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Learn / Search

GETTING STARTED
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FUNDAMENTALS
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ADVANCED
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REPORTING
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TOOLS
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View

All Cases / Cases / Triggers / Events: Central Deadline Hub

All Cases

All Cases displays all of your Active Cases. The search fields are case sensitive. Click View to access the Case details screen or Case View.

Case View

The Case View screen is the home screen for your case. Case Details displays all of the information stored on your Case. Case Name, Jurisdiction, Calendars Assigned to the Case, Location Text, Subject Text and Comments or Body Text can all be stored and recalled each time you calculate a new trigger.

Edit Case:

When you make changes to the Case, the changes are stored at the case level and applied to all future calculations. Edit Case is also where the Archive Case button is located. (Before you can Archive a case you must first Archive all Triggers.

If you need to update events that have already been applied to your calendar edit either the Trigger or an individual Event.

Outlook Users do not have Email Reminders. Outlook Users have Categories instead of Event Color.

Create Events:

The Create Events button will take you to the Create Events screen and automatically select your Case and Jurisdiction. You can also navigate directly to the Create Events screen and select a case from the Case Dropdown Menu.

View All Events:

The View All Events Button on the Case Details Screen gives you a list of all of your case events for that specific case. Events can be sorted by Date, Event Title, Trigger Name and Calendars and all fields are searchable. Searches are case sensitive. Click the View Button to see Event Details and Edit Events.

Triggers:

Triggers will show all Triggers you have calculated and saved to your case. Click the View button to access Trigger Details, Edit or Recalculate your Trigger, and to View and Edit your Trigger Events.

Installing the Outlook Add-In

DocketCalendar for Outlook works through an Outlook Add-In, which you must download and install on each workstation where docket calculations will be performed.

The DocketCalendar Add-In is downloaded from the following link: https://tools.docketcalendar.com/outlook/setup.exe

To download and install it:

  1. Click on the link; or, if that does not work, copy and paste the link into your browser’s address bar and hit the Enter key.

This will cause your browser to begin downloading the DCO Add-In’s installation file, “setup.exe”.

2. Depending on the Internet browser you are using, do the following: 

  •  If you are using Internet Explorer or Microsoft Edge, click the Run button on the banner at the bottom of the screen.
  • If you are using Google Chrome, double click on Setup.exe in the left bottom corner of your screen.
  • If you are using Firefox, click on the Save File button on the box that appears on the screen.

If you do not see another box in the top right corner, click on the downward pointing arrow to the right of the address bar to display it.

Double click on the word “setup.exe" in the box to start installation of the Add-In.

If you receive an error message during installation, warning you that DocketCalendar for Outlook “is not trusted,” then you will need to add the web address of the computer where the setup file is located, “www.docketcalendar.com,” If you need help contact support@docketcalendar.com

If you do not receive an error message, another box will appear on the screen, giving you the option to install the Add-In. Click the Install button.

After the setup program runs, another screen will appear, indicating that installation has been successful.

Click the Close button on that screen. The Add-In is now ready to use.

Quick Start Guide

Once you have installed DocketCalendar, close and restart Outlook. You will now see an Add-Ins tab. Click the Add-Ins tab and then click the DocketCalendar button to launch DocketCalendar

The first time you lunch DocketCalendar, you will be prompted to enter your login credentials. Once you have entered your login credentials, you will not need to use a login and password again unless you logout.

When DocketCalendar first launches, it will set itself to add events to your personal default Outlook Calendar. You can change this setting later but for now we want try a test so begin by using the default settings.

Follow the red arrows. Select a court from the Jurisdiction dropdown menu. Then select a trigger from the Trigger menu. (If you select a service trigger, the service dropdown will become active. If you select a trigger with a time, trial or hearing for example, you will need to select a time ) Add a Case Name. (Your case name will be automatically saved when you add the events to your calendar)

Next follow the highlighted green boxes, click Calculate Events, you can uncheck any events you do not want to add to your calendar.

When you are ready to add your events to your calendar, follow the highlighted blue box, click Add Checked Events.

You will see a confirmation popup screen. (Check all your trigger details before you proceed) When you are ready, click create events.

You should now see your events on your calendar.

Click on any event in the group you have just added. You should see the DocketCalendar Events window covering the bottom half of the event screen. If you do not see it, look at the bottom of the event window for the DocketCalendar icon with the plus button. (Second screen shot below)

To move the DocketCalendar Events window up and down, follow the red arrow in the screen shot and click and drag the double line up or down. To delete all of the events in the series that you have just added, click the Delete All Events button highlighted in the green box. To collapse the Docket Calendar Event window, click the minus sign in the blue box.

To expand the Docket Calendar Events window, click the Plus sign highlighted in the blue box.

Adding a Calendar to Outlook

You may choose the primary calendar of any Outlook account shared with you, or you can create a new calendar in an Outlook account to serve as the calendar folder. You must follow this procedure, or the new calendar will not work correctly as a calendar folder with DocketCalendar.

Add a Calendar to an Outlook Profile

Log into the Outlook account where you want to create the new calendar.

At the bottom of the screen, click on the three dots and select the folders icon.

Click on the email address and choose new folder from the context menu.

Display the dropdown list in the folder contains the field and select calendar items.

Press the OK button

Name the calendar.

Display the dropdown list in the folder contains the field and select calendar items.

Press the OK button

Manually Adding the Firmwide Calendar to the Shared Calendars List

  • Open the Outlook account of the staff member and navigate to the calendars page.
  • From the manage calendars section of the main menu at the top of the screen, select add calendar.
  • To add the firmwide calendar from the Address Book, click the from address book menu item.
  • To add the firmwide calendar by opening it, click the open shared calendar menu item. Enter the email address of the Outlook account where the calendar to be shared is located.
  • Click the OK button.
  • The shared firmwide calendar will appear in the list of Shared Calendars under the name or display name of the Outlook account where the firmwide calendar is located.

Firm Calendar

DocketCalendar adds events to any Calendar you own or have shared access to. When you first install DocketCalendar it defaults to adding events to your Primary Calendar. Regardless of the size of your firm, we consider it a best practice to create an extra email account specifically dedicated to deadlines. Although you can call this Calendar anything, we generally recommend you simply give it the first name "Firm" and last name "Calendar" The Firm Calendar becomes the central place where all of your deadlines will be located.

There are several compelling reasons for this approach.

Changes to Personnel - Calendaring may be one person's responsibility today, and another person's responsibility next year. Having a central Firm Calendar means you simply assign the new person access to the Firm Calendar. You don't have to consider moving events from one Calendar to another and you'll always have total control over who has access to this calendar.

Coverage - When someone is out of the office or on vacation, having a Firm Calendar means that any individual with appropriate access to the Firm Calendar can handle routine management of deadlines.

Access - Having a Firm Calendar makes it easy to provide any person in the firm who may need to see deadlines access without having to rely on individuals to share their calendars.

Reporting - If you have multiple people calendaring separately each on their own calendar, in order to produce a firmwide report of deadlines, you would need to have access to all of the calendars where deadlines have been created and you would need to search them all to produce a report. With a central Firm Calendar, reports are easy to produce.

The Firm Calendar contains all deadlines. Each Attorney only gets the deadlines related to their matters.

Reporting - If you have multiple people calendaring for different Attorneys in the firm and each person is using their Calendar you will have the firm's deadlines spread throughout your users Outlook Calendars. If you wish to pull a report of deadlines, you would need to get each person who has created deadlines to produce a report and then compile that data into a single firmwide report.

Sample Report using Outlook Quick Search and the Firm Calendar

Options--General Tab

General Options

Default Jurisdiction.  If there is more than one court in your subscription, you can pick one as your default and it will appear on the screen every time you perform a rules calculation.

Appointment & Task.  Default:  All rules events are appointments. DocketCalendar has the ability to treat events as either Outlook appointments or tasks. We recommend keeping this set to the default value.

Add Court Rule to Body. Default: Rule Text. By default, the system adds the text from the rule underlying a date calculation to the body of the appointments or deadlines created on the Outlook calendar.

  • Don’t add: Rule text will not be added.
  • Rule Text: the default—rule text will be added.
  • Rule ID only. An identification code, frequently the official abbreviation used to refer to the applicable procedural rules, will be added

Add Date Rule to Body. Default: Yes. The Date Rule is an abbreviated summary of the calculation used to calculate the event date. 

Add Activity to BodyDefault: Yes. Each Event title or “Activity” is limited to the character length of Outlook’s Subject Line. If you are adding your Case Name to the Subject as well, in some cases the last few words of the Activity may become truncated. To overcome this limitation, this setting allows you to see the full text of each Activity repeated in the Body of the appointment.

Save Case Name. Default: “Yes”. By default, the system will save case names entered, so they can be re-used later. Change this option to No if you do not want to store case names.

Preload Related Events. Default: “Yes”. By default, when you open an event on your Outlook calendar, all of the related events created by the Trigger are displayed in a list with the event you opened highlighted in light red. This allows you to open any of these other events, but the process of loading the related events can cause older computers to slow down to an unacceptable level.  If you change the option to “No”, this will prevent the related events from loading when you open the event and speed things up. To view the other events, you can click the Load button, which will load the events on to the form on demand.

Recalculated Events. Default: When a trigger date gets changed, and the events are recalculated, there are two choices. One choice is to leave the event content alone (subject and body), and just update the date (default). The other choice is to replace the existing events with new events from the latest version of the rules. If you change the default, any changes to the description you may have made during the first calculation will be overwritten.

Check for Updates. Default: “Yes”. If yes, when the Add-In opens, it checks for rules updates and presents a notification if any are found.

Show Excluded Events. Default: “No”. You have the option of preventing certain related events from appearing when they create deadlines during rules calculations, using the Excluded Events tab. 

Show Trigger on Calendar. Default: If changed to yes, a check box will be shown on the Use Rules tab, and if checked during event creation process, the Trigger itself will be created as an appointment. For example, if you select Interrogatories Served and enter last Friday as the trigger date, an event called Interrogatories Served, dated last Friday, will be placed on the calendar if a user selects the checkbox “Trigger on Calendar”.  This option shows and hides that check box. DocketCalendar already creates these types of events for Triggers like Trial, or Hearing on Motion, where we know the trigger itself belongs on the calendar. Most users will not want to turn this option on.

Request Response. Default: Yes. We recommend switching this to no as most attendees will not accept the invites and simply delete them.

Show Confirmation Screen. Default: Yes. The confirmation screen appears after you have completed a calculation by clicking on Add Checked Items on the Use Rules Screen. It shows you the selections you have made during a rules calculation and gives you an opportunity (by clicking the Cancel button) to enter information you may have omitted.  Clicking Create Events completes the event creation process.

Options--Appointments Tab

The Appointments tab allows you to adjust setting related to DCO events that are placed on an Outlook calendar as appointments.

Access Appointments Options. To access the settings relating to Appointments, click on the Options tab on the DCO main screen and then click on the Appointments tab.

Default Calendar Folder. This field allows you to select a single calendar as the default calendar folder where DocketCalendar date calculations will be directly added. Calendars in the dropdown list will include your personal calendar, any additional calendars you create in your Outlook account and any calendars which have been shared with you. If you accept the default setting for this field, both deadlines and appointments will be placed on your default Outlook calendar–the single calendar Outlook automatically creates when it is installed. If you follow our recommendation, you should choose your firm’s firmwide calendar as the Default Calendar Folder. This will result in all date calculations for all cases handled by your firm being placed on a single calendar.   For the firmwide calendar, we recommend for a solo practice using the primary calendar of the solo practitioner and in a larger firm using the primary calendar of a separate Outlook account set up specifically for that purpose. Once created, your firm’s firmwide calendar will not appear in the list of the Default Calendar Folder field and will not be available to select until it has been shared with you.

You Can Ignore These Settings:

The following settings can generally be ignored:

  • Public Folders Scan/Public Folders Autoscan.  Default:  All folders.
  • Public Calendar “Favorites” Folder.  Default: Favorites.
  • Additional Shared Calendar Folder. Typically, when another staff member’s calendar has been shared with a staff member using the DocketCalendar Add-In, it will automatically appear in the list of shared calendars in the Calendar Folder. But if a shared calendar is not present–it may have been deleted or not correctly “accepted”–this option provides an alternate way to add it to the Calendar Folder. You do so by entering the email address of the staff member who shared the calendar and clicking Add.
  • Cache Calendar/Task Folders.  Default: Yes. This setting determines whether the list of shared calendars in the Calendar Folder is retained from session to session or retrieved from the Exchange Server when the DocketCalendar Add-In is started. It may affect how long it takes for the DocketCalendar Add-In to load. You should accept the default.  If recently added shared calendars fail to appear in the Calendar Folder list, temporarily changing the default from Yes to No and restarting the Add-In may solve the problem. If it persists, you should contact customer support.

Show Calendar Folder on “Use Rules Tab”. Default: Unchecked. If checked, the list of calendars to which you have access will appear in a dropdown list on the Use Rules tab. When you perform a rules calculation, you will have the option to choose any calendar in the list and the events you create will be placed on that calendar.

Appointment Length.  This setting determines the length of time that will be reserved on your calendar, when a rules calculation places an appointment event on your calendar that takes place at a specified time. The default is 60 minutes. If the Appointment w/Time Status setting is set to “busy”, your calendar will show that you are busy for the period of time selected.

Reminder For Appointments (minutes). The default amount of time before an appointment that you will receive a pop-up reminder in Outlook. The default reminder is 15 minutes.

Default Category for Appointments. If you use Outlook categories, you can select the one you want assigned to appointments by default. We recommend that you select Category “Z CRO”. You will need to create that Category in Outlook before it can be selected here. 

All Day Appointment Status. Default: “free”When you choose to display deadlines on your Outlook calendar as appointments, they are configured as all day events, so that they will appear at the top of the calendar, separated from other appointments scheduled for a particular time. Since normally Outlook will show you as “busy” during appointments, people looking at your calendar would not be able to tell when you were free to schedule a standard appointment on any day when at least one deadline appeared on your calendar. This setting is used to show your appointment status as “free” for these all day “appointments”.

Appointment w/Time Status.  Default:  “busy”.  This setting determines whether a calculated event that is a court appearance or appointment will show the time slot when it takes place as “busy” on your Outlook calendar, so that other people will not try to schedule other appointment at that time. The default is “busy”.

Case Name Location.  Default Setting: Prepend to subject. This option determines where the case name will be placed in the subject or the body of an Outlook calendar entry or Task list. For help on how to view the body of a deadline or appointment placed on your Outlook calendar. If you do not want to accept the default setting, select one of the other options from the dropdown list:

  • Prepend to subject. Puts the case name first on the subject line, before the event description. (Default and recommended setting)
  • Append to subject. Puts the case name after the event description in the subject line. If the event has a lengthy description, the case name may be cut off when you view the subject line on the Outlook calendar.
  • Prepend to body. Puts the case name in the body of the calendar entry, before the rule snippet or rule ID.
  • Append to body. Puts the case name in the body of the event after the location of the rule snippet or rule ID.
  • Don’t add. Removes the case name from the subject and body. This option is not recommended, because you may not be able to identify the case without the case name.

Custom Text Location. Default setting: Prepend to body. This option determines the location of custom text entered during docket calculations in the calendar entry on the Outlook calendar. It can be put at the beginning or end of the subject line or body of the calendar entry using the following selections:

  • Don’t add. Custom text not displayed.
  • Prepend to subject. Displayed at the beginning of the subject.
  • Append to subject. Displayed at the end of the subject.
  • Prepend to body. Displayed at the beginning of the body.
  • Append to body. Displayed at the end of the body.

Add “DocketCalendarEvent” Tag. Default setting: No. If enabled, this setting will configure DocketCalendar to automatically insert the text string “DocketCalendarEvent” into the body of each Outlook appointment and meeting invitation generated by DocketCalendar when deadlines and events are created. These text characters can be used to uniquely identify DocketCalendar appointments on the calendar of staff members as well as the meeting invitations for these events appearing in the Outlook inboxes of staff members. Using this identifier, staff members can search for DocketCalendar events among others on their calendars, create filters to only display these events on calendars or create Outlook “Rules” to remove automatically meeting invitations from their Outlook inboxes. Since we recommend that you set up an Outlook Rule to suppress meeting invitations and cancellations, this setting should be changed to “Yes”.

Outlook Mobile App

We strongly urge you to install the Outlook Mobile App on the mobile phones of staff members who will receive meeting invitations through DCO. There are several reasons for our recommendation.

Your Mobile Phone's Native Apps Can't Block DocketCalendar Meeting Invitations

When DocketCalendar events are sent to your calendar using meeting invitations, event notifications cannot be avoided, if you are using your smartphone's email and calendar applications to receive them. With the Outlook application installed on your desktop, an Outlook rule can be configured to suppress the appointment invitations DocketCalendar sends out to "attendees". But Outlook Rules won't work on your mobile phone's native email and calendar applications. When Outlook interacts with your mobile phone, your emails go to the phone's email app, and your appointments go to its calendar app. Both Android and iPhone standard applications will receive the DocketCalendar meeting invitations in their inboxes. But the Outlook Rule you configured for your Outlook desktop application will not stop the meeting invitations from showing up on your mobile phone. Consequently each time a DocketCalendar meeting invitation is received in your phone's calendar application, your phone will buzz, you will see a banner notification and, if you have an iPhone, the mobile phone's calendar app will display a red dot. On the iPhone you can disable the Invitation specifically but you cannot disable the red dot on the Calendar App unless you turn off all Notifications. If you turn off all Notifications, your phone will not notify you when you have an appointment on your calendar. The only option for the standard phone app to work without buzzing when you receive invites but to notify you when appointments are about to begin, is to leave Allow Notifications turned on, but Invitation notifications turned off. You will either need to ignore the red dots on the Calendar App, or you will need to accept them on the phone.

Using the Outlook Mobile App Will Honor Outlook Rules and Eliminate Unnecessary Notifications

To eliminate DocketCalendar meeting invitations and notifications, the simple solution is to replace your phone's standard mail and calendar applications with the Microsoft Outlook Phone App. The Outlook Mobile App consolidates both email and calendar in a single app. Mail and Calendar both support multiple email accounts so you can keep your business and personal account accessible within the same application or you can just use Outlook’s Phone App for firm related activities. In addition to having access to multiple accounts, the phone app allows you to view shared exchange calendars. This is a feature the standard phone calendars do not support. In addition, DocketCalendar meeting invitations will not show up in the Outlook Phone App. The events will flow directly to the calendar and, because of the Outlook Rule, the invitations will be deleted as they arrive in the user’s email account. This creates a seamless handoff of the events from DocketCalendar to Outlook to the Outlook Mobile App. As with any program, it has subtle differences but the functionality is improved in almost every way with the Microsoft Outlook Phone App.

