Arbiter to Outlook/Palm
 

Has anyone who's association uses Arbiter for assigning games found an easy way to dump your schedule from Arbiter into Microsoft Outlook for easy uploading to a Palm Handheld Device?

I'd love to know this too. Right now I'm just synching an exported PDF document of my schedule and manually inserting it into my calendar.

I don't think it can be done at this time. It would be nice though.

It's not that difficult to implement. My site (www.RefTown.com) does that. I can't tell you how to get the data out of Arbiter, but if you can export an .vcf or .icf, Outlook can read it.

If it is a single game, you can just click the link, then click open and it will popup an outlook calendar window where you can slick save and close.

If it is multiple games, Outlook can't import it as easily as a single game but it can be imported.

Here are the steps needed to import a multiple event .icf or .vcf calendar file:

1. Click whatever link you are presented to download the data
2. Save file to your hard drive
3. Open Outlook
4. Click File Menu
5. Click Import and Export...
6. Select Import an iCalendar or vCalendar file (.vcs)
7. Click Next
8. Locate and Select the file as saved in step 2
9. Click OK
10. (optionally) Delete file saved in step 2

Not having a Palm (have PocketPC), I can't tell you the steps for Syncing it with Outlook but I'm guessing you already know that part.

Why do you insist on turning every thread with a question about any assigning software into a commercial for your program? Are you that desperate for customers?

I use the arbiter and I can't see a way to export your list of assignments to *anything*. Thanks for trying, but your simple easy to implement 27 step instruction manual kinda makes using a damn computer besides the point, don't it?

It would be great if the arbiter and assignbyweb and whatever other assigning software we all use would have a simple button that says "export to PDA" and whatever sync method you use would then automagically place your assignments (and contacts, and map) into your PDA.

But they don't.

Tell me the truth, though. You kinda expected that when you saw the thread title, no?

You want 'whose' here. And don't forget all the important ® signs.

I know you're being a bit sarcastic but the 10 steps are extremely detailed, it's not really that hard (on only necessary for multipe events at the same time).

An "Export to PDA" would be great if Outlook could actually handle it. I can and do export the data in one click. The problem is Outlook. Once it is exported, none of the web assignment developers can do anything about Outlooks inability to import multiple events easily.

While I don't have a PalmPilot, I'm told that Palm Desktop doesn't suffer the same limitation....that you can import multiple games with the same simplicity as a single game in outlook.

While I haven't discovered if there is a good way to export to an Outlook calendar, it does export to a pdf document, excel, and word.

To do this, from the arbiter start page:

1) Click "SCHEDULE"
2) Under reports in the left-side menu, click "SCHEDULE"
3) Choose the date range you want
4) Choose the format you want from the pull down menu
5) Click print preview

If you are using Firefox browser, this should download your schedule in the selected format. I usually download mine in Excel, so I can edit it as I choose.

I have noticed that some versions of Internet Explorer do not download the file, but open it inside the browser. If you are stuck using IE, you can still open the file in Excel format, open a NEW Excel file, then cut and paste your schedule into the new file.

This doesn't get you exactly where you want to be with an automated way of getting the appointments into Outlook, but at least you can save your schedule on a PDA in this format.

Im also guessing that there is perhaps a way to get it from Excel to Outlook, but that remains over my head for now. If I find a way, I will pass it along.

The problem with your suggestion is that there is not an option to export a .vcf or .icf file.

That is, unless you know how to create one using Excel?

I could probably do it but I don't have it done (and don't really want to do free work for one of my competitors).

After 5 minutes of poking a round in Outlook.....outlook can import events from Excel files. Essentially the same steps as I detailed above but chosing .xls instead of .vcf. You may have to play around with the column headings before you import but it looks possible.

---

After a bit more testing, it appears that it only imports the first one in the excel file and all the rest are ignored.