SIGH

November 20, 2016 9:08 AM

I followed these instructions to sync my Facebook events with my Google calendar. And get this error: "The address that you provided did not contain a calendar in a valid iCal or GData format." AskGoogle and AskFacebook don't help. I hope ask.me can, though I would not be surprised if this was an intentionally broken FB thing.

Basically, the instructions are on your FB events page, right click the "upcoming" link, copy the URL and paste it into your Google calendar where is says "add calendar by URL". I've also tried using the "calendar" and "subscribe" links from my FB events page. I've tried this in Chrome and in Firefox. All return the same error: "The address that you provided did not contain a calendar in a valid iCal or GData format."

Other methods suggested by Google are from 2-3 years ago and include using an export option which I don't see on either the all upcoming events list or the individual events.

I am using Google Apps for domains, which might be a problem, too, I suppose. Suggestions?

posted by crush-onastick to Computers & Internet (7 answers total)

I have no solution to offer, but I have encountered the same issue. I have been able to sync the calendar directly to my iPhone, but not google calendar for use on my desktop.
posted by girlalex at 9:16 AM on November 20, 2016

Response by poster: Perhaps I should add: Windows 10, android phone (but I've not tried with the phone yet).
posted by crush-onastick at 9:34 AM on November 20, 2016

I use an app called 'Facebook calendar sync' to sync to my Android phone. It seems to work well.
posted by sevenyearlurk at 6:33 PM on November 20, 2016

Best answer: just to confirm, the url you're adding looks something like webcal://www.facebook.com/ical/u.php?uid=[a number]&key=[letters and numbers]

I tried deleting my fb calendar from google and re-adding it, and it worked, doing the same things you described

I tried doing it, but deleting one of the letters from the key, and got the same error as you did.
posted by garlic at 7:38 PM on November 20, 2016

Response by poster: nope, the url does not look like that. it looks like:
https://www.facebook.com/events/upcoming/?acontext= [ a bunch of numbers, letters, and %symbols]

I wonder if it's the browser add ons I'm using to make FB bearable?
posted by crush-onastick at 8:05 PM on November 20, 2016

Response by poster: Well, it's not the add ons because when they are disabled my url still does not look like the example. which makes since it did not work in either Chrome (which has no add ons) or Firefox (which does). This is vexing.
posted by crush-onastick at 8:10 PM on November 20, 2016

Response by poster: And I'm a dumbass, it's a link in a different part of the screen you're supposed to right click & save as. CALENDARS ARE HARD. Thanks, garlic, your info helped, actually.
posted by crush-onastick at 8:20 PM on November 20, 2016 [2 favorites]