User Guide Home Page

Options--Tasks Tab

The options on the Tasks tab under the Options tab allow you to configure certain settings that affect how deadlines or appointments are displayed on Outlook’s To-Do task list, differently from when they are displayed as appointments on Outlook Calendars. As noted previously, we do not recommend that you configure DocketCalendar display events and deadlines as tasks, because of limitations in Outlook functionality.

Access Tasks Options. To access the settings relating to Tasks, click on the Options tab on DocketCalendar main screen and then click on the Tasks tab.

Task Folder. If you have chosen to treat deadlines or appointments as Tasks, they are stored by default in Outlook’s Task list. The Task Folder option gives you the ability to store them in a separate Task folder, so that they can be segregated from other tasks created using Outlook. To use this option, you will need to create a new Task list in your Outlook folders. Once it is created, it will appear in the Task Folder dropdown list, where it can be selected.

Case Name Location. (Default and Recommended setting: Prepend to Subject) This setting, like the setting for Appointments, determines the location of the case name either on the Subject line or in the body of the task. See Case Name Location in Appointment Options for the available choices.

Custom Text Location. (Default and Recommended setting: Prepend to Body) Similarly, if you use the Custom Text field, this setting determines it's location on the body of a Task. To understand the choices, see Custom Text Location in Appointment Options.

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How to Assign a Calendar

Assigning your first calendar

Once you have linked your email account and granted permission to DocketCalendar, you will be prompted to assign your first calendar.

Click here if your have not yet linked your email account to DocketCalendar

DocketCalendar should automatically walk you through this process the first time you log in after granting permission. Once you have assigned your first calendar, the "Connect a Calendar" button will change to "Assigned Calendars".

If you need additional guidance, please follow the steps below.

Assigning Additional Calendars

1. Add the number of desired calendars to your subscription from the shopping cart. The shopping cart can be accessed by clicking on “Subscription” under the manage tab in DocketCalendar. You may add an unlimited amount of calendars while in free trial mode.

2. Click on Assigned Calendars under the MANAGE section on the toolbar. (Screenshot Below)

3. If you want to assign a calendar that does not belong to your linked email account, you will need to share that calendar.  Share Outlook    Share Gmail

3. Give your calendar a name.

4. Enter the email address of this calendar. (If this is a secondary calendar, enter the email address of its primary calendar)

5. Locate and select the calendar you want to assign from the “Select Calendar” dropdown. If you do not see the calendar you want to assign, you will need to share that calendar with the linked email account. (If you have not shared any calendars with your linked email account, you will have three options to choose from; United States holidays, Calendar, and Birthdays)

6. Click “Assign.”

Note: If your newly shared calendars do not appear in the select calendar dropdown, you may need to accept/add them from your linked email account.

After calendars have been shared, you will need to accept the invitation and click view. The invitation will be sent to the inbox of the linked email account.  

Outlook Users: If your IT administrator shared the calendars from a PowerShell command, they will need to be added to the calendar using the Add Calendar / Add From Directory function.

Google Users: In order to add a shared calendar to your Gmail account, you must be logged in to only that Gmail account in your web browser. If you use Gmail normally for any other email address, we recommend, just for adding new shared calendars, that you open an incognito window in Chrome and login to your Linked Gmail account there. Then accept the shared calendar.

You can not edit the name or email for notification after assigning a calendar. If you need to remove an assigned calendar we recommend you remove the events from your calendar first.

Choosing Your Linked Email Account

You can connect DocketCalendar to any Outlook or Google calendar. Which calendar should you use?

Click here to view the previous section on how DocketCalendar integrates with your Outlook or Gmail calendar

Considerations

Who has access to this email?

Everyone at your firm who uses DocketCalendar must log into this email account. You will want to choose an email to which multiple people at the firm can log into. If you choose a personal email, your credentials will need to be shared with anyone who wants to log into the DocketCalendar application.

Should I create a new email account?

We recommend creating a new email account as the connection point to DocketCalendar. You can name this calendar whatever you want; something like firmcalendar@yourdomain.com is always a good choice. Whatever you decide, we strongly recommend you do not call your new email account simply "calendar" Everyone who uses email has a "calendar" it is too generic for an email account name.

Can I use an email account that already exists?

Yes. You may already have an email account that multiple people have access to like an admin@ or info@. One consideration is that the linked email account will have all of your internal staff's calendars on it. You may only want authorized calendaring personnel to access this calendar so be mindful not to repurpose an existing email account that is used by people in the firm who you may not want to have edit access your firm calendar.

Do events generated by DocketCalendar have to go on this calendar?

No, events do not have to go on this calendar.

Outlook: The linked email account is the connection point between your Outlook domain and DocketCalendar; placing deadlines on this calendar is optional.

Can I change my linked email account later?

Yes, however, changing the linked account requires DocketCalendar assistance.

Outlook Users: Does this email account have to be an Outlook 365 account?

Yes, the linked email account must be an Outlook 365 email account, however DocketCalendar will not work with a free Outlook.com account.

Gmail Users: Can I use any Gmail account?

Yes, you can use any standard Gmail or Google Workspace account.

Once you have selected your Linked Email Account, you'll want to connect your email account to DocketCalendar.

Click here to connect your email account to DocketCalendar

Attaching Documents to your Deadlines

DocketCalendar does not allow you to upload documents to your deadlines through the application. If you need documents attached to your calendar events, after you save your events to your calendar or calendars, you can open the events that you need to attach documents to and add them directly to the events on your calendar.

Although you can upload a document to an event, documents attached to events on your firm calendar will use memory and although this feature is supported with both Outlook and Google there are several considerations.

1) Documents added to events become duplicates which can lead to document proliferation.

2) Documents added to a Trial Trigger can create over 100 copies of the document on each calendar you add your events to. Even a 1 meg file stored in a trial on 5 calendars suddenly becomes 500 megs of data stored in your Outlook Calendar.

3) Too much data in your Outlook Calendar can lead to performance issues

4) Calendar events containing a physical copy of a document can be forwarded outside your environment inadvertently. Sending a copy of a deadline to apposing counsel or a deponent could include copies of sensitive information.

Document links do not add unnecessary data to your calendar and they come with built in security. Most shared files can be password protected so if you are using One Drive or Drop Box and someone not on your intended list for review rights to a document winds up with a copy of an event with your document link, they will not be able to view it.

File Sharing

Instead of adding a physical copy of your document to your events, we recommend inserting a link into the Description field in DocketCalendar events, which can be applied at the Case level if you want a link to your event available on all Case related deadlines, or you can insert a link into the Description field for any Trigger as you calculated deadlines, and you can also insert links into individual events.

For this article we will look at the two common file sharing programs. Dropbox, and OneDrive. Both of these file sharing programs have the same functionality so we will use One Drive as an example.

For OneDrive, open any file folder you have in OneDrive and right click on the file you want to share.

In the dropdown menu, click the Share icon.

A new window will popup with a Copy button that will copy a link to your document inside your OneDrive folder. Click the copy button.

Then go to DocketCalendar to past your link into your Case, Trigger or Event.

If you are calculating new deadlines, you can paste your link right in the Description field on the Create Events Screen. Once you calculate and save your events to your calendar, all of the events related to your trigger will have your event link.

If you have already created events that you want to add a document link to, you can edit the trigger to add your document link to all of the related events by editing the trigger. See View & Edit Triggers.

If you want to add a document link to a single event. See View & Edit Events

Multiple DocketCalendar Screens: There can be more than one!

DocketCalendar does not work in multiple tabs in the same browser, but it does work with multiple sessions in different browsers. With Chrome, Firefox & Edge you can open three sessions of DocketCalendar and perform Calculations and Updates on all the simultaneously.

Quick Start Google

Welcome to DocketCalendar

This Quick Start Guide assumes that you have already connected (Linked) your DocketCalendar account to your Google Gmail account.

Click here If you have not yet connect DocketCalendar to Gmail

If you've already been using DocketCalendar and have just connect to Outlook, this Quick Start Guide will help you find your way to the new features in the application that you have unlocked. If this is your first time using DocketCalendar, these links will help you get started.

First Time Users Click Here

DocketCalendar User Guide

How To Create Your First Case

How To Calculated Deadlines And Save To Your Calendar

How to Edit a Trigger

How to Edit an Event

What's New?

DocketCalendar now fully supports Pop-up & email reminders and Google Colors . Click here for more information about Google reminders and Colors

Training is free!

We would love to help you get started. Click here to book a DocketCalendar training call.

Click here to log in to DocketCalendar

Can't find what you are looking for or need help getting set up, click here to reach us directly or to schedule a free support call.

Quick Start Outlook

Welcome to DocketCalendar for Outlook

This Quick Start Guide assumes that you have already connected (Linked) your DocketCalendar account to your Microsoft Outlook account.

Click here If you have not yet connect DocketCalendar to Outlook

If you've already been using DocketCalendar and have just connect to Outlook, this Quick Start Guide will help you find your way to the new features in the application that you have unlocked. If this is your first time using DocketCalendar, these links will help you get started.

First Time Users Click Here

DocketCalendar User Guide

How To Create Your First Case

How To Calculated Deadlines And Save To Your Calendar

How to Edit a Trigger

How to Edit an Event

What's New?

DocketCalendar now fully supports Pop-up reminders and Outlook Categories. Click here for more information about Outlook reminders and Categories

Training is free!

We would love to help you get started. Click here to book a DocketCalendar training call.

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Can't find what you are looking for or need help getting set up, click here to reach us directly or to schedule a free support call.

Can't find what you are looking for or need help getting set up, click here to reach us directly or to schedule a free support call.

General Reminders: Create Reminder Events For Your Deadlines

General Reminders give you the ability to create a group of event reminders associated with a specific date. Outlook creates pop up reminders but you may also want additional events to your calendar so you can see them when you view your calendar. The General Reminders events can be set before “prior” or after “post” any date and can be grouped with other reminder events so that if your trigger date (for example, day of trial or day of deposition) changes, you only have to update the reminder group’s “trigger” date and all of the reminders will also update to your new date.

In this example we have reminders on Calendar for a Deposition

General Reminders has a few pre-built triggers like , 1 day, 1 week, 1month reminders and then it has groups that are built to be used in a pseudo custom fashion. There are 3 sets. Custom Reminders, Customer Reminders Past & Prior, Abbreviated Reminders. They all function similarly but they have slightly different default language.

Custom Reminder triggers produce an event for every day 1 to 31 days past and prior, every 2 weeks up to 4 months, every month up to a year and a 2 year reminder. Using our Excluded Events feature, you can create your custom group of events by excluding those you don't want leaving you with the exact group of deadlines you wish to create in a reminder group. For example. Excluding all events except 3 days before, 9 days before, 27 days before would produce only those 3 reminders. For more on excluded events see the Exclude Events section of the user guide. 

You can manually change the text in the Event Titles or you can apply text globally to your reminders using the custom text fields, Location, Subject, Description.

To add the General Reminders rule set click on the Subscription button in the Manage Section of the Sidebar Menu

Next select Other from the State Selection Dropdown Menu and then using the center scroll bar, scroll down to the bottom of the available rule sets. You will see General Reminders at the bottom of this section.

Note: General Reminders includes the 2 Triggers that are in General Reminders II, but if you only need to create single Events either as All Day Events or Events with Time, you can just use the General Reminders II rule set. It is only $12.00 per year.

Using General Reminders to create a group of events prior to a Deposition Date.

We have a Deposition on Calendar for Thursday Oct 13th. We want to create reminder events for this deposition on our Calendar.

Begin by going to the Create Events Page and selecting my Case.

Change the Jurisdiction to General Reminders

In this example we are using a General Reminders Trigger for 90,60,45,30,14,7,3,1 Reminders. DocketCalendar will calculate each event and insert the appropriate Reminder length in the Event Title. IE 90 Day Reminder:

Type image caption here (optional)'

By combining the Case Name, Subject Field and the Event Title, your Reminder Event will read "Happy V Lucky (Bozo Depo) 90 Day Reminder:

You can use a Category or Event Color to make your reminders stand out on your Calendar

How Many Calendars Do I Need?

You need at least one calendar to operate DocketCalendar. If everyone at the firm keeps their deadlines on a single shared calendar, one calendar will be sufficient.

Click here to watch a short video- How many calendars do I need?

DocketCalendar charges a user fee based on the number of calendars you send deadlines to.

The two advantages to having deadlines on your calendar-

- Popup reminders only work on events that are placed on your calendar.

- A shared calendar, in even a two attorney firm, can create clutter and making identifying your own deadlines more difficult.

The advantage to having a shared calendar is to give the firm's staff access to a single view where all deadlines can be seen. Anyone who has access to DocketCalendar will have access to the internal Firm Calendar. However, you may want an Outlook firm calendar so that attorneys have the option of viewing either their own deadlines or all deadlines.

If you or someone at your firm wants to receive deadlines on their calendar, you will need to add a calendar in the shopping cart.

The number of calendars you need is up to you and the members of your firm; feel free to add or remove calendars for free while in the trial period to determine what works best for your firm.

There are a variety of ways that Attorneys, Paralegals, Secretaries and Staff may use and share calendars.

The most common methods are as follows...

Solo Firm - Everyone shares one calendar.

Small Firm - Attorneys have their deadlines on their calendar. Paralegals, secretaries and staff may share an attorney's calendar or a firm calendar.

Mid Size firm - Every attorney, secretary, paralegal and staff members has their deadlines on their own calendar. The office maintains a central firm calendar as well.

Multi Office Firm - Every attorney, secretary, paralegal and staff members has their deadlines on their own calendar. Each office maintains a central firm calendar. Some firms find it useful to keep a central calendar with all offices deadlines as well.

Appearances Calendar - You may want to have a specific calendar to keep track of all court appearances and physical appearances such as depositions.

DocketCalendar will support as many calendars as you need. You only need one to use DocketCalendar, but you can have an unlimited number of calendars to support your firm's calendar requirements. DocketCalendar is capable of communicating with any calendar in your Outlook or Google domain.

Scheduling Orders: How to Calendar a Trial Order

In US District Courts DocketCalendar offers a Scheduling Order Template with no court rules so that the user can create a group of related dates with total control over the Event Titles and the Dates.

From any USDC Court select the Trigger: Scheduling Order Template (No Rules - Enter Dates from Order) You do not need to set the Trigger Date.

Press the Preview / Select Events button to display your events. Uncheck any Events you do not need and click the Next Edit Events / Add Calendars button

On the Edit Events / Add Calendar Screen you can Edit the Date for each Event by clicking into the Date Field, changing the Date and clicking Update Date.

You can Edit the Text of Any of the Events by Clicking the Pencil to Edit the Events. See Create Events for more details about Creating Events.

Click Add Events to Calendar(s) when you are ready to Save your Events to your Calendar.

For any Jurisdiction that does not offer a Scheduling Order Template. DocketCalendar offers a Generic Scheduling Order Template in General Reminders.

To use the General Reminder Scheduling Order go to the Create Events Page. Select your Case and then change the Jurisdiction to General Reminders and the Trigger: Scheduling Order Template (No Rules - Enter Dates from Order) Follow the steps above to customize your Scheduling Order Events.

Entering Non Rules Based Events: Client Meeting, Follow Ups

Sometimes you need to enter an event on your Calendar associated with your case that is not Court Rules based. There are several examples where manual entry is required.

1) You want to add a single event to your Calendar either as an All Day Event or an Event with Time. IE: Lunch with Client on Friday to discuss case.

2) You want to add a group of Events onto your Calendar to remind you of an upcoming important event. IE: One month, one week, and one day reminders before the day of a trial.

3) You have a Scheduling Order for your Case and need to enter a group of events with custom dates.

To Accommodate these scenarios we offer two rules sets General Reminders & General Reminders II

General Reminders give you the ability to create a group of event reminders associated with a specific date. General Reminders can be used for all three examples. Single events on a designated day, Groups of Reminders, and Scheduling Orders.

To Create Single Event you will need either the General Reminders rule set or the General Reminders II rules set. Click on the Subscription button in the Manage Section of the Sidebar Menu

Next select Other from the State Selection Dropdown Menu and then using the center scroll bar, scroll down to the bottom of the available rule sets. You will see General Reminders and General Reminders II at the bottom of this section.

Note: General Reminders includes the 2 Triggers that are in General Reminders II, but if you only need to create single Events either as All Day Events or Events with Time, you can just use the General Reminders II rule set. It is only $12.00 per year.

General Reminders II includes only 2 Triggers. “0 day reminder”  and “0 day reminder with time” These two triggers are for instances when you simply want to add an event to your calendar linked to your case name in DocketCalendar. 

To create a 0 day event or 0 day event with time, go to the Create Events Screen. Select the Case from the Case Dropdown that you want to create a single event for, and then Click on the Jurisdiction Dropdown to Select General Reminders. Note: The Jurisdiction Dropdown is searchable. You will only have access to General Reminders or General Reminders II if you have added them to your subscription.

Next select either 0 Day Event or 0 Day Event with Time, set your Trigger Date and Time if necessary and then click the Preview Events Button.

You will see a single Event listed at "Day of Event with Time" To customize your Event Title, click the Next: Edit Events / Add Calendars button.

On the Edit Event Screen, Click the Edit Pencil next to the Event Title "Day of Event with Time"

The Event will expand to show a blank field. You can enter any text into the Title Field and then click the Save button on the right side of the Title Field.

Once you click the Save button, your custom text is saved, but the screen will show the default text with (Edited) to indicate that the event has been customized. Click the Add Events To Calendar(s) button.

On the Confirmation Screen you will see your Customized Event Title displayed.

Can we customize the rules?

You cannot modify existing events or calculations. You can manually customize the event details and you can exclude events that you may not want to add to your Calendar. For non rules based events you can use General Reminders as a way to create custom Groups of Events. See Entering Non Rules Based Events for more information. =

If you need further customization, contact us about building new rules for you at support@docketcalendar.com

Don't See Your Court?

Just ask! DocketCalendar continues to build their library through feedback and customer demand. Once they build a rule set, it is monitored and kept it up to date, so generally new rules are not built until they have been requested. For most standard litigation related rule sets in State or Federal court, rules are built for free if there is at least one subscriber. Send requests for courts to support@docketcalendar.com

Delete a Group of Events

DocketCalendar Events are typically grouped together in Triggers. Each Trigger can have between one and over a hundred Events or Deadlines. When you Calculate a Trial and Save all of the Events to your Calendar, if your Case settles, you may want to remove all of the future Deadlines for your Trial from your Calendar. Archive Trigger Allows you to remove and entire group of Events from all of your Calendars. See Archive for more information

Court Rules Updates

DocketCalendar uses the CalendarRules engine and their proprietary technology and legal staff to build and maintain all rule sets. Because DocketCalendar is cloud-based, it can provide updates to customers in real-time, without any interaction required by end users.

