SubmissionSystem:Scheduling Talks

Scheduling Talks

Scheduling talks for a conference involves creating a CSV file that can be run through an import script. The import script will parse the schedule CSV file and update the accepted talk in the database. Each talk has two sets of scheduling fields (date,start_time,end_time,room) and a set of tentative fields (tentative_date,tentative_start_time..). The import script only updates the tentative fields and sends out no emails. As such the submission system pages (and conference web site pages) will not display any of the most recently imported data to the public (or speakers). This will allow previewing and making changes to the schedule before making them public (or sending emails).

Once the schedule has been reviewed and more (or less) finalized you use the "Little Button' page to finish the process of scheduling the talks. It as this point that the speakers have been notified of their talks schedule and the database is in place for the public to view the schedule on the conference web site.

Create a CSV file with the schedule data

The file used to import the schedule for a conference should in a modified CVS format where semicolons are used as the cell delimiter.

 "2010-11-02";;;;;
 "Times";"Room 1";"Room 2";"Room 3";"Room 4";"Room 5"
 "9:00 - 13:00";1833;1676;1941;1937;1806
 "13:00 - 14:00";1944;;;;
 "14:00 - 18:00";1898;1892;1940;1924;
 "18:00 - 19:30";1950;;;;
 ;;;;;

The first line defines the date you are scheduling talks for. The second line lists the names of the rooms (after the 'time' spacer cell). Each following line has the start and end times (separated by a dash) as the first entry and the other cells have the talk IDs to be scheduled.

A spacer row is added at the end of a day for clarity and parsing ease.

If you are going to schedule a series of talks in one room separate the talk IDs by a backslash. Example:

 "10:30 - 11:25";1658;1884;1679;1710;"1673/1677"

Check in the Schedule File

Once the you have created the CVS schedule file you will need to import the file into the 'submissions/tempdata/' folder in your workspace and commit it to the CVS repository.

Run the Import Script

Once the file has been imported to your workspace you will need to edit the 'import_schedule.php' to use that file. The variable '$file_path' holds the path to the schedule file to import.

Once you have checked in the CVS file, changes to 'import_schedule.php' and rolled out these changes to the live server you will need to run the import_schedule script. Example:

 http://www.eclipsecon.org/submissions/foo2010/import_schedule.php

Review the schedule

Once the schedule is imported into the tentative fields with the import script you can preview the schedule on the conference web site. The previewing is predicated on having the 'tables' directory setup and configured on the conference web site (outside the scope of this documentation).

Example URL:

  http://www.example.com/conferenceFoo2010/table/?page=table&date=2010-11-02&tentative=true

Finalize the Schedule and send emails

The import script only updates the tentative fields of the schedule. So in order for the schedule to be finalized you will need to push the Little Button. That will send out the emails and move the tentative schedule to the finalized schedule, which will make the schedule viewable on the conference web site.

Making the Schedule Live

Once the tentative schedule has been imported (will be covered in a future wiki update) with the 'import_schedule.php' script and it has been previewed on the conference web site. Log into the Submission System with a user who has the 'conference_chair' role and go to the conference chair page. The conference chair page has a set of buttons to trigger various parts of the conference chair workflow. Find the 'Little Button' button and press it, it will take you to the Little Button page that will show what talks will be getting scheduled.

Pushing the Little Button

The 'Little Button' page when run will take the tentative schedule fields for the accepted talks and convert them into the final fields. These changes will be viewable on the conference web site after the page finishes running. When the 'Little Button' is pressed it will also send the 'talk_updated' emails out to all speakers who have accepted talks that are being scheduled (or rescheduled). The 'talk_update' email is one of the rolled up emails. This is so one speaker will get one email with all the scheduling information instead of multiple emails.

When reviewing emails sent to a speaker on the on speakers individual page (only visible for users with the 'conference chair' role) you will not see the 'talk_updated' emails as the rolled up emails are not shown. Most of the emails that are of interest to the conference chair are not the rolled up emails since these emails are mostly just update made by the speaker.

The 'Little Button' page works on changes between the tentative and final schedule. So attempts to run the 'Little Button' page multiple times will not result in duplicate emails being sent out.