McMaster's Daily News Calendar of Events has arrived! If you haven't already noticed the new McMaster University calendar on the right-hand side of our home page take a look now and, if you have the time, try out this new service.

“This new, comprehensive, fully searchable and user-friendly Calendar of Events replaces our popular Coming Events section and offers on- and off-campus visitors to the site a wide range of information about the day-to-day activities at McMaster. We hope this new calendar will become the place to post or find information on what's happening at McMaster. The calendar is another good reason for faculty, staff and students to start their day with the Daily News,” says Kelly Curwin, publications/communications co-ordinator, Office of Public Relations.

Curwin is excited about the launch of the new calendar. “The calendar offers a number of features that we think users will appreciate. People can post, revise and delete their own submissions. They can e-mail a calendar listing to a friend or to their own e-mail. They can even print out the event description for a seminar and post it on a local bulletin board as a small poster.”

The success of the service will depend, in large measure, says Curwin, on regular and frequent contributions by people from all areas and departments on campus.

While the calendar is now live on the site, it may take a couple of days until all of the calendar functions are fully operational. Staff in public relations have begun posting information onto the site and the information database will grow as more items are posted by members of the community. Training sessions are being held for those on campus whose departments and areas frequently submit items for posting on the calendar.

To find out what's happening on campus you can view calendar items by day or by week or even look ahead a couple of months. Or you can search the calendar's database by keyword, Faculty or category. For example, using the category or Faculty search buttons you can find out what events on campus are scheduled for alumni or what lectures and seminars are being presented by a particular Faculty.

Items by, for and about the McMaster community occurring on or off campus or which involve members of the University community are eligible for posting. The calendar listings are governed by the Office of Public Relations style guidelines and submissions will be reviewed by the Daily News Calendar of Events editor prior to posting.

If you have an item you want to post on the calendar — a lecture, an event, a conference — simply click on the Make a Submission link under Calendar of Events (on the home page) and complete the customized form. In addition to including the usual details about an upcoming event, you can also include relevent Web site links and even a photograph of the event or lecturer.

The launch of the new calendar completes the development of the Daily News Web site, created in January 2000. Pilot project funding ($50,000) for the site, including the calendar development, was provided under the Reallocation Fund.

The calendar was created by staff in the Office of Public Relations in conjunction with Computing & Information Services and Ebiz Professionals (formerly TDG Interactive) in Guelph. The site is maintained by the Office of Public Relations.

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To view a sampling of items now posted on the calendar:

Go to Select Month and choose September 2001 (click Go)

Select Week of Sept. 9 to see the Week View

Click on “True confessions of an art collector” (Sept. 11) to see Event Description

Select Sept. 11 (numeral on main calendar) for the Day View

Click on Search the Calendar (on home page)

In the Search by Category box select “alumni' from the drop-down box (Calendar will display all items listed in alumni category)