  • Updates are released to the CalendarRules team in advance of publication and added to our system on the effective date. Any subscriber to that court is automatically in compliance with the new rules.
  • Sometimes a court will publish rule changes with an immediate effective date or for the next day. DocketCalendar is positioned to make these changes effective immediately so the end user does not have to apply any updates.

Court-Observed Holidays

Each court has holidays defined through their court's rules. All calculations take into account court-specific holidays and rule definitions. When you calculate deadlines Holidays are automatically factored into your calculations. If you want to see the specific Holidays observed by a particular court, you can check using the Research Console / Find Holidays Tab.

DocketCalendar Terminology: What is a Trigger?

The CalendarRules rules-based scheduling engine, which DocketCalendar uses to perform date calculations, relies upon two factors that apply in virtually every case.

First, the deadlines are almost always based upon–or triggered by–events described by a court's procedural rules.

Second, the procedural rules normally specify the length of time before or after that event that a deadline expires and the formula to be used to calculate that date.  

CalendarRules attorneys have identified the procedural rules that apply to a large percentage of the Federal and State courts and other tribunals that decide cases in the United States. From their review of those procedural rules, they have extracted the information that is is stored in the CalendarRules database and then utilized by DocketCalendar to perform deadline calculations:

  • Court Rules: All of the rules of procedure that apply in a case pending before a particular court or tribunal, or if available, a particular judge, are consolidated into a single set of rules applicable to a particular Jurisdiction.
  • List of Triggers for Each Jurisdiction: A comprehensive list of the trigger events–the events upon which deadlines are based–contained in all procedural rules applicable to the jurisdiction.
  • Related Events: A comprehensive list of the related events–deadlines–that are expressly calculated in reference to each trigger event and for each related event, the time period allowed by the procedural rules to comply with it.
  • Deadline: A specific due date calculated from court rules.
  • Holiday List: A list of the official holidays applicable to the rule set for each jurisdiction.
  • Service Types: The types of service of court papers recognized under the applicable procedural rules for each jurisdiction.
  • Date Rule: For each related event, the formulas specified in the procedural rules that describe how to calculate the deadline, including how the time period is affected by service types and when the deadline falls on a weekend or legal holiday.
  • Rule Text: For each related Event, an ID and snippet of text for each provision of the procedural rules that describes the event and its relation to the trigger event and prescribes the time period for compliance.
  • Calendar: Events created by a rules calculation will be placed automatically on you calendar. You can save which Calendars DocketCalendar saves Deadlines to for for each Case.
  • Jurisdiction: DocketCalendar uses the term jurisdiction as a shorthand to refer to all of the procedural rules that govern rule calculation for a case. Each jurisdiction on the use rules screen will automatically apply the federal rules of civil procedure, the local rules for that district.
  • Trigger, Trigger Event or Trigger Item: Virtually every deadline in a case is based upon and relates to an event spelled out in the procedural rules. In DocketCalendar, these events are called trigger events, trigger items or simply triggers. For example, summons and complaint served is the trigger.
  • Trigger Date: This is simply the date of the trigger event. Depending upon the trigger, it may be a date in the past or future, or today’s date—for example, the date of an upcoming trial or the date when a motion was served.
  • Related Events: This term refers to the deadlines and court appointments produced by a rules calculation based upon a trigger.  Most related events are deadlines, but where a trigger itself is a case-related court appointment that should appear on your calendar—e.g., deposition, hearing, trial, etc.—DocketCalendar will include it in the list as a Related Event.
  • Court Days; Holiday List; Rolling–Backward or Forward: When a deadline falls on a weekend or legal holiday. Each court has unique rules for how to address what to do with deadlines that land on a weekend or holiday. When court rules specify that a deadline is to be moved to the next court day, DocketCalendar refers to it as rolling forward; when court rules specify that the deadlines is to be moved to the previous court day, DocketCalendar refers to it as rolling backward.  
  • Service Type: Where a trigger is the service of a case filing, procedural rules in many courts add a period of time to the calculation of the related deadlines, depending upon the method of service or service type–for example, personal service, electronic service, service by mail, etc. DocketCalendar calls the addition of time to a deadline based upon the service type a service type offset.
  • Date Rule: When related events are calculated, DocketCalendar will allow you to view an abbreviated summary of the formula it used to calculate the deadline.  This is known as the date rule. DocketCalendar will also give you the option to include the date rule on your calendar entry for each of the related events.
  • Court Rule: DocketCalendar also allows you to view the text of the procedural rules which were used to formulate the date rule on which a deadline is based and the option to include the text in the body of the calendar entry for the deadline on your calendar. The court rule consists of two components:
  • Rule Text: One or more excerpts from the rules of procedural applicable to the case.
  • Rule ID: An abbreviation for the name of the applicable rules of civil procedure followed by the paragraph or section number for each rule text excerpt. For example, CCP 412.20(a)(3); 430.40(a), referring to two sections of the California Rules of Civil Procedure.

Parent & Child Events: Related Events & Sub Events

Parent Events with Children

Most Events in DocketCalendar are calculated from a Trigger Date. The Trigger Date is used to calculate the due dates, but some events are actually Triggered by an event that is being Triggered itself. We call Events with Sub Events, Parents, and their Sub Events Children. Example. Trial is the Trigger. Discovery Cutoff is a Parent,  L/D to Serve Notice of Motion re Non-expert Discovery is Triggered by Discovery. This would be a Child Event.

If you edit a single Event that is a Parent, you will be Prompted by DocketCalendar to consider Updating the Child Events. You can only Update the Date on the Child Events. This function is only to make sure that if you change the Date of a Parent, it's Child Events will be updated to the proper dates.

Recalculate Triggers: Change your Trial Date and Deadlines

When a Trial Date or a Hearing or Deposition Date changes, you can quickly Recalculate your Trigger and all of your Deadlines with the Recalculate Function.

To Recalculate a Trigger Date, Go to the Edit Trigger screen.

To Recalculate your Trigger click into the Date field and change the date, and time if necessary. Then Click the Recalculate Date button. When you use the Recalculate function DocketCalendar will also update any Text changes you make and any Categories you add or remove.

Note: Once you click the Recalculate Date button you will directed to a screen that will display all of your new event dates. Click the Update Calendars button to complete the process. Click the Back button if you do not want to process your changes.

Subscription: Make changes to your Courts & Calendars

You can make changes to your subscription but going clicking the Subscription button in the Manage section of the side bar menu.

DocketCalendar will open a new window and automatically log you into your shopping cart where you can add and remove courts and calendars from your subscription.

You will see a current list of Courts and Calendars displayed with your monthly recurring total subscription rate.

Select the State or United States for Federal courts and Other for Miscellaneous courts. You will see a complete list of available courts. The List has it's own scroll bar independent of the main browser scroll bar. Scroll in the Court list to see all available courts. Once you find your court, Press the plus button next to the court to add it to your cart.

To Add Calendars Click the Green + button next to Add Calendars. The Total will update for each Calendar you add so you can see you monthly charge for the additional Calendars before you check out.

To remove Calendar, click the Red Button in the Subscription section.

(Note: If you have added any courts or Calendars, the Cart Tab will be expanded and the Subscription Tab will be closed. You can click the Arrow next to Subscription to open the Subscription Tab to remove courts or Calendars.

You will not be charged until you click Check out if you are a Subscriber and in Trial mode you will not be charged at all. Remove courts from your subscription by clicking the grey x next to the court you want to remove and remove Calendars by click the Red - next to Calendar(s) in the Subscription section of your shopping cart.

Once you have finished adding courts press the checkout button. (In trial mode this will say Add Courts to Trial)

Click the Edit Profile button to change your contact information.

Archive: Remove Events from You Calendar

Archive is a very powerful tool to help you manage your events when you are ready to remove them from your Calendar.

You can Archive any Event, Trigger, or Case, and all of your Archived Events will be removed from every Assigned Calendar and a copy of your Events, Triggers, and Cases will be stored automatically in Archive

The Archive Function is found on the Edit Screens. Edit Case, Edit Trigger, and Edit Event.

When you click any Archive button you will be prompted to confirm before the Archive takes place.

Archiving Events works like Exporting Events.

You will see a popup message with a % meter showing the status of your Process. DO NOT CLOSE YOUR BROWSER until the Update has completed and you have been returned to the View Case Screen. Processing Events takes time. You can open multiple sessions of DocketCalendar, but not in the same browser. See Multiple Docket Calendar Screens for more information on using multiple sessions of DocketCalendar.

Once your Events have been Archived, you can view your events by clicking the Archive button in the View section of the side bar menu.

Before you can Archive a Case, you must first Archive the individual Triggers

Archive shows All Archive Cases. This view is identical to the All Cases view except here you are viewing Archived Data. If you only Archive a single Event, DocketCalendar will show the Case, and the Trigger for that Event in the Archive so that you always see your data organized in the same structure. Case, Trigger, Event.

Any Event that has been Archived can be Deleted from the Archive by navigating to the Event View Screen for that Event in the Archive and clicking the Delete Button

Note: You can't Delete a Case from the Archive if you have only Archived some of the Events or Triggers. As long as there are Events belonging to a Trigger on your Calendar, the Archived Case and Trigger can't be deleted.

All Archived Case View

Archived Case Detail View

Archive Trigger View

Archive Event View

Events: How to Calculate Deadlines & Save to Your Calendar

The Create Events Screen is where you Calculate Deadlines and Create Events for your Cases. From any Case Details Screen, you can click the Create Events Button and you will be taken to the Create Events Screen with your Case Name and Jurisdiction preloaded.

You can also click the Events button in the Create section of the side panel menu.

Once you have selected a Case your Case Name and all of your case related details will populate.

On the Create Events Screen, DocketCalendar will load your Jurisdiction, and your Custom Text Fields.

You can erase or edit the details in the Location, Subject or Description fields. DocketCalendar will remember the changes you make for each Trigger as you calculate and save them to your calendar but it will not overwrite any Text you have saved at the Case level.

To update the text for the Location, Subject, and Comment fields so that the Create Events Screen pre populates with different information, you must go to the Case screen, click Edit Case and make your changes in the Case. (Only do this if you want all future Triggers to have this information)

Once you have selected a Case, next you must select a Trigger from the Trigger Dropdown menu.

The Trigger Dropdown Menu is Searchable.

Select a Trigger, Set the Trigger Date to the appropriate date. The Time Field Field defaults to 8 AM. You only need to set the time if your event includes a time, otherwise leave it set to 8 AM. All Events will be created as All Day Events. If you forget to set the time on a Trigger that requires time, you will be prompted to confirm that you want your appointment time set to 8 AM or you can change it before proceeding. You can also set the length of time for the timed event.

If your Trigger includes a consideration for Service Type in the calculation, a Service Type dropdown menu will appear.

Note: For multi day events IE: Day of Trial (Your trial may be 4 days) DocketCalendar does not support multi day events or events with a different Start and End Date. To accommodate Multi day events we recommend using the Zero Day Event in General Reminders.

You will notice in the first screen shot, the Case is selected and the Description is Pre-filled with a Description from the Case. Add additional information into the Subject and Location to provide more details on your Calendar Events. Example, (Motion to Compel) will populate in the Subject field in between the Case name and the Deadlines (Straight V Narrow (Motion to Compel) L/D to file Notice of Motion)

Press the Preview Events button.

Once you have set your Date, Time and Text fields, DocketCalendar will Calculate all of your deadlines and produce a list of Events at the bottom of the screen. Scroll Down to view all of your events.

In the Preview / Select Events section You will see all of the available events for your Trigger.

If you have Excluded Events they will be unchecked automatically. You will see in the Results field, a record count for all of the Events calculated.

You can uncheck any events you do not want to save for this trigger. Only checked events will be saved to your Case and Calendars. If you want to review the Court Rules, click the arrow next to the check box to expand the event's details. You will see the full text of the Court Rule for each Deadline and the "Date Rule".  We also include the specific part of the Court Rule that pertains to the Date Calculation separately as the Date Rule.

You also have options to Print, Export to Excel, CSV, iCal, or VCS files. If, for example, you want to send your client a copy of the deadlines so they can drop them on their Outlook Calendar. Note: Export files are static files that will not interact with DocketCalendar. To send deadlines to your calendar or your firm's calendars, proceed to the Edit Events / Add Calendars Screen.

To prevent you from placing unnecessary events on your calendar, DocketCalendar will automatically uncheck events that are sub events, or grand children of another event. If you do not wish to add Discovery Cutoff to your calendar, you won't want the last day to file the notice of Discovery Cutoff added to your Calendar. To learn more about Parent and Child Events click here: Parent & Child Events

If you want to see the relationship of the events you have calculated, click the Show Tree View button. Note: If you have manually unchecked any events, those changes will be lost when you change views. If your unchecked events are stored as Excluded Events, they will remain unchecked.

You will need to switch back to Date view to proceed Click the Text Link Show Normal View to return to the default view.

Once you are have selected your events click the Next: Edit Events / Add Calendars button.

DocketCalendar will proceed to the Edit Events / Add Calendars screen and it will only display the Events you had checked on the Create Events Screen. You notice that there is a new record count. If you unchecked events, this number will reflect the number of Events you will be Adding to your Calendar(s).

On the Edit Events / Add Calendar Screen you can modify the text of each Event and edit the date.

To Edit the Date, click in the Date field and date picker will open. Select your new date and the date picker will close. Click Update Date Button

To Edit the Event Text, click the pencil icon next to the event title. The Event will expand to display a blank text field. You can type in the blank edit text field and replace the original text, or you can use the Copy button to copy the original text into the edit text field and then make changes to the text. If you want to abandon your change, click the cancel button. Click Save to Save your changes to the Event title. Note: DocketCalendar will not show the edited Event title. After the event is saved, The text (Edited) will be displayed next to the edit pencil showing that the Event has been edited.

If you missed unchecking an Event on the Create Events Screen, you can uncheck additional events on this screen

Add / Remove Calendars

Make any changes to the Calendars that will receive the Trigger events. You can Add and Remove Calendars at this stage.

Add / Remove Categories

Outlook users can Add and Remove multiple Categories. Google Users can choose or change one Color on the Group of Events.

Google users can modify the Event color and add an additional Popup Reminder and Email reminder for each individual Event.

Add Event to Calendar(s)

When you click the Add Events to Calendar(s) button and all of your Events will be added directly to all of the Calendar you have assigned to the Trigger.

You will see a popup message with a % meter showing the status of your Event Export. DO NOT CLOSE YOUR BROWSER until the Export has completed and you see the Confirmation Screen. Processing Events takes time. You can open multiple sessions of DocketCalendar, but not in the same browser. See Multiple Docket Calendar Screens for more information on using multiple sessions of DocketCalendar.

Once you see the Confirmation Screen, your Events are now on you Calendars. The process is complete.

View & Edit Triggers: Change Dates, Edit Location & Calendars

Triggers are all saved directly under each Case. To view your Triggers, click on the All Cases Button to view a list of all of your active cases. Then select a the View button next to the case you wish to view.

View Triggers:

The Case detail screen shows a list of all Triggers that have been saved to your calendar for the case. You can search the Trigger list using the header search fields. Note: the search fields are case sensitive. Click the View button next to the Trigger you wish to view or edit.

View Trigger Details:

On the View Trigger screen you will see all of the details for your trigger in two sections.

The top half of the View Trigger screen shows the Trigger specific information. Name of Trigger, Trigger date, all custom text applied to the Trigger a list of the Calendars that the trigger has been saved to and a list of the Categories used on the Trigger.

The Bottom half displays a list of all Triggers that have been saved to your calendar. The Trigger list is searchable and the search fields are case sensitive. Click the View button next to a Trigger to view or edit a specific Trigger.

Click the Back to Case Button to get Back to the Case View screen. 

Click Edit Trigger if you want to Recalculate a Trigger ,make changes to the text fields, add or remove calendars or Archive a Trigger.

Edit Trigger

The Edit Trigger screen is where you go to make changes to your Trigger and all the related Events for that Trigger.

Recalculate:

To Recalculate your Trigger click into the Date field and change the date, and time if necessary. Then Click the Recalculate Date button. When you use the Recalculate function DocketCalendar will also update any Text changes you make and any Categories you add or remove.

Note: Once you click the Recalculate Date button you will directed to a screen that will display all of your new event dates. Click the Update Calendars button to complete the process. Click the Back button if you do not want to process your changes.

Update Text & Categories:

To make changes to text fields or to update the Category on all events related to your Trigger, click the Apply Changes button. Note: Apply Changes will note Recalculate your Trigger. If you need to Recalculate and Update text at the same time, use the Recalculate Date button.

Add & Remove Calendars:

You can not Add or Remove Calendars while Recalculating or Updating Text and Categories. If you need to Add or Remove a Calendar and you also need to either Recalculate your Trigger or Update the Text fields or change a Category, make your changes first, then add or remove Calendars.

Archive Trigger:

To remove a Trigger and all of the related Events, Click the Archive Trigger Button

View All Events: Quickly Find and Edit any Event

View All Events gives you quick access to All Events created by DocketCalendar. To access the All Events view click the All Events button in the View section of the sidebar menu.

This is a handy way to find a specific event without having to build a Report, or go through the navigation of the Cases and Triggers to find what you are looking for. All of the rows are sortable so you can quickly sort by Date or Case Name or Trigger title. Click the View button to view or edit any event.

You can use the Search filter box to type in any partial word to narrow the view to specific items such as a Case Name or Event Title. You can search for a date by typing in the full date 09-06 will find all events on that day in any year. 09-06-2022 will find the specific date.

All Cases / Cases / Triggers / Events: Central Deadline Hub

All Cases

All Cases displays all of your Active Cases. The search fields are case sensitive. Click View to access the Case details screen or Case View.

Case View

The Case View screen is the home screen for your case. Case Details displays all of the information stored on your Case. Case Name, Jurisdiction, Calendars Assigned to the Case, Location Text, Subject Text and Comments or Body Text can all be stored and recalled each time you calculate a new trigger.

Edit Case:

When you make changes to the Case, the changes are stored at the case level and applied to all future calculations. Edit Case is also where the Archive Case button is located. (Before you can Archive a case you must first Archive all Triggers.

If you need to update events that have already been applied to your calendar edit either the Trigger or an individual Event.

