Linking
Events can have multiple links to other items, including:Contact Links
Contact links link an event to a specific contact and is the default type of link. In the Edit Dialog, tap the Create Link button (will show Edit Link(s) if there's already a link present), and the default contact database display appears. You can navigate around the Contacts Activity, using Find or any other selection mechanism to locate the Contact you want to link to. Then tap the Select button to select that contact. When displaying a list of links, Contact links display the full name of the individual that was linked. Pimlical will automatically select the local contacts database for linking if the database exists, but if it does not exist, it will automatically use the Android Contacts Database.Memo Links
Memo links link an event to a specific memo in the local Memo Database. In the Edit Dialog, long press the Create Link button (will show Edit Link(s) if there's already a link present), and select Memos and the default Memo Database display then appears. You can navigate around the Memos Activity, using Find or any other selection mechanism to locate the Memo you want to link to, then tap the Memo to select that Memo. When displaying a list of links, Memo links display the title of the Memo.Local File Links
File links an event to a specific file in the local filing system on the device.In the Edit Dialog, long press the Create Link button (will show Edit Link(s) if there's already a link present), and select Local File the default File Navigator display appears. You can navigate around the local filing system (with the exception of the Scoped Storage areas for other Apps) and select a file. When displaying a list of links, the filename is displayed. This is very useful for linking to things like PDF documents, images, videos ,etc.Web (URL) Links
URL links an event to a specific URL (normally a web page on the internet but which could also be the tag: MailTo: followed by an email address). In the Edit Dialog, long press the Create Link button (will show Edit Link(s) if there's already a link present), and select URL and a Text Box appears in which you can type in the full URL. You would normally select a web page in your web browser, copy the full URL to the clipboard, switch to P/A and then just paste that URL into the text field. You can add an identifying tag ahead of the URL, separated from the URL with a comma. If you don't enter an identifying tag, Pimlical will employ best efforts to try and create a meaningful tag from the URL - usually the domain name.Notes on Links.
To handle all four link types in a consistent manner, the preference: UseCustomFieldForSetLink should be set to its default value of 5 (setting it to 0-4 implements the older behavior where File/Web links are just placed in a text field).
In addition to setting a link via the Edit Dialog, all four types of links can also be set with Popup Commands on an event in an Event Selection List:
The link field is normally hidden in the internal Link field in the database. The contents of this field are displayed with the popup command: Internal Record Details. You can also use that popup command to copy text from the link field. To delete an existing link, or modify the Tag field for that link, go into the Edit Dialog, tap on the Edit Link(s) button or bring up an Event Selection List and use the new popup command: Set Link. A list of all the links for that event will then be displayed - tap on the link to select the link you wish to modify/remove. At that point the Tag for that link is displayed in an editable field - after changing the tag, tap OK to update the link tag, or tap the Remove button to completely remove the tag.
Linking Events using the Master/Subordinate Linking mechanism (New in V-4.2.24, Subscription Only)
Pimlical has a separate mechanism for linking events to each other, whereby one event is designated a Master event and the other events are designated as Subordinate events. These events are linked to each other with a hidden TemplateUID field. This is very similar to how Master and Subordinate Templates are handled, except there is no requirement to use templates to establish these links.
To
link items, first display all the items that you want to link together
in an Event Selection List using the Multi-Select feature and mark
all the events as Selected (remember that you can long-press the
Multi-Select button to set that mode and automatically select all the
items in the selection list). Include the Master event (which must have
already been marked with the Action Tag: Master Template), then
long-press any item in the list and issue the Link to Master popup command. Those items are then all linked to the Master. The Master should then display the Master Icon [M] and the subordinate items all display the Subordinate Icon [S]. You can select ANY single event (master or subordinate) and use the popup command: Find All Linked Events to immediately locate ALL the events that are linked to that Master (including the Master Event).
The ONLY functionality that exists here with the Master/Subordinate linking feature is:
(a) That you can quickly and easily locate all the linked events from any single event, and
(b)
You can toggle the display of Subordinate events on and off easily
(especially if you put that command on the Command Bar – see below).
With
tasks, it means you can have a display of say five things that you need
to do. Now if each task has 10-20 subordinate tasks, the list would be
huge, you would have to scroll through it, and you would lose focus on
the big picture. By toggling the display of subordinates off, you are
now presented with just the five Master
tasks. You can then either toggle the display of subordinates to review
all the subordinate tasks, or long-press one of the five master tasks
and use find Linked Items to see just that Master along with its
subordinate tasks.
It's also convenient when using the main
calendar display – you can include ALL your Master Tasks, without
having to clutter up the calendar with all the subordinate tasks.
Again, if you want to review the subordinate tasks, just select the
Master in an event selection list and use popup command: Find All
Linked Events to see them all.
When using the feature to locate all the linked events, one can then long-press the Multi-Select button (which selects ALL the items in the linked grouping) and do useful things like delete all of them, or use the Shift Times Forwards/Backwards popup command to move the entire group to a different day or time.
The linking mechanism can be used
on events or tasks in either the local or Android Calendars (the
linking mechanism is preserved in tags in the Note field for Android
Calendars, so it can be restored when the Android Calendar is read),
and the events in the “linked group” can be any kind of event (Appt,
Float, Task).
An event can only be in ONE link grouping – when you
link an item, any prior subordinate link is replaced with the new link.
Prior to linking items with Link to Master, you can of course see if
the item was previously linked, because if it was, it would have an [S]
icon displayed. When you use Link to Master, that does not remove any
existing subordinate events from that Master (i.e. if you subsequently
select the Master and some OTHER event and use Link to Master
it would be added into the link group). To remove the linkage from an
event or group of events, select all the events and tap the Master or
subordinate link icon and you will see the number of subordinates
present along with an UNLINK button, that if tapped, will remove all
the links from the selected items.
To put the toggle on the command bar, just go into Menu | Preferences | Commands/Functions and change one of the CommandBarViewButton# preferences to use: Ts – Toggle Display of Subordinates and you will then see the [S] icon with a red X through it – that toggles the display of subordinates on and off.
Historical Support for Web-Email Links in versions prior to V-4.02.22
To maintain full backwards compatibility, P/A continues to support the old style web/Url link which works by simply placing the entire link in either the Description, Note, or any custom field. When present, the Weblink icon is displayed on the event (a Blue W with an arrow coming out of the top) and an extra line appears in the Edit Dialog, just below the note field to display the links.
Web links
Web links consist of a string of text starting with one of these tags:
http://
https://
www.
If Pimlical sees these strings of text, the event is marked as having a "weblink". All text up to the End of Line or vertical bar (|) is considered to be the link. There is no limit to the number of URL's you can place in the note or description fields, just separate each one with an end of line or vertical bar.
Email links
To set an email link, use mailto: immediately followed by the email address of the person - for example:
To set a link to a local file, use file:// followed by the full path in the Android file system to the file. For example, placing file://sdcard/pimlical/default.txt would
result in a text editor like Jota+ being launched to edit that file.
Unknown file types (based upon extension) will simply display an error
message that no associated application can be found. (A future release
may provide a file browser/navigator to select a file for this purpose).
Invoking the links
To invoke the link, go into the Edit Dialog and you will notice that there is another line, not normally visible, underneath the note field. Click on the button containing the URL(s) and if there is only one URL, Pimlical immediately invokes that link. If there are two or more, a selection list appears so you can choose which web/email link you want to invoke.
Weblinks bring up the web page, while email links bring up your default email program on the device with the subject line filled in with the description field of the event. To exit out of the web page or email, just press the back button.