448979 - Exceptions to recurring events in cached calendar are not updated.

Status: VERIFIED DUPLICATE of bug 439267

(Calendar :: Provider: GData, defect)

Description

[Marty]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.1.16) Gecko/20080702 Firefox/2.0.0.16 Mnenhy/0.7.5.0
Build Identifier: Sunbird/0.8

If a single occurrence of a repeating event is edited using a different application, the exceptions are not updated on the cached version; only the repeating event data is displayed.  It occurs both in Lightning/0.8 and Sunbird/0.8 with Google calendars using Provider for Google Calendar 0.4 extension.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.  Select Cache (EXPERIMENTAL) from the calendar properties of a calendar hosted on Google.
2.  Verify that each occurrence of a repeating event is the same.
3.  Edit the event in another application, either remotely with Sunbird or Lightning or in Goggle Calendar.
Actual Results:  
After editing the event, view event in the cached calendar.  Observe that the change is not reflected as it should be.

Viewing the event on an uncached version or within Google Calendar shows the edited event correctly.

Try reloading remote calendar.  Event is still not updated.

Expected Results:  
Event is updated on cached or uncached calendars upon reload or automatic refresh.

If the cache setting is subsequently unchecked and the calendar is reloaded, the updated events are properly displayed.

Comment 1

[Philipp Kewisch [:Fallen] [:📆][:🧩]]

This may actually be a bug on Google's side. I believe last time I checked, if you change an exception, the item is not included in the feed you've set updated-min on. The only "workaround" is to update the item itself, but I agree its not really practical.

Comment 2

[Marty]

As an end-user, not a programmer, I am not sure what you mean by "updated-min".  

From my perspective, it is a cache problem since it works with cache off and doesn't with cache on, even if the remote calendar is reloaded.  So turning cache on seems to block a complete reload of the calendar.

I am also not sure what you mean by updating the item itself.  In my case, the calendar is a shared calendar, so I need it updated if one of the other owners changes it.  But I also need the latest version even if I am off-line.  Remembering to turn cache on and reloading Thunderbird and/or Sunbird before going off-line works, but only if I remember to do it!

Comment 3

[Philipp Kewisch [:Fallen] [:📆][:🧩]]

Sorry for being too technical. If I query Google for all events that have been updated since the last time I've synchronized the cache, then Google doesn't return items where only exceptions or occurrences have been changed.

With the cache off, I get all items when retrieving the set, which means I always get up-to-date items, but things take longer.

I'm not sure the workaround I posted works, so please ignore. basically it might work if you change the master item (i.e change the title for all items), but its pretty impractical, as said.

Comment 4

[Marty]

I understand.  You are using cache as a means to speed up synchronization, not just a way to use it off-line.

My desire for having a calendar cached is so I can use it off line.  When on-line, I don't care if it takes longer to retrieve.  Maybe I am unique in having a high speed connection and calendars that load fast (~1 second) because they don't have hundreds of entries.  

If this is different from the intended purpose, maybe there needs to be yet another option that supports off-line use (making this an enhancement request, not a bug).  It would be similar to cache, but would retrieve the whole set when reloading or refreshing.

Thanks for the explanation.

Comment 5

[Micah]

I too am having problems with cache in this fashion.  Whether I delete a single instance of a reoccurring meeting, or just edit some of the properties (e.g. time, or description) of a single instance, it never updates on the cached copy.  If I then look at google calendar, it did correctly get updated.  I've restarted Thunderbird, and still no luck with the cached copy.  If I disable caching, and then restart, I then see the correct updates.

I have a lot of reoccurring events, and tend to modify single instances frequently, so this is a key feature that I would like to see a fix for.

Thanks!

Comment 6

[Philipp Kewisch [:Fallen] [:📆][:🧩]]

Marty, I think that introducing something like that might confuse users, since the cache and the offline mode do essentially the same, but one is with full getItems() and the other is only incremental.

I'd rather see you putting pressure on Google to fix their issue, which in turn would mean no extra code for us and also the speed of incremental updates ;-) I found the bug I originally filed on this: bug 439267