Outlook Users do not have Email Reminders. Outlook Users have Categories instead of Event Color.

Create Events:

The Create Events button will take you to the Create Events screen and automatically select your Case and Jurisdiction. You can also navigate directly to the Create Events screen and select a case from the Case Dropdown Menu.

View All Events:

The View All Events Button on the Case Details Screen gives you a list of all of your case events for that specific case. Events can be sorted by Date, Event Title, Trigger Name and Calendars and all fields are searchable. Searches are case sensitive. Click the View Button to see Event Details and Edit Events.

Triggers:

Triggers will show all Triggers you have calculated and saved to your case. Click the View button to access Trigger Details, Edit or Recalculate your Trigger, and to View and Edit your Trigger Events.

Introduction: Welcome To DocketCalendar

DocketCalendar calculates court rules-based deadlines and automatically creates events on your Outlook or Google Calendar. DocketCalendar also has a built in calendar so you can start calculating deadlines before you connect to Outlook or Google.

A few things DocketCalendar can do

- Automatically calculate, and create All rules based deadlines related to your case.

- Instantly populate your deadlines directly onto any Outlook or Google calendar.

- Automatically recalculate and remove deadlines from everyone’s calendar when matters settle or court dates change.

- Instantly produce robust deadline reports and much more!

Click here for a quick start video and instructional guide

Click here to Login and get started

The first time you log into DocketCalendar you will be able to instantly calculate deadlines and save them to DocketCalendar built in Firm Calendar.

You may want to try a few calculations before connecting DocketCalendar to your Outlook or Google environment. When you are ready, connecting to Outlook or Google only takes a few minutes.

Click here when you are ready to connect DocketCalendar to your Outlook or Gmail Account

How does my subscription work?

Your DocketCalendar Subscription has two components; Court Rules and Calendars.
Each Court Rule set contains local court rules combined with the state court rules, you only have to use one court rule set to calculate your deadlines properly.

What comes with a court?

- Unlimited firm-wide use of that jurisdiction.

- The ability to remove courts from your subscription at any time; this way you only pay for what you currently need.

- The ability to add courts to your subscription at any time, you can gain immediate access to any court as new cases open.

DocketCalendar does not charge per user, only per calendar.

What comes with a calendar?

- Unlimited firm-wide use and access to that calendar.

- The ability to share the calendar with anyone at the firm.

- The ability to add or remove calendars from your subscription at any time.

How many calendars do I need?

- If everyone at the firm keeps their deadlines on a shared calendar or firm calendar, you may only need one.

- If you or someone at your firm wants to receive deadlines on their calendar, you will need to add a calendar in the shopping cart.

Click here for more information on how to select the right number of calendars

Secondary Outlook Calendars

How to Create a Secondary Outlook Calendar

Add a calendar to an Outlook profile from Outlook desktop.

Log into the Outlook account where you want to create the new calendar.

At the bottom of the screen, click on the three dots and select the folders icon.

Click the "New Folder" option.

In the create new folder window, scroll up to select "Folder contains: Calendar Items".

Name your calendar and click save.

You can then share your calendar with either the firm calendar or if you creating a secondary calendar on the firm calendar, you can share it with users in the firm.

Add a Calendar to an Outlook Profile from Outlook Web.

Log into the Outlook account where you want to create the new calendar.

Click the "Add Calendar" button, located above "My calendars".

In the new window click on the option to "Create blank calendar"

Name your calendar and set the calendar color and icon. Press save to create your calendar. You can then share your calendar with either the firm calendar or if you creating a secondary calendar on the firm calendar, you can share it with users in the firm.

Sharing an Outlook Calendar

Sharing an Outlook Calendar

In order to post events created through DocketCalendar to an Outlook calendar that belongs to another user, the calendar must be shared with to the linked email calendar.

Outlook Desktop

To share your Outlook calendar, click on the "Share Calendar" icon in the home menu of your Outlook calendar.

Select the contact you want to share your calendar with. Click the "Add" button and then pick from your address book to send an invitation to share your calendar.

Once you add the contact to the list of shared calendar contacts, you can change the permission level to "Can Edit"

Note:  Only people in your Outlook contacts listing for the account you have logged into will appear in the list.  

Outlook Web

To share your Outlook calendar, click on the three dots next to the calendar in the calendar view and select "Sharing and permissions".

Enter the name of the person you want to share your calendar with and click the share button.

Set permission level to "Can edit".

IT Admin Consent for Outlook

Depending on how your Outlook is configured, you may receive a request for approval for DocketCalendar, but if your user was given the option to accept permissions, you will not receive and approval request and you will see DocketCalendar listed as an "Enterprise Application".

Regardless of whether you approved a request, or the user has approved permissions, you will still need to click on the DocketCalendar Enterprise Application link and go to the permissions screen and "Grant" permissions.

User Approved Permissions Process

If you did not receive a request for approval for the DocketCalendar application, and your user was given the option to accept permissions follow these steps. See below for Admin Approval Process.

Log into the Azure Admin Portal and click on the Active Directory- SIGN IN HERE

From the Overview screen click Enterprise Applications

From the Enterprise Application screen click on the DocketCalendar application link.

From the DocketCalendar Overview screen click Permissions

From the DocketCalendar permissions screen click the "Grant admin consent for "Your firm's URL"" Once you click the Grand admin consent button you will be prompted to login with your Firm's admin credentials.

You will be prompted to login with Admin credentials.

Click accept on the permission request pop up window.

You will see a confirmation pop-up in the top right side of your permissions screen. Once you have completed this step, DocketCalendar is fully permissioned and ready for use. There is no automatic notification to the users that the approval process has been completed so you may want to inform your users that they can now login.

Admin Approval Process

You should receive and email request to Grant permission for DocketCalendar

From the Admin Consent screen, click on the DocketCalendar link under "My Pending"

In the Details section, click the "Review permissions and consent button".

Note: you will be prompted to login with Admin credentials and accept permissions. Once you have completed this step, you will need to go back to the Enterprise applications screen shown above, click on DocketCalendar, and go to the permissions screen.
Then click the "Grant permissions" button. You will be prompted to login with Admin credentials a second time and you will be prompted to accept permissions a second time.

Once you have completed this step DocketCalendar is fully permissioned and ready for use. Although the user will receive an email confirmation when you approve DocketCalendar through the Admin Consent Request Screen, there is no automatic notification to the users that the approval process has been completed after you Grant permission, so you may want to inform your users that they can now login.

Assigned Calendars: Linking to your Google & Outlook Calendars

This Quick Guide assumes that you have already connected (Linked) your DocketCalendar account to your Email account.

Click here If you have not yet connect DocketCalendar to your Email account

Assigning Calendars

1. Add the number of desired calendars to your subscription from the shopping cart. The shopping cart can be accessed by clicking on “Subscription” under the manage tab in DocketCalendar. You may add an unlimited amount of calendars while in free trial mode.

2. Click on “Assigned Calendars” under the manage section on the toolbar. (Screenshot Below)

3. If you want to assign a calendar that does not belong to your linked email account, you will need to share that calendar.  Share Outlook    Share Gmail

3. Give your calendar a name.

4. Enter the email address of this calendar. (If this is a secondary calendar, enter the email address of its primary calendar)

5. Locate and select the calendar you want to assign from the “Select Calendar” dropdown. If you do not see the calendar you want to assign, you will need to share that calendar with the linked email account. (If you have not shared any calendars with your linked email account, you will have three options to choose from; United States holidays, Calendar, and Birthdays)

6. Click “Assign.”

Note: If your newly shared calendars do not appear in the select calendar dropdown, you may need to accept/add them from your Linked email account.

After calendars have been shared, you will need to accept the invitation and click view. The invitation will be sent to the inbox of the linked email account.  

Outlook Users: If your IT administrator shared the calendars from a PowerShell command, they will need to be added to the calendar using the Add Calendar / Add From Directory function.

Google Users: In order to add a shared calendar to your Gmail account, you must be logged in to only that Gmail account in your web browser. If you use Gmail normally for any other email address, we recommend, just for adding new shared calendars, that you open an incognito in Chrome and login to your Linked Gmail account there. Then accept the shared calendar.

You can not make edits to an Assigned Calendar. If you need to Remove an Assigned Calendar we recommend you Remove the Events from Your Calendar Assigned to that Calendar first.

Login with Outlook

When you log into DocketCalendar, you will need two sets of credentials. Your DocketCalendar account login and password, and your Linked email account login and password. (Note - The linked email account is not your personal work email. See Below - Check with your Firm Admin for your Linked Account login credentials)

The first time you log into DocketCalendar in a new browser, you will need both sets of credentials, but once you have logged in, you can save your credentials to your password manager or your browser, and then you'll be able to log in with just a click.

Login to DocketCalendar

In addition to the DocketCalendar website, we recommend you bookmark the Microsoft office 365 website

Step 1:  Enter your Login and Password,  Click the End User Agreement checkbox and then the login button.

Login: Provided by DocketCalendar

PW: Request from your firm Administrator

Step 2: You will be prompted to log into your Linked email account. This is not your email account, it is a different login that you will need in order to log into DocketCalendar.

Request your Linked email address and Password from your email Administrator

DocketCalendar and your Web Browsers

Multiple Sessions

DocketCalendar does not allow you to "Create" events, "Recalculate" events, or "Edit" events in the same browser session. In other words, you can't calculate and save to Trials simultaneously in the same browser, however, you can calculate and save events in different browsers. We recommend opening at least 2 sessions. Either Chrome and Firefox, or Chrome and Edge, or all three Chrome, Firefox, and Edge.

Browser Tabs

Although you can't calculate more than one trigger at a time inside a browser, you can open multiple browser tabs for reference. This will come in handy if you are working on a trigger related to another event and you want to keep a copy of that event open in another screen. If you right-click on any of the left-panel navigation windows, you can keep your current screen and open another session in a new tab. (Remember, one calculation at a time in each browser, but having multiple screens may come in handy from time to time.

Here are a few links to help you get started with DocketCalendar

DocketCalendar User Guide

How To Create Your First Case

How To Calculated Deadlines And Save To Your Calendar

How to Edit a Trigger

How to Edit an Event

Reports: Deadline & Custom Reporting Tools

Reports can be printed, converted into a pdf file or exported in a spreadsheet format. You can even copy the text from your browser and past it directly into an email.

How to Generate a Report

Click on the + Reports button in the Create section of the sidebar menu

You will be taken to the Create Reports Screen

The Report Tool includes a variety of filters that allow you to select the deadlines and other case-related events you want to view in a report format.

Report Options:

Date Filters:

Choose the beginning and end dates for a date range search

Case Filter:

Choose this filter to display all events in a particular case. Combine with other filters such as date range to produce a more specific subset of your case data.

Jurisdiction:

You choose this filter from a dropdown list of all Jurisdictions to which your firm has subscribed. This filter will give you all events relating to cases where the specified jurisdiction has been selected for the case.

Report Details:

Many of the details of your Cases, Triggers, and Events can be searched using Report Details. These fields are not Dropdown menus, but they have a prefill logic similar to internet fields that begin to prefill as you type. Report Details fields will only prefill with information from existing events you have saved in your cases.

These fields will present all possible matches for whatever you type into the field, but the options you can select are only total phrases from the field you are searching. In this example typing in Summ, will show three triggers that have the words Summary and Summons. You can't search for just Summ, you must select a complete Phrase. Select Summons and Complaint Filed in Court and your report will include all Summons events in all Case and Jurisdictions.

(If you want to do partial word searches in your reports see below for the Search Results field)

Triggers:

Search any Trigger title that you have used in a calculation

Event Name:

Search any Event Title you have used in a Calculation

Event Types:

Search for the three event types. Day to Appear or Attend, Day to File and/or Serve, Other

Subject:

Any custom text you type into the subject field on the Create Events Screen can be searched.

Location:

Location is a text field, it can filter any text saved in the location field.

Comment:

Any custom text you type into the comment or field on the Create Events Screen can be searched.

Calendar(s):

Any Calendars you have assigned to your cases can be searched

Categories(s):

Outlook Only. Search your Outlook Categories used in your Deadlines.

Once you are ready to run your report. Scroll Down to the bottom of the page and click the Preview Report Screen.

Display Options:

The default view for your reports will include Case Name, Event Date, Event Title. You can add additional fields by clicking the checkboxes in the Columns section of the Display Options.

Search Results

Filter Search Results:

Once you have clicked the Preview Reports Button you will notice a small Search box on the top right side of the screen. This search field is a global search and will automatically filter your report by matches in any field in your report.

You can Print your results, export your result to CSV or Excel and you can Copy the Raw Text using the Copy button.

Extra Reports Tip:

You can Click and Drag the text on the report screen and paste it into an email and it will display with Formatting. Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge will retain some formatting. In the screenshot below. DocketCalendar Report Data copied from Microsoft Edge and Pasted into an Outlook 365 Web Email puts the report data in a scrollable Excel view right in the email. Just copy from page and paste in email.

Excluded Events: Permanently Remove Unwanted Deadlines

Excluded Events provides advanced functionality that allows you to exclude events from being created during rules calculations and save your preference as a default. Each time you calculate that trigger, you automatically have the events you do not want to create unchecked.

DocketCalendar will provide a deadline for every court rule and this will include deadlines for every type of matter before the court. Procedural rules may trigger deadlines applicable to types of cases the firm does not handle. Excluding those deadlines will speed up the review process during rules calculations.

With Exclude Events you can: Exclude specific events from each unique trigger in any court you have in your subscription. You can apply your changes either to a single court, or to all "like" courts, for example, all State Superior Courts. This enables you to quickly set your entire rules subscription to your preference.

Click the Excluded Events button in the Manage section of the side bar menu.

You will be taken to the View All Excluded Events Screen. This page shows all of your currently Excluded Events. The first time you access this screen it will have no data to display.

To Add Excluded Events, Click the Edit Exclude Events Button and you will be taken to the Edit Excluded Events Screen.

1. Select the Jurisdiction that includes the events you wish to exclude from the Jurisdiction dropdown list.

2. Select the trigger in the Jurisdiction that creates the events you want to exclude.

3. Click the Preview Events button.

4. The list of the events relating to that Trigger will be displayed.

5. Select the events you wish to exclude by checking the applicable checkboxes. (Checking a box will make that event default uncheck at calculation).

6. Choose whether you want to apply the exclusions only to the selected jurisdiction or to all related jurisdictions that contain the same Trigger.

Note:  Use Apply to All Jurisdictions where several jurisdictions include the same trigger and related events. This will generally apply where two or more jurisdictions employ the same procedural rules—for instance, if your subscription includes several federal bankruptcy courts or district courts.

Click the Save Excluded Events button.

The list of events with checkboxes will clear from the screen and you will see a list of the specific Events Excluded for your trigger.

Click the View Excluded Events to return to the All Excluded Events Screen.

Restore Excluded Events

Excluded events can be restored, so that they will once again show up during rules calculations. To restore excluded events, you reverse the process used to exclude them. To restore Excluded Events: Follow the Steps above and uncheck the Events you want to restore.

View & Edit Events: Change Event Titles, Dates and More

If you need to make edits to a single event. Do not edit the event on your Outlook or Google Calendar Calendar. DocketCalendar will create individual copies of your events for each Calendar. Changes made on a Calendar will only apply to that person's calendar and if the Event is updated by DocketCalendar any changes made by an individual may be over written.

Finding Your Event

To Edit or Delete (Archive) an event, you will need to find the Event in DocketCalendar. If you are viewing a Trigger you will see a list of events for that Trigger on the View Trigger screen you can view, edit and delete from the list of event on any View Trigger screen. You can also use the View All Events function to find, view, and edit your events. From the View All Events Screen you can search your Events using the Search field.

If you are looking at the built in Calendar in the DocketCalendar application, you can click on any event on the Calendar and click the View Event button. You can also access any event from your Outlook Calendar. Each event on your Outlook Calendar will contain a link to the corresponding DocketCalendar event. Note: You must have your DocketCalendar login credentials to view the events in DocketCalendar.

View Event

The View Event Screen shows all of the details of your Event. Many of these values are also visible in your Calendar entries but the View Event Details screen contains every piece of event information available including the Original Event date, the Court Rule and Date Rules so if you recalculate, you will always know your original date and if you have questions about your deadline, you have the rule text right on screen.

If you want to Edit of Delete (Archive) and event, from the View Event screen, click Edit Even

Edit or Delete /Archive an Event

On the Edit Event Screen, you can Modify the Event Title, Change the Date, Modify any of the Custom Text Fields.

Edit Text:

Note: Text and Category Changes made to an individual Event will be retained during Recalculation and Update. If you update the Comment Text at the Event level and then Update the Comment Text at the Trigger level at a later time, the Trigger change will overwrite the Event. However if you make changes to the Comment Text at the Event level and then Update the Location, the changes made to the Comment at the Event level will be remembered. They will only be overwritten if that specific field is being modified at a higher (Trigger) level.

Text and Category changes do not apply to Children Events - See Parent Events with Children below

Although you can add and remove Calendars from an individual Event, The DocketCalendar program currently does not support these events during Trigger Updates. If you make updates to a Trigger, or you Delete / Archive a trigger any Events added to Calendars at the Event level will not be updated. In the event that you need to update a Trigger that has an event with additional Calendars added to it at the single Event level, we recommend, going back to the Event, removing the additional Calendars at the event level, make your Trigger changes, then add your additional Calendars back.

Edit Date:

You can modify the Date on any single Event. If you make changes to the Date, and you also make changes to the Text both functions can be updated at the same time. However, if you hare updating an Event that has Children, even if you select the Update Children option, only the Date will be used to Recalculate the Children.

Edit Calendars:

Add and Remove Calendars does not factor in Child Events. You can only Add or Remove a Calendar from a Single Event on the Edit Event Screen.

Parent Events with Children

Most Events in DocketCalendar are calculated from a Trigger Date. The Trigger Date is used to calculate the due dates, but some events are actually Triggered by an event that is being Triggered itself. We call Events with Sub Events, Parents, and their Sub Events Children. Example. Trial is the Trigger. Discovery Cutoff is a Parent,  L/D to Serve Notice of Motion re Non-expert Discovery is Triggered by Discovery. This would be a Child Event.

If you edit a single Event that is a Parent, you will be Prompted by DocketCalendar to consider Updating the Child Events. You can only Update the Date on the Child Events. This function is only to make sure that if you change the Date of a Parent, it's Child Events will be updated to the proper dates.

Changes made to Text, or Category will only be applied to the Parent. Typically you would use this function, for example, to add a Zoom link to the Day of Deposition, but not to all of the Child Events.

