Event Aggregator not adding new events, not deleting source-deleted events, etc.

[Heather Acton]

Hi there,

We’ve been testing the event aggregator quite a bit and have hit the following snags:

1 – We set up an import to run on a manual schedule (mostly so we don’t have to wait for a scheduled import to test things). First import from a Google .ics went fine. I then added a test event to the source calendar, then manually ran the import again. I tried this over the course of a couple hours and my test event never was imported. I then deleted my import and set it up fresh again, and then my test event came in. It should come in on any manual import run after the test event was added to the feed. (I did check the ics file as well, and the test event was there.) It almost seems as though the aggregator is not grabbing the newest version of the file, but instead one already stored on the local server.

2 – The real reason we were excited for the event aggregator was the “smart sync” in hopes that it would delete events on the website that were no longer in the ics file (i.e. they were deleted at the source Google calendar). Per this post in the user voice forum, I thought the chances were good https://tribe.uservoice.com/forums/195723-feature-ideas/suggestions/9624687-sync-google-calendar-with-ical-feed. However, we’ve continued to try with both manual and scheduled imports, and our deleted source events don’t get deleted on the site. I’m not sure if this is the same issue as #1 or not.

3 – The importer is not running on schedule. This is a heavily visited site, so I don’t know why it wouldn’t be triggered to run. See screenshot: https://www.dropbox.com/s/kyray4djvit3n27/Screenshot%202016-11-10%2014.17.34.png?dl=0

Further notes:
– this testing has been done on a local server and remote on the production site at WP Engine, and same issues are seen in both places.
– local testing was done on a site with no other plugins and the default WP theme
– Google calendar URL: https://calendar.google.com/calendar/ical/d123.org_444f2d5075626c6963%40resource.calendar.google.com/private-7209f3dc8af0864ff725730688d393cb/basic.ics
– Events Calendar system status report is attached

If there’s any other info you need, please let me know. We’d love to stick with this calendar even if the bugs take a while to work out, but if the event deletion isn’t even on the road map we will have to find an alternate solution.

Thanks so much,
Heather

[Josh]

Hey Heather,

Thanks for reaching out to us. Also, thanks for providing such great information here for us to dig into further here!

Let me do some further testing based on the information that you’ve provided here in I’ll get back to you with full answers for these.

Thanks!

[Heather Acton]

Thanks, Josh! I’ll hold tight but let me know if you have any questions.

[Josh]

Hey Heather,

1. I’ve tested this a few times myself and have been able to verify the issue you’re describing here. On-Demand imports don’t seem to be updating with the new events created at the source calendar. I’m creating an internal bug ticket for tracking this issue and you will be notified here as we make progress on this one.
2. I reached out to our team on this one and got clarification on this feature. The “Smart Sync” here won’t be able to track deleted events from the source calendar. ICS files don’t have a signifier to state that an event has been “deleted”. It would just be missing from the file. For us, and the plugin, it would lead to a lot of unintended consequences if we deleted events from the calendar just because they weren’t available in an ICS file.

   There is however a tag for events in ICS feeds that let you know that an event has been “Cancelled”. Our plugin doesn’t yet have a process for handling those types of events at this time but it would be something we could add down the line since it is supported in the files.

3. Has the scheduled import continued to stay that far behind the import schedule? I’ve had a test import scheduled on my local install but I haven’t noticed long delays outside of the scheduled import interval such as the 5 hours in your screenshot.

Thanks!

[Heather Acton]

Hi Josh,

Thanks a ton!!!

1 – Great – I’ll keep an eye out for updates on that bug. We’re not super-dependent on the Manual import but it was something we noticed in testing so glad that helped.

2 – It would be AMAZING if that “cancelled” flag could translate into something on import. Even just put it in a category that we specify so that we can exclude that category from display. This one is really the key for us sticking with ECP, so hopefully that can make the roadmap. If you can let me know the likelihood of that, that would be awesome.

3 – Here’s what I noticed on scheduled imports. On the Scheduled Imports tab I see Last Import was 6 hours ago, but if I go to the History tab, I see this: https://www.dropbox.com/s/to6lxsclhrtmol5/Screenshot%202016-11-16%2016.09.00.png?dl=0 So it does seem that there’s an issue with the schedule. Again, our host is WP Engine so maybe there’s something with their setup that interferes…not sure. The 30 minute import isn’t super critical, but it does need to update at least 1/day and it seems it’s doing that.

Thanks again!
Heather

[Josh]

Hey Heather,

No problem, happy to help!

2. I know we can add that as a feature request but that wouldn’t give you any real feedback right now on whether or not it would be something we would pursue in the near future. I’ll reach out to one of our project managers to see if I can get a better guage on this particular feature.

3. For WP Engine, you could request that they switch to their alternate cron on this install to see if it gives you a more reliable performance of those scheduled imports https://wpengine.com/support/wp-cron-wordpress-scheduling/.

Thanks!

[Support Droid]

Hey there! This thread has been pretty quiet for the last three weeks, so we’re going to go ahead and close it to avoid confusion with other topics. If you’re still looking for help with this, please do open a new thread, reference this one and we’d be more than happy to continue the conversation over there.

Thanks so much!
The Events Calendar Support Team

[Nico]

Hi there,

Just wanted to inform that the fix for this issue has been pushed to the Event Aggregator server! There’s no need to update the plugins, although I recommend using the latest version of The Events Calendar.

Please let us know if this is working as expected for you,
Best,
Nico

[Heather Acton]

Hi Nico – do you mind expanding on which part was fixed? I’m assuming it was related to the manual imports not pulling in new events, and/or the scheduled imports not running on schedule. I’m hopeful that you mean the flagging of the source-deleted events, so that we can categorize those and not show them on our site, but I know that is a feature addition and not a bug fix. If you can let me know exactly what was addressed, I can check on our site and verify it’s working.

Thanks much!
Heather

[Josh]

Hey Heather,

To clarify here, the issue that was addressed in our latest update was in reference to the on demand imports not updating with the new information from their source calendars. Can you test this particular feature with the latest version and verify that is working for you now?

Thanks!

[Support Droid]

Hey there! This thread has been pretty quiet for the last three weeks, so we’re going to go ahead and close it to avoid confusion with other topics. If you’re still looking for help with this, please do open a new thread, reference this one and we’d be more than happy to continue the conversation over there.

Thanks so much!
The Events Calendar Support Team

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