Google Calendar timetable sync

Calendar sync gives each person a "rs - … Timetable" calendar in Google, filled with their timetabled lessons from the MIS and kept in sync nightly. Only lessons that changed are touched — a quiet timetable costs nothing and nobody's calendar flickers.

Turn it on

Calendar sync in the sidebar (or Calendar settings from the MAT overview, where settings can be applied across schools) has three switches:

• Staff timetable calendars — each member of staff gets their lessons.
• Learner timetable calendars — each learner gets theirs.
• Room booking — lessons also book the room as a Google resource, so room calendars show real availability.
• Which classes appear for staff — every class they teach, or only classes where they are the main teacher.

Settings live with every other sync setting and survive deploys. Turning a switch off deletes the calendars it created — see Turning calendar sync off before you do.

Turning calendar sync off

Switching a calendar off is a delete instruction, not just a setting: Realsmart removes the calendars that switch created from Google, along with everything on them. Saving the change shows you what will go — including how many people currently have a calendar — and asks you to confirm.

It cannot be undone. Turning calendar sync back on later builds new calendars from the current timetable. It does not restore a deleted calendar, its history, or anything anyone added to one by hand.

What each switch takes with it:

• Staff timetable calendars off — staff calendars go, learners' stay.
• Learner timetable calendars off — learners' go, staff's stay.
• All three off — the school leaves calendar sync and every timetable calendar is removed.
• Room booking off — lessons stop booking rooms and Realsmart's events are cleared off the room calendars. The room resources themselves are left alone.

It happens over several nights

Removal starts on the next nightly sync and works through a batch at a time, so a large school takes a few nights to clear. That is deliberate — deleting a whole trust's calendars in one night would swamp the sync queue, and draining it gradually keeps the operation reviewable while it runs.

While it is working, the Calendar sync settings page shows how many calendars are left. If you change your mind, turn a switch back on: removal stops immediately and the calendars that survived are rebuilt on the next sync.

If a calendar will not delete

A calendar belonging to someone whose Google account has been deleted or purged sometimes cannot be removed. Realsmart retries for several nights, then stops and reports it rather than failing every night for ever. The banner on the settings page names how many are in that state — those need us to look at them, so contact support.

Debug a user's calendar

Open the user (Users → the person) — when calendar sync is on, they have a Calendar tab showing three things side by side:

1. What should be there — their timetabled lessons, week by week.
2. What the sync did — status plus a change log with real error detail. Quiet runs write nothing; if something failed you'll see why, not "unknown error".
3. What Google actually has — select Check their Google calendar for a live read of the next 7 days. A green dot marks events the sync manages.

If it looks wrong, Sync calendar now queues a full re-sync of just that person through the normal machinery — allow a few minutes, then re-check.

Troubleshooting

• "No timetabled lessons" — the MIS import hasn't brought lessons in for their classes yet, or they're not attached to any timetabled class.
• "No timetable calendar is registered" — the sync hasn't run for them since being enabled; use Sync calendar now or wait for the nightly run.
• Lessons wrong for a teacher — check Which classes appear for staff: on "main teacher only", classes where they aren't the main teacher won't appear.
• Calendars still in Google after switching off — removal runs over several nights. The settings page shows how many are left; if the number isn't falling, contact support.
• Switched off long ago and the calendars are still there — schools that switched off before September 2026 were never removed, because the sync simply stopped visiting them. Contact support and we'll clear them.