Delete / Archive  Events

You can remove an Event from your Calendar use the Archive Event Button. To remove an entire trigger Update the Trigger and use the Archive Trigger button.

Secondary Google Calendars

How to Create a Secondary Google Calendar

  1. Open the Google calendar associated with your Google account. If you have not created a shortcut to access your calendar, type "calendar.google.com" in your browser's address bar and press the Enter key.
  1. On the bottom portion of the calendar sidebar, click "+" to the right of the words "Other calendars" to display a menu.
  1. On that menu, choose "Create new calendar".

The Settings page for the new calendar will be displayed.

  1. Enter a name for your secondary calendar and click "Create calendar".

A gray banner at the bottom of the page will indicate that the new calendar is being created.

  1. After the banner disappears from the page, click the arrow to the left of Settings at the top of the page to return to the list of your calendars.

The secondary calendar will appear in the list of calendars on the left side of the page. The new calendar will now appear in the dropdown list of calendars on the "assigned calendars" page in DocketCalendar.

Application Defaults: Include Court Rule in Events

DocketCalendar contains many user controllable settings locate on the Application or "App" Defaults screen. These settings are global to all DocketCalendar Users. We suggest you review these settings with all of your users before making changes to the defaults.

When a User logs into DocketCalendar for the first time and reviews settings on the Update Options screen, they will already be configured as shown below and no further action is needed unless the User wants to change the default values.

Below is a list of available options. Once you have made changes, click the Save button to save your changes.

Linked Email Account

The Linked Email Account is set when you create your DocketCalendar Subscription. It is viewable from the App Default screen for confirmation purposes but it can not be changed. If you need to change your Linked Email Account you will need to contact us at support@docketcalendar.com

Default Jurisdiction.

If you have subscribed to the rules in more than one jurisdiction, you can select one as the default jurisdiction. When you create a case, this jurisdiction will be automatically selected. This setting would be useful to a practitioner whose litigation practice is limited primarily to a single jurisdiction. Default Setting: No Jurisdiction Selected.

Add "Court Rule" to Body

By default, the system adds text from the court rule to the body of the appointments or deadlines created on the calendar. Users can change this option as follows:

  • Don’t add: The Court Rule will not be added.
  • Rule Text: The default—rule text will be added.
  • Rule ID only. An identification code, frequently the official abbreviation used to refer to the applicable procedural rules, will be added—for example, FRCP 33(b)(2)—i.e., Rule 33(b)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

Add "Date Rule" to Body

Default Setting: The Date Rule is an abbreviated summary of the calculation used to calculate the event date. It includes how many days, what type of days (court or calendar), what direction (forward or backward), and the roll method (what to do if the date lands on weekend or holiday). By default, the Date Rule is placed into the body of the appointment or deadline on the calendar. Users can change the option to “No” if they do not want the Date Rule in the body. 

Case Location

Default Setting: Prepend to subject: This option determines where the case name will be placed in the subject or the body of the calendar entry. If you do not want to accept the default setting, select one of the other options from the dropdown list:

Prepend to subject. Puts the case name first on the subject line, before the event description. (Default and recommended setting)

Append to subject. Puts the case name after the event description in the subject line. If the event has a lengthy description, the case name may be cut off when you view the subject line in the Google calendar.

Prepend to body. Puts the case name in the body of the calendar entry, before the Court Rule or Rule ID.

Append to body. Puts the case name in the body of the event after the location of the Court Rule or Rule ID.

Note: If you choose an option that puts the case name in calendar entry, either before or after the body, the case name will not appear in the subject of the event on the Google calendar and you not be able to see it without opening the calendar entry.

Don’t add. Removes the case name from the subject and body. This option is also not recommended, because you may not be able to identify the case without the case name.

Add "User Notification" Tag

This will place a unique text string on each event that belongs to a specific Assigned Calendar.

Email Reminder - Gmail Only

This setting assigns the default value on the Add Case screen for the length of time before an event or deadline created in a case that the Google calendar will generate an email notification for a particular event placed on the Google calendar.

Pop-Up Reminder

This setting assigns the default value on the Add Case screen for the length of time before an event or deadline created in a case that the calendar will generate a Pop Up notification for a particular event placed on the calendar.

Display "Events" Details:

This setting will override all event settings and remove all event details from your DocketCalendar Events.

Display Trigger Title on Calendar Body:

This setting will display the trigger Title on all related events. Default setting is Yes

Appointments w/time status

This setting determines whether a calculated event that is a court appearance or appointment will show the time slot when it takes place as “busy”, so that other people will not try to schedule other appointment at that time. The default is “busy”. It works in conjunction with Appointment length setting.

Appointment length

This setting determines the length of time that will be reserved on your calendar, when a rules calculation places an appointment event on your calendar that takes place at a specified time. The default is 1 hour. If the previous option is set to “busy”, your calendar will show that you are busy for the period of time selected.

Add “DocketCalendarDeadline” Tag

By default this setting is set to “Yes”. When enabled, the word “DocketCalendarDeadline” is placed into the body of a calendar item. When the calendar item is transmitted as a meeting invitation during the docket creation process, the presence of this tag gives the recipient the option to identify those invitations received from DC. Using the Google’s filtering function, the User is able to create a filter that can remove incoming meeting invitations and archive them or move them to another folder.

Event Color

This setting establishes a default color for events appearing on the Google calendar, as a result of Date Calculations. When a new Case is created, the selected color is automatically transferred to the Event Color field on the Add Case screen, where it becomes the default Event Color for every event created in that case. During a Date Calculation, the Event Color can be changed again, allowing all events created using a particular Trigger to have a different color than other events created in the case. By default, this setting is set to “No Color”. You can choose one of the colors from the dropdown list.

Search Triggers, Events & Rules

Sometimes, it is not obvious which Trigger to use to calculate particular deadlines in a case. You can search the Trigger Title when you are calculating, but you may only know the deadline and may not be sure what triggers it, or you may only know the court rule.

Search Triggers, Events & Rules allows you to keyword search all of the DocketCalendar content.

Click on the Research Console Button

You will be taken to the Search Triggers, Events & Rules Tab

To perform a search:

1) Select a Case with the Jurisdiction in question from the dropdown list.

2) Enter a keyword or phrase.

Use as few words as possible, or the root of words, remembering that DocketCalendar will be looking for an exact match. For instance, if you type "appeal", you will find "appealable", but if you type "appealable", you will not find "appeal".

3) Choose whether you want to search any Triggers, Events or Rules within the Jurisdiction by clicking on the applicable checkboxes.

Trigger: This option will search for all Triggers in the Jurisdiction that include the keywords.

Event: This option will search through all events--deadlines and court events--in the Jurisdiction that include the keywords and find the Triggers used to calculate them.

Rules: This option will search for the keywords in all excerpts of procedural rules in the Jurisdiction that relate to events that are calculated using Triggers.

4) Click the Search button.

DocketCalendar will search through the information you have selected and display a list of Triggers. That contain your key word or words. Keywords will be red.

5) Click the arrow to expand any Trigger to see your key word. You can click the arrow next to each event under the trigger to expand the Court Rule

Linked Email Account: How DocketCalendar Talks to Your Email

DocketCalendar requires a dedicated full email account to function as a connection point between your firm's email domain and DocketCalendar. We call this your linked email account.

Your linked email account is the connection point between DocketCalendar and all of your firm's calendars. DocketCalendar will create events directly onto any calendar that is shared with your linked account's calendar. Once you connect an email account to DocketCalendar, the default calendar for that email account will be visible to DocketCalendar and you will be able create events on that calendar.

To add events to any other calendar in your firm, simply share the calendar from the person who needs to receive deadlines to your linked email account.

Example: rocky@docketcalendar.com needs to receive deadlines, he shares his calendar with the linked email account and then DocketCalendar will be able to write events directly onto Rocky's calendar.

Read the next article before you connect your email account to DocketCalendar- Choosing Your Linked Email Account

Click here to connect your email account to DocketCalendar

View Jurisdiction's Holidays

Virtually all courts have rules that specify what happens when a deadline lands on an official holiday. What holidays are recognized for the purpose of rules calculations varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction and when certain holidays are observed may vary from year to year, if they fall on a weekend.

DocketCalendar automatically takes these holidays into account when calculating a deadline, but there will be times when you might want to view the actual list of holidays used by DocketCalendar and when they are observed, particularly if you practice before multiple courts. The Holiday tool, accessible from a tab on the Docket Research screen, allows you to do this.

To view a list of Holidays for  a Jurisdiction in your subscription:

  1. Click on the Research Console and then click on the Find Holidays tab.
  2. Choose a Case with the Jurisdiction whose holidays you wish to view.

Only the Jurisdictions in your DocketCalendar subscription will appear in the list.

  1. Specify a date range by inserting a Start Date and End Date in the date fields, or accept the default date range of one year from the current date.
  2. Click the Find Holidays button.

Docket Calendar will display a list of the holidays for the Jurisdiction and the dates on which they fall or are observed.

Case: Your Central Hub for Case Information & Deadlines

Click the Case Button in the Create section at the top of the DocketCalendar Navigation Panel.

DocketCalendar Cases store the basic information you will need to calendar deadlines. Case Name, Jurisdiction, Calendars assigned to the case, Reminder and Category or Color preference and you can also store information that will populate in the Location, Subject, and Comments or Body sections of each event. Each Case Record also contains a complete list of all Triggers and Events Calendared for the case and all edit functions related to the Case, Triggers and Events as well.

Case Details

Case Details stores your Case Name, Jurisdiction and the Calendars Assigned to the Case.

Add a Case Name - Case names will be combined with the deadline in the subject field of your events. We recommend brief case names.

Pick a Jurisdiction for your Case - The Jurisdiction Dropdown will show all courts in your subscription

Add Calendars to Your Case - Assign Calendars will display a list of all of your current Assigned Calendar Users.

Event Details

Event Details allows you to store Text or Comments in the 3 main fields of your events. Location, Subject and Comments or Body. Any information saved at the case level will autofill the Location, Subject and Comments section each time you calculate a trigger.

Location - Text entered in location will populate in the location field on your events

Subject - Text entered into the subject will populate in between the case name and the deadlines or event title

Comments - Text entered into comments will populate in the body or comments section of each event along with the Case Details, Jurisdiction, Trigger Title etc.

Notifications - Outlook

Outlook users can change the Popup Notification setting for each case. This will give the case event the same default Popup setting.

Categories: DocketCalendar will read your Linked Email Account's Calendar Categories and allow you to save a preference for a Category at the case level.

Notifications - Gmail

Gmail users can change one Popup notification and one email notification setting for each case. This will give the case events the same default Popup and email setting.

Event Color: Google Events have an Event Color option. You can store an event color preference at the case level.

Date Calculator: Calculate a date count in any Court

The Date Calculator tool allows you to calculation a deadline in a particular Jurisdiction, using that Jurisdiction's court observed holidays.

Click the Research Console button and then Click the Date Calculator Button

The Date Calculator Screen will be displayed.

1) Select a Court from the Holiday Set dropdown list.

2) Enter the Start Date in the Start Date field.

Just like a Trigger Date, this is the date upon which you will base your calculation: e.g., 30 days/weeks/months before or after the Start Date.  

3) Enter the number for your calculation either in days, weeks, months, etc.--in the # to Calculate field

4) Determine whether the time period is measured in calendar days, court days, weeks, months or years and select the applicable radio button on the screen.

5) Determine whether you are counting forward or backward and make the appropriate selection. Your choice depends upon the purpose of the date calculation.

  • Counting Forward. You are trying to calculate a deadline which will occur after the Start Date--e.g., the last day to file an answer after the date of the service of the complaint (Start Date); the last day to file a notice of appeal after the date of the entry of judgment (Start Date).
  • Counting Backwards. You are trying to calculate a deadline which will occur before the Start Date--e.g., the date of the last day to file proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law before the date of trial (the Start Date).

6) Determine whether you want the calculated deadline to "Roll Forward" or "Roll Backward", if it lands on a holiday or weekend day.

Roll Forward. If you select "Roll Forward", the Date Calculator will move a date to the next court day--a day that is neither an official holiday nor a weekend day.

Roll Backward. If you are calculating a deadline that must be met prior to the Trigger Event, such as filing a brief or other submission for the court, the procedural rules might specify that if the calculated date occurs on a weekend or holiday, the deadlines should be moved to the previous court day. If that is the case, then choose "Roll Backward".

No Roll.  If you are only interested in knowing the date of the deadline, regardless of holidays and weekends, then leave the default selection at "No Roll".

Click the Calculate button when ready to Calculate your Deadline

The Date Calculator will display the date and day of the week of the deadline.

Login with Gmail

When you log into DocketCalendar, you will need two sets of credentials. Your DocketCalendar account login and password, and your Linked email account login and password. (Note - The linked email account is not your personal work email. See Below - Check with your Firm Admin for your Linked Account login credentials)

The first time you log into DocketCalendar in a new browser, you will need both sets of credentials, but once you have logged in, you can save your credentials to your password manager or your browser, and then you'll be able to log in with just a click.

Login to DocketCalendar

In addition to the DocketCalendar website, we recommend you bookmark the Gmail Calendar that is Linked to your DocketCalendar account.

Step 1:  Enter your Login and Password,  Click the End User Agreement checkbox and then the login button.

Login: Provided by DocketCalendar

PW: Request from your firm Administrator

Step 2: You will be prompted to log into your Linked email account. This is not your email account, it is a different login that you will need in order to log into DocketCalendar.

Request your Linked email address and Password from your email Administrator

DocketCalendar and your Web Browsers

Multiple Sessions

DocketCalendar does not allow you to "Create" events, "Recalculate" events, or "Edit" events in the same browser session. In other words, you can't calculate and save to Trials simultaneously in the same browser, however, you can calculate and save events in different browsers. We recommend opening at least 2 sessions. Either Chrome and Firefox, or Chrome and Edge, or all three Chrome, Firefox, and Edge.

Browser Tabs

Although you can't calculate more than one trigger at a time inside a browser, you can open multiple browser tabs for reference. This will come in handy if you are working on a trigger related to another event and you want to keep a copy of that event open in another screen. If you right-click on any of the left-panel navigation windows, you can keep your current screen and open another session in a new tab. (Remember, one calculation at a time in each browser, but having multiple screens may come in handy from time to time.

Here are a few links to help you get started with DocketCalendar

DocketCalendar User Guide

How To Create Your First Case

How To Calculated Deadlines And Save To Your Calendar

How to Edit a Trigger

How to Edit an Event

Add an Internet Calendar to Outlook

Step 1 Right-click  on your Calendar and select Add New Calendar

Step 2 - Select Add Calendar From Internet

Step 3 - In the Pop up window - Paste the Link that was emailed to you

Step 4 - Click Yes on the 2 Outlook prompts

Your New Calendar will be visible

Service Type Offsets: By Mail, Hand, Electronic

The procedural rules for most courts add a specified number of days to respond to deadlines based upon service type. When service type is a consideration in a deadlines' calculation, DocketCalendar automatically factors this into the calculation. We refer to this as Service Type Offset. If you want to review what the Service Type Offset is for a particular court, Click the Docket Research button

  • Personal or In hand--Usually no offset
  • Electronic--Usually no offset
  • By Fax--Usually no offset
  • Service by Mail on a Party Outside the State--usually an offset.
  • Express or Overnight--Usually an offset
  • Regular Mail--Usually an offset

DC automatically takes these offsets into consideration when you perform docket calculations. The Service Types tool accessible from the Docket Research screen, allows you view the offsets prescribed in a particular Jurisdiction.

To view a list of Service Type Offsets:

  1. Click the Research Console Button and click on the Service Types tab.
  2. Choose a case with the Jurisdiction whose Service Type offsets you wish to view from the Jurisdiction dropdown box.
  3. Click the Get Service Types button

DocketCalendar will display a list of the Service Types for the Jurisdiction and the number of days, if any, of the applicable offsets.

Adding Deadlines to your Calendar

Adding Deadlines to your Calendar

Review the Details of Rules Calculations:
  •  By clicking the triangular-shaped pointer at the beginning of each event, you can see the details of how the deadline is calculated.
Display Events in Tree View:
  • Click the show tree view to view the events in a hierarchical view to show the relationship between events and some deadlines as the trigger for other sub-events.
Exclude Events:
  • Exclude deadlines by unchecking them in the list. You can also create preferences for automatically excluding certain events so that they will not show up on the list of events at all on the Docket Calculator.
Print Events: 
  • Print a list of events by clicking the print shortcut.
Export to Outlook or iCal Format:
  • By clicking the Outlook or iCal shortcut, DocketCalendar will create a file containing the events in a format that can import into Outlook or any other calendaring program compatible with the iCal format.

Post the Events

  • Click the import to calendar button. 
  • The deadlines you have selected will appear on a new screen, called the verify screen. 
  • The verify screen will only include the deadlines you checked on the Docket Calculator screen.

Saving Deadlines to Google Calendars

Post to Calendar: 
  • Choose a single Google Calendar on which to post the events. 
Add Calendars: 
  • Send events to the people in the office who may want these deadlines and events placed on their Google calendars.

Edit the Description, Calendar Color, and Notifications That Apply to an Event

  • Click the edit icon located at the end of the description of any event you want to change.
Change Description:
  •  Click the copy button, which will copy the current description into the text box for further editing.
  •  The text typed into the text box will be substituted for the original description. 
  • The new description will not appear on the screen, but it will appear on Google calendars. 
  • If you need to update the new description, click the edit icon again.
Change Event Color:
  • You can choose a color for the event. This action will override the event color selected when you created the case.

Add Additional Email and Pop-Up Notifications:
  • Set the length of time before the event when either the Google pop-up notification or Email notification will be generated. This action changes the notification settings selected when creating the case.
  • Click the save button when you are done.

Saving the Events

  • ‍Click the save to calendar button. 
  • Events will be posted on the calendars you selected. A confirmation screen will appear, showing the details of the date calculations.

Adding or Removing Calendars from a Trigger

Any Calendars selected when creating the case will appear on the Docket Calculator screen when you calculate events. They will receive meeting invitations for all events using a trigger that will appear on their calendars. On the update trigger screen, you can add or remove Calendars. If you add an Calendar, their Google Calendar will be updated with all of the events related to the trigger. You can add or remove Calendars on the trigger update screen independently of updating a trigger with a new date. 

Add or remove an Attendee

  • Select update trigger.
  • Remove an existing attendee by clicking on the "X" to the left of the attendee's name in the attendees dropdown box.

  • Add new Calendars by selecting one or more names from the dropdown list.
  • Click the update button; or, alternatively,
  • If you are changing the date of the trigger, you can also make that change then click the recalculate button.
  • The Google calendars for the events relating to the trigger will be updated.

Forwarding Gmail Reminders to Outlook

Begin Process to Forward Email

Step 1 - From your Gmail email screen click on the gear icon on the top right side of the screen. Then click See all settings

Step 2 Click on "Forwarding and POP/IMAP" and then click on "Add a forwarding address"

Step 3 - Add the email address you want to forward the reminders to and then click proceed. a 3rd pop up will appear, click OK.

What the Recipient reminders needs to do

The next steps are required by the person who will be receiving the forwarded email reminders.


Step 1) From Inbox look for an email with a link to approve the request to forward emails. Click the link

Step 2) Click confirm, there is a final Confirmation screen, close the browser tab.

Forward Reminders


Once you have sent the request to the recipient and they have accepted. You can create their inbox forwarding rule.

Step 1 Go to Manage Calendars - Find the Calendar you want to forward email reminds for. Scroll to the right on the view screen and copy the UserCalendarTag

Step 2 Click on the far right in the search mail box at the top of the screen, click the icon to expand search options. Paste the unique CalendarUserTag into the "Has the words" field and click "Create Filter"

Step 3 Click Forward and then select the name of the email you want the reminders forwarded to, and then click Create filter.

Calculating Deadlines

Calculating Deadlines

  • Choose Docket Calculator from the tools menu to open the Docket Calculator screen.
  • Select a case from the matter case dropdown list.

  • Ensure that a jurisdiction is selected in the jurisdiction field.
  • Select a trigger from the trigger item field. 

  • Pick your trigger date.

  • If the trigger item will take place at a specific time, such as a trial, hearing, or deposition: enter the time of the event.
  • If the trigger is not an event scheduled for a specific time: do not fill in the time. 
  • If the trigger involves the service of a pleading or other document, the service type field will become active. (Note: In some jurisdictions, certain types of service, such as service by mail, may affect the length of deadlines for particular events, such as responses to motions.)

  • Fill out the location field if necessary.
  • Once you have completed filling out the fields, click the calculate button at the bottom of the screen.

  • The deadlines and events calculated using the trigger will appear at the bottom of the screen.

Sharing a Google Calendar

Sharing a Google Calendar

If you want to be able to post events created through DocketCalendar on a Google calendar that belongs to another Google account, it must be shared with your linked email account.

Log into the Google account you want to share.

Open the Google calendar. Under the calendars section in the left panel, move your cursor over the name of calendar you wish to share until the Options menu shortcut (represented by three vertical dots) is displayed and then click it.

On the Options menu, click "Settings and Sharing".

The entire Settings menu will be displayed.

Scroll down to the heading "Share with specific people" and click "+Add people".

A list of people in your Google contacts will be displayed in a dropdown list.

Scroll down the list, or use type search, to locate the people with whom you want to be able to share the calendar and then click on a name.

The person you have selected will appear in the "Share with specific people" field.

Note:  Only people in the Google contacts listing for the account you have logged into will appear in the list.  

Click the arrow in the permissions field to display the list of sharing permission that are available for the selected person and choose "Make changes to events".  If you want to enable the selected person to be able to change sharing permissions for the calendar, select "Make changes and manage sharing".

When you are done, click the send button.

The Master Calendar will receive a notification.

Note: You If you use multiple Gmail accounts, you must be logged into the linked Gmail account before any other Gmail accounts or you can log out of all Gmail Accounts and login to the linked calendar to add the shared calendars.

If you forget and find that when you click on the link to add the new shared Calendar it does not add, this means you are not logged in to the linked calendar first. Google will simply not add the shared calendar until you log out of other accounts. The email can be re-used so you don't have to re-share the calendar. Just click the link again to add it.

Recalculate a Trigger

Note--Changing Just Attendees: Adding or removing Attendees whose calendars will be updated with the events can be done separately or at the same time as recalculating the Trigger using a different date. To update Attendees separately, see Adding or Removing Attendees. Once the Update Trigger screen is being shown:

  1. Click in the Trigger Date field to display the date control and choose the new date by clicking on the number of the day of the month.
  1. Select "use new date" from the Recalculated Events dropdown box.
  1. Click the Recalculate button.

The events with the recalculated dates will appear on the next screen.

From there you can:

  • Review the date rule used to calculate a specific event and the procedural rules where those calculations are specified.
  • Exempt an event from the recalculation by unchecking its checkbox.

Note: The original event will remain on the Google calendars where it was first posted.

  1. Click the Update Calendar button.

A confirmation screen will be displayed, showing the details of the Trigger calculation and listing the events that were updated. The Google calendars of the Attendees and the default calendar for the case will be updated.

IT Admin Consent for DocketCalendar

Depending on how your Outlook is configured, you may receive a request for approval for DocketCalendar, but if your user was given the option to Accept permissions, you will not receive and approval request and you will see DocketCalendar listed as an Enterprise Application.

Regardless of whether you approved a request, or the user has approved permissions, you will still need to click on the DocketCalendar Enterprise Application link and go to the permissions screen and "Grant" permissions.

User Approved Permissions Process

If you did not receive a request for approval for the DocketCalendar Application, and your user was given the option to Accept permissions follow these steps. See below for Admin Approval Process.

Log into the Azure Admin Portal and click on the Active Directory- SIGN IN HERE

From the Overview screen click Enterprise Applications

From the Enterprise Application screen click on the DocketCalendar application link.

From the DocketCalendar Overview screen click Permissions

From the DocketCalendar Permissions screen click the Grant admin consent for "Your firm's URL" Once you click the Grand admin consent button you will be prompted to login with your Firm's Admin credentials.

You will be prompted to login with Amin Credentials

Click Accept on the Permission request pop up window

You will see a confirmation pop-up in the top right side of your Permissions screen. Once you have completed this step DocketCalendar is fully permissioned and ready for use. There is no automatic notification to the users that the approval process has been completed so you may want to inform your users that they can now login.

Admin Approval Process

You should receive and email request to Grant permission for DocketCalendar

From the Admin Consent screen, click on the DocketCalendar link under "My Pending"

In the Details section, click the Review permissions and consent button. Note: you will be prompted to login with Admin Credentials and Accept permissions. Once you have completed this step, you will need to go back to the Enterprise Applications screen shown above, click on DocketCalendar, and go to the Permissions screen.
Then click the Grant permissions button. You will be prompted to login with Admin credentials a second time and you will be prompted to Accept permissions a second time.

Once you have completed this step DocketCalendar is fully permissioned and ready for use. Although the user will receive an email confirmation when you approve DocketCalendar through the Admin Consent Request Screen, there is no automatic notification to the users that the approval process has been completed after you Grant permission so you may want to inform your users that they can now login.

Updating Cases / Changing Calendars / Archiving

You can change and update the details and settings for a particular case.

Changes will only be applied to Case Events Going Forward.

(Note - The Case Name Field is accessible here but the program will not update Case events already applied to your calendar. Do not change the Case Name if you have already Added Events to the Calendar) This feature is coming soon.

  • From the Tools menu, select Docket Cases.

The Docket Calculator Cases screen will appear, displaying a list of existing cases.

  • Find the case you want to update. If the case is not displayed in the list, you can:
  • Use the vertical scroll bar to move down the list; or
  • Search for the case by typing in a few letters in the type search box.
  • Click the Edit button next to the case you wish to update.

The Update Case screen will appear

  • To remove an Calendar or a User, click on the “x” in the left corner of the name Calendar you wish to remove.
  • To add an Calendar, use the dropdown box to locate and select them

When you are done, click the Update Case button at the bottom of the screen.

Note: Archive Case will not remove events from your calendar. You must first go to the Edit Trigger Screen and Archive each Trigger before you archive the Case. Archive Case & Triggers is coming soon.

Adding Deadlines to your Calendar

Adding Deadlines to your Calendar

Review the Details of Rules Calculations:
  •  By clicking the triangular-shaped pointer at the beginning of each event, you can see the details of how the deadline is calculated.
Display Events in Tree View:
  • Click the show tree view to view the events in a hierarchical view to show the relationship between events and some deadlines as the trigger for other sub-events.
Exclude Events:
  • Exclude deadlines by unchecking them in the list. You can also create preferences for automatically excluding certain events so that they will not show up on the list of events at all on the Docket Calculator.
Print Events: 
  • Print a list of events by clicking the print shortcut.
Export to Outlook or iCal Format:
  • By clicking the Outlook or iCal shortcut, DocketCalendar will create a file containing the events in a format that can import into Outlook or any other calendaring program compatible with the iCal format.

Post the Events

  • Click the import to calendar button. 
  • The deadlines you have selected will appear on a new screen, called the verify screen. 
  • The verify screen will only include the deadlines you checked on the Docket Calculator screen.

Saving Deadlines to your Calendars

Add Calendars: 
  • Choose the Calendar on which to post the events. 

Edit the Description, Calendar Color, and Notifications That Apply to an Event

  • Click the edit icon located at the end of the description of any event you want to change.
Change Description:
  •  Click the copy button, which will copy the current description into the text box for further editing.
  •  The text typed into the text box will be substituted for the original description. 
  • The new description will not appear on the screen, but it will appear on your calendars. 
  • If you need to update the new description, click the edit icon again.
Change Event Category:
  • You can choose multiple categories for the event. This action will override the event color selected when you created the case.

Add Additional Email and Pop-Up Notifications:
  • Set the length of time before the event when the  pop-up notification will be generated. This action changes the notification setting selected when creating the case.
  • Click the save button when you are done.

Saving the Events

  • ‍Click the save to calendar button. 
  • Events will be posted on the calendars you selected. A confirmation screen will appear, showing the details of the date calculations.

Secondary Outlook Calendars

How to Create a Secondary Outlook Calendar

You may choose the primary calendar of any Outlook account shared with you, or you can create a new calendar in an Outlook account to serve as the calendar folder.

Add a Calendar to an Outlook Profile from Outlook Desktop

Log into the Outlook account where you want to create the new calendar.

At the bottom of the screen, click on the three dots and select the folders icon.

Click the New Folder Option

In the Create New Folder Window, scroll up to select Folder Contains: Calendar Items.

Name your calendar and click save. Your calendar will be created. You can then share your calendar either with the Firm Calendar or if you creating a secondary calendar on the Firm Calendar, you can share it with users in the firm.

Add a Calendar to an Outlook Profile from Outlook Web

Log into the Outlook account where you want to create the new calendar.

Click the Add Calendar Button

In the new window click on the option to "Create blank calendar"

Name your Calendar and you can set the Calendar color and Icon as well. Press save to create your calendar.

Remove Triggers and Events

Remove Triggers and Events

You delete Triggers and calendar events by archiving them. Archiving a Trigger removes it and all of the related events from the case as well as all affected calendars—the single default calendar and the calendars of any Attendees who were added to the Trigger at the time the events were created or updated. You must archive individual calendar events from “inside” the Trigger where they were created.

Archive (Remove) Individual Triggers

  1. On the Docket Calculator Cases screen, locate the case where the Trigger was used and click the View button to open the case and display a list of its Triggers.  
  2. On the Cases Triggers screen, locate the Trigger you wish to archive and click its Edit button.

The Update Trigger(s) screen will be displayed.

  1. Click the Archive Trigger button at the bottom left corner of the screen.

DocketCalendar will display a confirmation screen, asking you to confirm your decision to archive the Trigger.

  1. Click Confirm to archive the events or click Cancel to cancel.

DocketCalendar will archive the Trigger and remove all related items from the calendars where they were posted.

Archive (Remove) Individual Calendar Events

  1. On the Docket Calculator Cases screen, locate the case where the calendar event was created.
  2. Click the View button to open the case and display the list of Triggers for the case. 
  3. Locate the Trigger used to create the event and click its View button.

A list of all events relating the Trigger will be displayed.

  1. Locate the event you want to archive and click its Edit button.

The Update Events screen will be displayed.

  1. Click the archive button at the bottom right corner of the screen.

The individual event will be removed from the DC case and the calendars where it has been posted.

Permanently Remove a Case from the Archive

You can permanently delete a case from DocketCalendar that has been moved to the archive of cases. You should not permanently delete a case unless you are certain there are no circumstances in which you would want to restore the case or review any of the events or other details relating to it.

  1. Open the list of archived cases by clicking on the Archive Cases menu item in the Cases & Reports menu.

The Archive Cases screen will appear, showing the list of cases that have already been archived.

  1. Click the Delete button.

A confirmation screen will be displayed. Click Confirm to proceed or Cancel to cancel. The case and all Triggers and events in the case will be permanently deleted.

Updating Individual Events

Updating the Date, Attendees and Custom Text for an Individual Event

You can update the date of an individual event, add or remove the Attendees or change the custom text for that event.

Locate the Individual Event

Individual events are listed with the Trigger used to create them in the case record. There are two ways to locate the event:

  • Follow the hyperlink in the body of the event on the calendar where it is posted.
  • Find it in the event list for the Trigger used to create the event in the case record.

Locate an Event by Following its Hyperlink in the Calendar.

  1. Locate the event you wish to update in one of the Google calendars.

See, Finding events in the Google Calendar.

  1. Click the event’s shortcut on the calendar.

The calendar item will open, showing all of the details of the event.

  1. Click the blue hyperlink.

The hyperlink contains the unique id number for the event. Clicking on it will take you to the Update Event screen for the event, where you can update the event date, add or remove Attendees and change the event’s custom text.

Locate an Event in the Event List of the Related Trigger

To find an event in the case record, you must find the Trigger used to create it. The Trigger for an event is included in the body of the event on the calendar.  Once you know the Trigger, follow these steps to display the Update Event scree

Locate the Trigger using the instructions set forth in Displaying the Trigger for Updating

Click the View button next to the Trigger.

The Trigger Events screen will be displayed.

On the Trigger Events screen, find the event you wish to update.

The Update Event screen will appear, where you can change the event date, add or remove Attendees or change the event’s custom text.

Update the Event

Change the Date of the Event

To change the date of the event:

  1. Click in the Event Date field to display the date control and choose the new date by clicking on the number of the day of the month.
  2. If the event is an appointment and you want to change the time, scroll up or down to find the time you want and click on it.
  1. If this is the only change you are making to the event, click Update Event at the bottom left side of the screen.

Change the Calendars

You can change what Calendars the Event appears on

  1. Remove an existing Calendar by click on the “x” to the left of the Calendar name
  2. Add new Calendars by selecting one or more names from the dropdown list.

If you are done making changes, click Update Event at the bottom left side of the screen.

Change Event Custom Text

You can change the Event Name, The Event Location, The Event Subject and Event Comment.

To change the Event Custom Text field, add text to the field or edit any text that may already be there. When you are done, click Update Event at the bottom left side of the screen.

Change Event Categories

You can change the Event Categories, Multiple Events are permitted.

Confirm Your Changes

To confirm that changes, click the Update Event button at the bottom left of the screen. The update will make changes to the event as it appears on the applicable Google calendars.

Remove (Archive) Triggers and Events

You can remove all Deadline Events from our Calendar by using the Archive Trigger Button. To remove an entire trigger Update the Trigger and use the Archive Trigger button.

Adding or Removing Calendars from a Trigger

Any Calendars selected when creating the case will appear on the Docket Calculator screen when you calculate events. All events will be written directly to these calendars

On the update trigger screen, you can add or remove Calendars. If you add an Calendar, their Outlook Calendar will be updated with all of the events related to the trigger. You can add or remove Calendars on the trigger update screen independently of updating a trigger with a new date. 

Add or remove an Attendee

  • Select update trigger.
  • Remove an existing attendee by clicking on the "X" to the left of the attendee's name in the attendees dropdown box.

  • Add new Calendars by selecting one or more names from the dropdown list.
  • Click the update button; or, alternatively,
  • If you are changing the date of the trigger, you can also make that change then click the recalculate button.
  • The calendars for the events relating to the trigger will be updated.

Recalculate a Trigger

Note--Changing Just Attendees: Adding or removing Attendees whose calendars will be updated with the events can be done separately or at the same time as recalculating the Trigger using a different date. To update Attendees separately, see Adding or Removing Attendees. Once the Update Trigger screen is being shown:

  1. Click in the Trigger Date field to display the date control and choose the new date by clicking on the number of the day of the month.
  1. Select "use new date" from the Recalculated Events dropdown box.
  1. Click the Recalculate button.

The events with the recalculated dates will appear on the next screen.

From there you can:

  1. Click the Update Calendar button.

A confirmation screen will be displayed, showing the details of the Trigger calculation and listing the events that were updated. All Calendars assigned to the trigger will be updated.

Case Triggers and Events

Case Triggers and Events

View the List of Triggers for a Case

  • Open the list of cases by selecting docket cases from the cases and reports menu.
  • The Docket Calculator cases screen will open.
  • Locate the case whose triggers you want to view.
  • Click the view button for the case in question.
  • From the case triggers screen, you may return to the docket calculator cases screen by clicking the docket cases shortcut, or print the list of triggers.

View All Events Relating to a Single Trigger

  • Display all triggers relating to the case in question.
  • Click the view button next to the trigger you want to view.

View all Events and Deadlines Across all Cases

  • Click Docket Cases from the Cases & Reports drop-down menu.
  • Click the case events shortcut in the upper right corner of the screen.
  • The calendar events screen will be displayed, showing all events from all cases in the system.

Date Calculator

The Date Calculator tool allows you to simulate the calculation of a deadline in a particular Jurisdiction, employing the same computer logic that DocketCalendar uses when calculating a deadline automatically based upon a Trigger. This allows you to run through the calculations required by a particular procedural rule to determine a deadline without having to select a Trigger and perform a date calculation in DocketCalendar. To use this tool, you specify a hypothetical Trigger date and the same parameters DocketCalendar uses when performing date calculations and DocketCalendar will calculate the date of the resulting deadline. In performing a calculation, the Date Calculator uses the following terminology:

  • A Holiday Set--the list of holidays recognized in the Jurisdiction where the calculation will apply.
  • A Start Date--the date on which you will base your calculation, the date of a hypothetical Trigger date.
  • A Time Period--the number of calendar days, court days, weeks, months or years.
  • Whether to Count Forward or Backward--whether you are counting forward from the Start Date to calculate a future deadline or counting backward from the Start Date to determine the date of an action that must be taken a specified period of time before the Start Date.
  • Whether to Roll Forward/Backward/Not at All--if the calculated deadline falls on a weekend or holiday recognized in the Jurisdiction, whether to force it forward to the next court date (a date that is neither a holiday nor a weekend) or backward to the previous court date or to accept the deadline calculation without regard to whether it lands on a court date.

To calculate a hypothetical deadline, using the holidays of a particular Jurisdiction:

  1. Open the Docket Research screen from the Tools menu.
  2. Click the Docket Calculator shortcut in the upper right corner of the screen.

The Date Calculator Screen will be displayed.

  1. Select a Jurisdiction from the Holiday Set dropdown list.
  2. Enter the Start Date in the Start Date field.

Just like a Trigger Date, this is the date upon which you will base your calculation: e.g., 30 days/weeks/months before or after the Start Date.  

  1. Enter the number of time increments you will be counting--.e.g, days, weeks, months, etc.--in the blank field directly below the date field.
  2. Determine whether the time period is measured in calendar days, court days, weeks, months or years and select the applicable radio button on the screen.

Typically the procedural rule you are trying to simulate will specify the time period.  If the rule specifies "days", it will normally means "Calendar Days". Remember that Court Days excludes weekends and the holidays recognized in the selected Jurisdiction.

  1. Determine whether you are counting forward or backward and make the appropriate selection. Your choice depends upon the purpose of the date calculation.
  • Counting Forward. You are trying to calculate a deadline which will occur after the Start Date--e.g., the last day to file an answer after the date of the service of the complaint (Start Date); the last day to file a notice of appeal after the date of the entry of judgment (Start Date).
  • Counting Backwards. You are trying to calculate a deadline which will occur before the Start Date--e.g., the date of the last day to file proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law before the date of trial (the Start Date).
  1. Determine whether you want the calculated deadline to "Roll Forward" or "Roll Backward", if it lands on a holiday or weekend day.
  2. Roll Forward. If you select "Roll Forward", the Date Calculator will move a date to the next court day--a day that is neither an official holiday nor a weekend day.  Most procedural rules grant you until the next court day, if a deadline lands on a weekend or holiday, if you are calculating a future deadline.
  3. Roll Backward. If you are calculating a deadline that must be met prior to the Trigger Event, such as filing a brief or other submission for the court, the procedural rules might specify that if the calculated date occurs on a weekend or holiday, the deadlines should be moved to the previous court day. If that is the case, then choose "Roll Backward".
  4. No Roll.  If you are only interested in knowing the date of the deadline, regardless of holidays and weekends, then leave the default selection at "No Roll".
  5. Click the Calculate button when you are done.

The Date Calculator will display the date and day of the week of the deadline.

Service Type Offsets

Service Type Offsets

The procedural rules for most courts add a specified number of days to respond to deadlines based upon service of pleadings and other case documents, utilizing certain methods of service, on the opposing party. DocketCalendar refers to this additional period of time, measured in days, as the "offset". The offset takes into account that there may be a delay in receiving court papers served using certain methods of service, justifying adding more time to a deadline to respond. DocketCalendar recognizes six methods of service:

  • Personal or In hand--Usually no offset
  • Electronic--Usually no offset
  • By Fax--Usually no offset
  • Service by Mail on a Party Outside the State--usually an offset.
  • Express or Overnight--Usually an offset
  • Regular Mail--Usually an offset

DocketCalendar automatically takes these offsets into consideration when you perform docket calculations. The Service Types tool accessible from the Docket Research screen, allows you view the offsets prescribed in a particular Jurisdiction.

To view a list of Service Type Offsets:

  1. Open the Docket Research screen and click on the Service Types tab.
  2. Choose the Jurisdiction whose Service Type offsets you wish to view from the Jurisdiction dropdown box.

Only the Jurisdictions in your DC subscription will appear in the list.

  1. Click the Find button.

DC will display a list of the Service Types for the Jurisdiction and the number of days, if any, of the applicable offsets.

View Jurisdiction's Holidays

View Jurisdiction's Holidays

Virtually all courts have rules that specify what happens when a deadline lands on an official holiday. What holidays are recognized for the purpose of rules calculations varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction and when certain holidays are observed may vary from year to year, if they fall on a weekend. DocketCalendar automatically takes these holidays into account when calculating a deadline, but there will be times when you might want to view the actual list of holidays used by DocketCalendar and when they are observed, particularly if you practice before multiple courts. The Holiday tool, accessible from a tab on the Docket Research screen, allows you to do this.

To view a list of Holidays for  a Jurisdiction in your subscription:

  1. Open the Docket Research screen and click on the Holidays tab.
  2. Choose the Jurisdiction whose holidays you wish to view from the Jurisdiction dropdown box.

Only the Jurisdictions in your DocketCalendar subscription will appear in the list.

  1. Specify a date range by inserting a Start Date and End Date in the date fields, or accept the default date range of one year from the current date.
  2. Click the Find button.

DocketCalendar will display a list of the holidays for the Jurisdiction and the dates on which they fall or are observed.

Trigger Search

Sometimes, it is not obvious which Trigger to use to calculate particular deadlines in a case. Docket Research is a research tool that will help you locate the correct Trigger to use for docket calculations by searching for keywords in the Triggers, Events and the Rules of a particular Jurisdiction. 

How to Search for a Trigger Using Docket Research

To search for a Trigger:  

  1. Click on Docket Research in the Tools menu to open the Docket Research Screen.

The Docket Research screen will be displayed.

  1. To perform a search:
  2. Select the Jurisdiction of the case in question from the dropdown list.

The list will include all rules sets in your subscription.

  1. Enter a keyword or phrase.

Use as few words as possible, or the root of words, remembering that DC will be looking for an exact match. For instance, if you type "appeal", you will find "appealable", but if you type "appealable", you will not find "appeal".

  1. Choose whether you want to search any Triggers, Events or Rules within the Jurisdiction by clicking on the applicable checkboxes.
  2. Trigger: This option will search for all Triggers in the Jurisdiction that include the keywords.
  3. Event: This option will search through all events--deadlines and court events--in the Jurisdiction that include the keywords and find the Triggers used to calculate them.
  4. Rules: This option will search for the keywords in all excerpts of procedural rules in the Jurisdiction that relate to events that are calculated using Triggers.
  1. Click the Find button.

DC will search through the information you have selected and display a list of Triggers.

Using Reports

Reports can be printed, converted into a pdf file or exported in a spreadsheet format.

How to Generate a Report

The Report Tool has access to all of the events in those cases to which the logged in User has access—that is, all cases to which the User has been assigned as a User when a case is created. To create a report, you follow these steps:

  1. Click on the Cases & Reports menu and select Reports.

The Report Tool screen will be displayed.

  1. On the Report Tool screen, choose the Filters that will select the event information you wish to include in the report.
  2. Choose the columns for the report you would like to see under Add Columns.
  3. Reports always display the case, date and time and a description of each event.
  4. If you want the report to include additional information, click one or more of the other items under Add Columns, such as the Jurisdiction or Attendees.
  5. Click the View button when you are done.

The output of the Report will appear at the bottom of the screen.

  1. Determine what format you want for the Report and click one of the output buttons.
  2. Copy.  Clicking Copy will copy the Report to your computer's clipboard, where it can be pasted into a word processing document.

Note: DC will download files in CSV and Excel format to the default location where your browser keeps files that have been downloaded from the Internet. This is usually the "download" directory on your computer.

Selecting Event Data Using Report Tool Filters

The Report Tool includes a variety of filters that allow you to select the deadlines and other case-related events you want to view in a report format. The following is an explanation of the more important filters.

Date Filters

Date filters allow you to select the events generated by DC in a specified range of dates. You can choose the beginning and end dates of the date range or use a pre-configured date ranged, called a "Quick Pick" on the Report Tools screen.

Date Picker

Case Filter

Choose this filter to display all events in a particular case within the specified date range.

Jurisdiction

You choose this filter from a dropdown list of all Jurisdictions to which your firm has subscribed. This filter will give you all events relating to cases where the specified jurisdiction has been selected for the case.

Filtering by Staff--Users and Attendees

You can create a report to show events in cases where one or more staff members are assigned to the case as Users or Attendees.  Click in the applicable dropdown box and select one or more staff members.

Using Filters Without a Dropdown List

Several of the filter fields--Trigger, Event Type, Location and Custom Field--allow you to filter by a single value entered into these fields during docket calculations, but do not provide you a list of values in the form of a dropdown list.  However, DC will locate each distinctive value entered into one of those fields during date calculations and aggregate them into a list "behind the scenes." To use one of these fields, type in a few letters or a word that is included in the value you are using for filtering. For instance, if you are looking for all events based on the Trigger "Hearing on Motion", typing the word "Hearing" in the Trigger filter field will display all Triggers that include that word.

Location

Since Location is a text field, it can filter any text saved in the location field.

Filtering by Staff--Users and Attendees

You can create a report to show events in cases where one or more staff members are assigned to the case as Users or Attendees. Click in the applicable dropdown box and select one or more staff members.

Google Calendar Reminders & Colors

Google allows Up to 4 Reminders for each event and 1 color for each event.

DocketCalendar fully supports control of your reminders at the Case, Trigger and Event level. The latest update of DocketCalendar unlocks a new level of control of reminders. Now when you are calculating events you will see an option on each event that will allow you to edit the individual reminders, and  the ability to edit the reminder for each Trigger as well. Once events have been calendared, you can now edit the reminders by editing the Trigger or Event to change all your reminder settings!

DocketCalendar gives you two reminders at the Case and Trigger level, one pop up and one email reminder and 2 additional reminders at the Event level, one pop up and one email reminder.

Email reminders are sent to the email address assigned to the calendar.

Create Events: Reminders & Categories

To Edit a single line item, after you have calculated your deadlines on the Create Events screen and clicked the Next: Edit Events button, you'll see an Edit Pencil icon at the end of each deadlines. Click the Edit Pencil icon and you will see a dropdown option for setting the individual event Popup, and the individual event Category. When you have completed your line item edits, click save on each line item you edit. Your Trigger level settings will be saved when you add the events to your calendars.

Note: You can only set one Category at the line item level but you can select multiple Categories at the Trigger level.

Case Reminders & Color

Case reminders and Category settings are set when you create a new case and can be edited at anytime. When you change the Case settings, the changes will apply to new deadlines calculated. If you need to change Reminders or Categories for any deadlines already calendared, you will need to edit the Trigger or the Event.

Trigger Reminders & Color

When you are calculating a new Trigger you can set your Trigger Reminder. Once you have calendared your events, you can edit the reminder setting at the Trigger level by going to the edit Trigger screen. Go to your Case, click the view button for the Trigger you want to edit and then click the Edit Trigger button.

Note: If you have been using DocketCalendar prior to the availability of the new reminders edit features the Event and Trigger screen released 12/27 make sure to check your reminders if you edit an Event or a Trigger.

Event Reminders & Color

When you are creating new events you can set your Event level Reminder and one Category. Once you have calendared your events, you can edit the Reminder & Category settings at the Trigger level by going to the Edit event screen. You can access your events from the Case / Trigger view, or from the View all Case Events button on each case. You can also find your events on the View All Events Screen.

Note: If you have been using DocketCalendar prior to the availability of the new reminders edit features the Event and Trigger screen released 12/27 make sure to check your reminders if you edit an Event or a Trigger.

Creating and Managing Cases

Every date calculation made in DocketCalendar is linked to a case.  

Creating a New Case

From the Docket Calculator Screen:
  • You can create a new case from the Docket Calculator screen in the process of running a rules calculation.

  • Click the add new case shortcut, located to the right of the matter case drop-down list.

From the Cases Screen:
  • From the tools menu, select Docket Cases.
  • Click the add new case shortcut at the top of the list.

  • Enter the name of the case. In most cases, you will use the case name in the form used by the court. If you want, you can also include the docket number assigned by the court—for example, Coburn v. Adelphi Corp., Civil No. 19-308478-MLK.
  • The case name you create will appear in the list of cases on Docket Calculator screen when you are asked to select case.

Show/Hide Case Name:
  • This field controls whether the case name will appear in the list of cases on the Docket Calculator screen, when you undertake docket calculations. It is set to show by default. If for any reason you want to prevent the case name from appearing in that list, click on the show/hide drop down list and change the value to hide.

Add Calendars to Your Case

Calendars are can be people or groups who will receive deadlines on their assigned Calendar when a deadline or event is created through the Docket Calculation process.

When you click "Save to Calendar" each deadline or event will be sent to the calendars assigned and will simultaneously appear on the calendar associated with the case.

  1. Click in the Add Calendar Users to case box.

A list of all Calendars you have in your Calendars listing will appear.

  1. Click the Calendars you want to add to the case

     
  1. To remove a Calendar, click the “x” next to a name in the box above the dropdown list.

Select the Jurisdiction

Select the jurisdiction where your case is pending from the dropdown list.

Location, Subject and Custom Text

These text fields can be left blank, or you can save information here to be automatically entered on the Docket calculation screen when you select a case. You can remove the default information or add to it at the time you calculate deadlines.

Pop Up Reminder

PopUp Reminders--allow you to establish on the case level when the reminders will appear in connection with events created in the case. The default values for this setting is set in the DocketCalendar Preferences settings and will automatically set this value for each trigger calculated.

Categories

Although Google Calendars can be assigned colors, you can also assign a color to the case so that multiple cases in the same calendar can be distinguished by color. This setting also overrides the default Event Color setting in DC Preferences.

When you are finished setting up your case, click the Add Case button.

Setting up Assigned Calendars

Calendars

Functionality:
  • DocketCalendar can create deadline events on multiple calendars simultaneously. Each unique calendar that requires deadlines must be shared with your Primary Firm Calendar with edit permissions.
  • Once a calendar has been shared with your Firm Calendar, you must then link it to a Calendar User inside DocketCalendar
  • You can assign unique deadlines to any calendar. Each calendar can be assigned to anyone in your organization. Once assigned to a case, anyone with access to that calendar will receive all deadlines for that case as they are added to the calendar by default.
  • You can create a calendar from inside your Primary calendar as a secondary calendar and then share it with another person through Outlook. You can also have any Outlook user share any primary or secondary calendar created on another Email account to your Primary Firm Calendar account and then assign it to anyone inside DocketCalendar.

Assign a Calendar

  • Click the calendars button on the Manage Menu.

  • Enter the full name and email address. 
  • Select the calendar you want to associate the user with it from the calendar dropdown.
  • Click the add button when you are done.

Deleting Assigned Calendars

  • Click the delete button to remove an assigned calendar. You should not remove an assigned calendar if it already has deadlines attached to it.

Excluded Events

Excluded Events, accessed from the Utilities menu item, provides advanced functionality that allows users to exclude events from being created during rules calculations, if they find it helpful to do so. Most firms will not exclude events, unless the rules calculations in the jurisdictions in which they practice produce a large number of deadlines that are irrelevant to their practice. For instance, some procedural rules may trigger deadlines applicable to types of cases the firm does not handle. Excluding those deadlines will speed up the review process during rules calculations. The rules in other jurisdictions may have few deadlines the firm considers extraneous, making excluding events unnecessary. You can:

  • Exclude events from selected Jurisdictions.
  • View the excluded events.
  • Restore the excluded events if they were excluded by mistake or need to be included for any other reason.

Add Events to the Exclusion List

  1. Open the Exclude Events screen from the Manage menu by selecting the Exclude Events menu item.

The Exclude events screen will appear.

  1. Select the Jurisdiction that includes the events you wish to exclude from the Jurisdiction dropdown list.  (The Jurisdiction you chose as the Default Jurisdiction in Docket Calendar User Preferences will be selected automatically.)
  1. Select the Trigger in the Jurisdiction that creates the events.
  1. Click the Preview Events button.

The list of the events relating to that Trigger will be displayed.

  1. Select the events you wish to exclude by checking the applicable checkboxes.
  2. Choose whether you want to apply the exclusions only to the selected jurisdiction or to all related jurisdictions that contain the same Trigger.
  3. Selecting “Apply To Selected Jurisdiction” will exclude the checked events for the single jurisdiction chosen.
  4. Selecting “Apply To All Jurisdictions” will excluded the checked events in every jurisdiction in your subscription with the same Trigger and events as selected on the screen.

Note:  Use this feature where several jurisdictions include the same trigger and related events. This will generally apply where two or more jurisdictions employ the same procedural rules—for instance, if your subscription includes several federal bankruptcy courts or district courts.

  1. Click the Save button.

The list of events is cleared from the screen. The events displayed on the screen will no longer appear for rules calculations using that Trigger in the affected jurisdictions.

View Excluded Events

You can view the events that have been excluded from Triggers in every Jurisdiction. To view Excluded Events:

  1. Open the Exclude Events screen from the Utilities menu and click the View Excluded Events shortcut.

The View Excluded Events screen will appear, showing a list of events that have been excluded from Triggers in every jurisdiction. For each entry, the list will show the Jurisdiction, Trigger and Event that was excluded.

Restore Excluded Events

Excluded events can be restored, so that they will once again show up during rules calculations. To restore excluded events, you reverse the process used to exclude them. To restore Excluded Events:

  1. Open the Exclude Events screen from the Utilities menu and click the View Excluded Events shortcut.

The list of excluded events will appear on the screen.

  1. On the Excluded Events screen, locate the event you wish to restore and note the Jurisdiction and Trigger associated with the deadlines.
  1. Click the Back shortcut to return to the Exclude Events screen.
  2. On the Exclude Events screen, select the Jurisdiction and Trigger from the dropdown lists and click the Preview Events button.

The complete list of events relating to the Trigger will be displayed. The excluded events will be shown checked.

  1. Locate the checked events you wish to restore and uncheck them.
  1. Select the Apply To Selected Jurisdiction option and click the Save button

The screen will clear and the selected events will be restored.

DocketCalendar User Preferences

Before you begin performing rules calculation, you should review the settings on the Preferences screen to determine whether you want to change the default values. You will probably find most of the default settings acceptable. The options on the Preferences screen primarily control settings that affect the location and content of information placed on the subject line and in the body of a your calendar entries when deadlines and appointments are placed on the calendars as a result of docket calculations.

Accessing the Preferences Screen

Choose Preferences from the Utilities menu.

User Preferences for DocketCalendar

DocketCalendar provides control for a number of global settings on the Preferences Screen.

To view and change preferences hover over the Manage Tab and click on the Preferences Option

Below is a list of available options. Once you have made changes, click the Update button to save your changes.

Default Jurisdiction.

If you have subscribed to the rules in more than one jurisdiction, you can select one as the default jurisdiction. When you create a case, this jurisdiction will be automatically selected. This setting would be useful to a practitioner whose litigation practice is limited primarily to a single jurisdiction. Default Setting: No Jurisdiction Selected.

Add "Court Rule" to Body

By default, the system adds text from the court rule to the body of the appointments or deadlines created on the calendar. Users can change this option as follows:

  • Don’t add: The Court Rule will not be added.
  • Rule Text: The default—rule text will be added.
  • Rule ID only. An identification code, frequently the official abbreviation used to refer to the applicable procedural rules, will be added—for example, FRCP 33(b)(2)—i.e., Rule 33(b)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

Add "Date Rule" to Body

Default Setting: The Date Rule is an abbreviated summary of the calculation used to calculate the event date. It includes how many days, what type of days (court or calendar), what direction (forward or backward), and the roll method (what to do if the date lands on weekend or holiday). By default, the Date Rule is placed into the body of the appointment or deadline on the calendar. Users can change the option to “No” if they do not want the Date Rule in the body. 

Case Location

Default Setting: Prepend to subject: This option determines where the case name will be placed in the subject or the body of the calendar entry. If you do not want to accept the default setting, select one of the other options from the dropdown list:

Prepend to subject. Puts the case name first on the subject line, before the event description. (Default and recommended setting)

Append to subject. Puts the case name after the event description in the subject line. If the event has a lengthy description, the case name may be cut off when you view the subject line in the Google calendar.

Prepend to body. Puts the case name in the body of the calendar entry, before the Court Rule or Rule ID.

Append to body. Puts the case name in the body of the event after the location of the Court Rule or Rule ID.

Note: If you choose an option that puts the case name in calendar entry, either before or after the body, the case name will not appear in the subject of the event on the Google calendar and you not be able to see it without opening the calendar entry.

Don’t add. Removes the case name from the subject and body. This option is also not recommended, because you may not be able to identify the case without the case name.

Add "User Notification" Tag

This will place a unique text string on each event that belongs to a specific Assigned Calendar.

Pop-Up Reminder

This setting assigns the default value on the Add Case screen for the length of time before an event or deadline created in a case that the calendar will generate a Pop Up notification for a particular event placed on the Outlook calendar.

Display "Events" Details:

This setting will override all event settings and remove all event details from your DocketCalendar Events.

Display Trigger Title on Calendar Body:

This setting will display the trigger Title on all related events. Default setting is Yes

Appointments w/time status

This setting determines whether a calculated event that is a court appearance or appointment will show the time slot when it takes place as “busy”, so that other people will not try to schedule other appointment at that time. The default is “busy”. It works in conjunction with Appointment length setting.

Appointment length

This setting determines the length of time that will be reserved on your calendar, when a rules calculation places an appointment event on your calendar that takes place at a specified time. The default is 1 hour. If the previous option is set to “busy”, your calendar will show that you are busy for the period of time selected.

Add “DocketCalendarDeadline” Tag

By default this setting is set to “Yes”. When enabled, the word “DocketCalendarDeadline” is placed into the body of a calendar item. When the calendar item is transmitted as a meeting invitation during the docket creation process, the presence of this tag gives the recipient the option to identify those invitations received from DC. Using the Google’s filtering function, the User is able to create a filter that can remove incoming meeting invitations and archive them or move them to another folder.

Categories

This setting establishes a default Category for events appearing on the calendar, as a result of Date Calculations. When a new Case is created, the selected Category is automatically transferred to each event on the Add Case screen, where it becomes the default Event Category for every event created in that case. During a Date Calculation, the Event Category can be changed again, allowing all events created using a particular Trigger to have a different category than other events created in the case. By default, this setting is set to “No Category”.

Note: Categories are created in your Primary Firm Calendar. Any Category you create will be available inside DocketCalendar.

Outlook Calendar Reminders & Categories

Microsoft Outlook allows one Popup Reminder for each event and multiple Categories for each event.

DocketCalendar fully supports control of your reminders at the Case, Trigger and Event level. The latest update of DocketCalendar unlocks a new level of control of reminders. Now when you are calculating events you will see an option on each event that will allow you to edit the individual reminders, and  the ability to edit the reminder for each Trigger as well. Once events have been calendared, you can now edit the reminders by editing the Trigger or Event to change all your reminder settings!

Create Events: Reminders & Categories

To Edit a single line item, after you have calculated your deadlines on the Create Events screen and clicked the Next: Edit Events button, you'll see an Edit Pencil icon at the end of each deadlines. Click the Edit Pencil icon and you will see a dropdown option for setting the individual event Popup, and the individual event Category. When you have completed your line item edits, click save on each line item you edit. Your Trigger level settings will be saved when you add the events to your calendars.

Note: You can only set one Category at the line item level but you can select multiple Categories at the Trigger level.

Case Reminders & Categories

Case reminders and Category settings are set when you create a new case and can be edited at anytime. When you change the Case settings, the changes will apply to new deadlines calculated. If you need to change Reminders or Categories for any deadlines already calendared, you will need to edit the Trigger or the Event.

Trigger Reminders & Categories

When you are calculating a new Trigger you can set your Trigger Reminder. Once you have calendared your events, you can edit the reminder setting at the Trigger level by going to the edit Trigger screen. Go to your Case, click the view button for the Trigger you want to edit and then click the Edit Trigger button.

Note: If you have been using DocketCalendar prior to the availability of the new reminders edit features the Event and Trigger screen released 12/27 make sure to check your reminders if you edit an Event or a Trigger.

Event Reminders & Categories

When you are creating new events you can set your Event level Reminder and one Category. Once you have calendared your events, you can edit the Reminder & Category settings at the Trigger level by going to the Edit event screen. You can access your events from the Case / Trigger view, or from the View all Case Events button on each case. You can also find your events on the View All Events Screen.

Note: If you have been using DocketCalendar prior to the availability of the new reminders edit features the Event and Trigger screen released 12/27 make sure to check your reminders if you edit an Event or a Trigger.

Primary Outlook Calendar

DocketCalendar requires a single Outlook Email Calendar to function as the hub for your firm's deadlines

Once you have set up your "Linked Calendar" You can begin using DocketCalendar.

DocketCalendar adds events directly to any shared Primary Calendar or any Secondary Calendar created inside your Outlook 365 domain.

When you are using Outlook meetings, you can put events on any calendar, but you can only invite someone's primary email calendar. This is the calendar that shows up in your Outlook Calendar view under My Calendars as "Calendar"

With DocketCalendar, you can create a new secondary calendar from any persons email account and share it to your Firm Calendar and DocketCalendar will add events directly to that calendar. You can also create secondary calendars on the primary Firm Calendar and then share those calendars to any person inside your domain as either a read only calendar, or with edit privileges.

Once you have added the shared Calendar to your Primary Firm Calendar. DocketCalendar will see these calendars and allow you to assign them to Calendar Users. See Calendar Users.

The Primary Calendar Associated with Your Email Account

The Email account you logged into after you logged into DocketCalendar is automatically associated with a single calendar, called your Primary Calendar. If you take no further action, your primary calendar will appear in the Calendars dropdown list that is present on the screen where you assign Calendar Users.

Secondary Calendars Associated with your Email Account or another User's Email Account

Outlook permits you to create one or more secondary calendars in your Email account. Note: Like the Primary Calendar, a secondary calendar can be shared with other members of the office.  

Shared Calendar Owned by Another Outlook User

You can also post events on a Primary calendar inside your domain which another Outlook user has shared with you. 

Adding Calendars to Your Cases & Triggers & Events

Now that you have connected your linked email account and assigned your calendars you can begin adding calendars to your cases, triggers and events.

Add Calendars to your Case

Click on "All Cases" to view your cases. You will notice a prompt at the top of the screen to add a calendar to your case. This message will disappear after you add your first calendar.

Click "View" on the case you would like to modify and click the "Edit Case" button.

You will notice there is now a new field where you can add your assigned calendars.

Click in the box under the Assigned Calendars label to open the list of available calendars. Select the calendars you want to add to your Case (Note: Click anywhere on the screen to close the Calendar Dropdown menu).

Once you have selected your calendar, click the "Save Case" button at the bottom of the Edit Case screen.

You will now see your calendar listed on your View Case screen as well as the All Cases list view.

DocketCalendar will now add events for your case directly to your Outlook or Google Calendar the next time you calculate deadlines.

Add Calendars to your Triggers

To add the triggers you have already calculated to your calendar, you will need to add your desired calendars to each trigger.

From the View Case screen. Click the "View" button for the first trigger you want to add to your Outlook or Gmail calendar.

Click "Edit Trigger" and on the Edit Trigger screen you will now see an option to add calendars. Click in the box under the Assigned Calendar(s) label to open the list of available calendars. Select the calendar(s) you want to add to your trigger (Note: Click anywhere on the screen to close the Calendar Dropdown menu)

Next, click the "Update Assigned Calendars" button and DocketCalendar will begin adding the trigger's events to your Outlook or Gmail Calendars.

If you don't have all of your calendars set up, don't worry, you can go back anytime and add and remove calendars from any trigger or event.

When you return to the View Case Screen, you will now see the calendars for each trigger.

Add Calendars to your Events

You may, at times, want to add a single event to a calendar. For Example: The paralegal has all of the last day deadlines for the Deposition on their calendar, but the Attorney only wants the "Appearance" deadline on his or her calendar.

Click on the "View" button for the trigger you want to edit and then click on the "View" button for the event you want to edit.

On the Edit Event screen, scroll to the bottom of the screen. Click in the box under the Assigned Calendar(s) label to open the list of available calendars. Select the calendars you want to add to your event and then click the "Add/Remove Calendars" button. (Note: Click anywhere on the screen to close the Calendar Dropdown menu)

Add an Internet Calendar to Outlook

Step 1 Right-click  on your Calendar and select Add New Calendar

Step 2 - Select Add Calendar From Internet

Step 3 - In the Pop up window - Paste the Link that was emailed to you

Step 4 - Click Yes on the 2 Outlook prompts

Your New Calendar will be visible

Forwarding Gmail Reminders to Outlook

Begin Process to Forward Email

Step 1 - From your Gmail email screen click on the gear icon on the top right side of the screen. Then click See all settings

Step 2 Click on "Forwarding and POP/IMAP" and then click on "Add a forwarding address"

Step 3 - Add the email address you want to forward the reminders to and then click proceed. a 3rd pop up will appear, click OK.

What the Recipient reminders needs to do

The next steps are required by the person who will be receiving the forwarded email reminders.


Step 1) From Inbox look for an email with a link to approve the request to forward emails. Click the link

Step 2) Click confirm, there is a final Confirmation screen, close the browser tab.

Forward Reminders


Once you have sent the request to the recipient and they have accepted. You can create their inbox forwarding rule.

Step 1 Go to Manage Calendars - Find the Calendar you want to forward email reminds for. Scroll to the right on the view screen and copy the UserCalendarTag

Step 2 Click on the far right in the search mail box at the top of the screen, click the icon to expand search options. Paste the unique CalendarUserTag into the "Has the words" field and click "Create Filter"

Step 3 Click Forward and then select the name of the email you want the reminders forwarded to, and then click Create filter.

Updating Cases / Changing Calendars / Archiving

You can change and update the details and settings for a particular case.

Changes will only be applied to Case Events Going Forward.

(Note - The Case Name Field is accessible here but the program will not update Case events already applied to your calendar. Do not change the Case Name if you have already Added Events to the Calendar) This feature is coming soon.

  • From the Tools menu, select Docket Cases.

The Docket Calculator Cases screen will appear, displaying a list of existing cases.

  • Find the case you want to update. If the case is not displayed in the list, you can:
  • Use the vertical scroll bar to move down the list; or
  • Search for the case by typing in a few letters in the type search box.
  • Click the Edit button next to the case you wish to update.

The Update Case screen will appear

  • To remove an Calendar or a User, click on the “x” in the left corner of the name Calendar you wish to remove.
  • To add an Calendar, use the dropdown box to locate and select them

When you are done, click the Update Case button at the bottom of the screen.

Note: Archive Case will not remove events from your calendar. You must first go to the Edit Trigger Screen and Archive each Trigger before you archive the Case. Archive Case & Triggers is coming soon.

Quick Print your DocketCalendar Deadlines

Once you have done a search of your Outlook Calendar for DocketCalendar Deadlines, you can quickly print out your deadlines by using Outlook's print option.

Click Control "P" to print

Change your print to Landscape

Adding Deadlines to your Calendar

Adding Deadlines to your Calendar

Review the Details of Rules Calculations:
  •  By clicking the triangular-shaped pointer at the beginning of each event, you can see the details of how the deadline is calculated.
Display Events in Tree View:
  • Click the show tree view to view the events in a hierarchical view to show the relationship between events and some deadlines as the trigger for other sub-events.
Exclude Events:
  • Exclude deadlines by unchecking them in the list. You can also create preferences for automatically excluding certain events so that they will not show up on the list of events at all on the Docket Calculator.
Print Events: 
  • Print a list of events by clicking the print shortcut.
Export to Outlook or iCal Format:
  • By clicking the Outlook or iCal shortcut, DocketCalendar will create a file containing the events in a format that can import into Outlook or any other calendaring program compatible with the iCal format.

Post the Events

  • Click the import to calendar button. 
  • The deadlines you have selected will appear on a new screen, called the verify screen. 
  • The verify screen will only include the deadlines you checked on the Docket Calculator screen.

Saving Deadlines to Google Calendars

Post to Calendar: 
  • Choose a single Google Calendar on which to post the events. 
Add Calendars: 
  • Send events to the people in the office who may want these deadlines and events placed on their Google calendars.

Edit the Description, Calendar Color, and Notifications That Apply to an Event

  • Click the edit icon located at the end of the description of any event you want to change.
Change Description:
  •  Click the copy button, which will copy the current description into the text box for further editing.
  •  The text typed into the text box will be substituted for the original description. 
  • The new description will not appear on the screen, but it will appear on Google calendars. 
  • If you need to update the new description, click the edit icon again.
Change Event Color:
  • You can choose a color for the event. This action will override the event color selected when you created the case.

Add Additional Email and Pop-Up Notifications:
  • Set the length of time before the event when either the Google pop-up notification or Email notification will be generated. This action changes the notification settings selected when creating the case.
  • Click the save button when you are done.

Saving the Events

  • ‍Click the save to calendar button. 
  • Events will be posted on the calendars you selected. A confirmation screen will appear, showing the details of the date calculations.

Viewing DocketCalendar Events

When you view a DocketCalendar event on the Outlook calendar, depending upon options set in DocketCalendar options you will see information about the event, including the trigger, the court rule and date calculation rules.

Deadlines are displayed as all-day events, which places them at the top of the calendar. 

What Information They Can View

The information included in an Outlook record you open includes:

  • Details of the Event. The details of the event inserted in Outlook's standard fields, including the date and time of the event, case name (unless suppressed by option settings), event description (sometime called activity) and location, if inserted by the user. The event description is also inserted into the body of the appointment.
  • List of Events. A list of all related events to the trigger.
  • Trigger Information. On the form, information regarding the trigger event, including the date, description, jurisdiction and, if applicable, the type of service of process involved.
  • Controls for Updating the Trigger. On the added form, controls for updating the events by changing the trigger date and recalculating the date of the events, as well as a control for deleting all of the events related to the trigger.

DocketCalendar Terminology

The CalendarRules rules-based scheduling engine, which DocketCalendar uses to perform date calculations, relies upon two factors that apply in virtually every case. First, the deadlines are almost always based upon–or triggered by–events described by a court's procedural rules. Second, the procedural rules normally specify the length of time before or after that event that a deadline expires and the formula to be used to calculate that date.  

CalendarRules attorneys have identified the procedural rules that apply to a large percentage of the Federal and State courts and other tribunals that decide cases in the United States. From their review of those procedural rules, they have extracted the information that is is stored in the CalendarRules database and then utilized by DocketCalendar to perform deadline calculations:

  • Court Rules: All of the rules of procedure that apply in a case pending before a particular court or tribunal, or if available, a particular judge, are consolidated into a single set of rules applicable to a particular Jurisdiction.
  • List of Triggers for Each Jurisdiction: A comprehensive list of the trigger events–the events upon which deadlines are based–contained in all procedural rules applicable to the jurisdiction.
  • Related Events: A comprehensive list of the related events–deadlines–that are expressly calculated in reference to each trigger event and for each related event, the time period allowed by the procedural rules to comply with it.
  • Holiday List: A list of the official holidays applicable to the rule set for each jurisdiction.
  • Service Types: The types of service of court papers recognized under the applicable procedural rules for each jurisdiction.
  • Date Rule: For each related event, the formulas specified in the procedural rules that describe how to calculate the deadline, including how the time period is affected by service types and when the deadline falls on a weekend or legal holiday.
  • Rule Text: For each related Event, an ID and snippet of text for each provision of the procedural rules that describes the event and its relation to the trigger event and prescribes the time period for compliance.
  • Calendar Folder: Events created by a rules calculation will be placed automatically on the default calendar. You can change the default calendar folder for the DocketCalendar add-in installed on your computer workstation in options.
  • Jurisdiction: DocketCalendar uses the term jurisdiction as a shorthand to refer to all of the procedural rules that govern rule calculation for a case. Each jurisdiction on the use rules screen will automatically apply the federal rules of civil procedure, the local rules for that district.
  • Trigger, Trigger Event or Trigger Item: Virtually every deadline in a case is based upon and relates to an event spelled out in the procedural rules. In DocketCalendar, these events are called trigger events, trigger items or simply triggers. For example, summons and complaint served is the trigger.
  • Trigger Date: This is simply the date of the trigger event. Depending upon the trigger, it may be a date in the past or future, or today’s date—for example, the date of an upcoming trial or the date when a motion was served.
  • Related Events: This term refers to the deadlines and court appointments produced by a rules calculation based upon a trigger.  Most related events are deadlines, but where a trigger itself is a case-related court appointment that should appear on your calendar—e.g., deposition, hearing, trial, etc.—DocketCalendar will include it in the list as a Related Event.
  • Court Days; Holiday List; Rolling–Backward or Forward: When a deadline falls on a weekend or legal holiday. Each court has unique rules for how to address what to do with deadlines that land on a weekend or holiday. When court rules specify that a deadline is to be moved to the next court day, DocketCalendar refers to it as rolling forward; when court rules specify that the deadlines is to be moved to the previous court day, DocketCalendar refers to it as rolling backward.  
  • Service Type: Where a trigger is the service of a case filing, procedural rules in many courts add a period of time to the calculation of the related deadlines, depending upon the method of service or service type–for example, personal service, electronic service, service by mail, etc. DocketCalendar calls the addition of time to a deadline based upon the service type a service type offset.
  • Date Rule: When related events are calculated, DocketCalendar will allow you to view an abbreviated summary of the formula it used to calculate the deadline.  This is known as the date rule. DocketCalendar will also give you the option to include the date rule on the Outlook calendar entry for each of the related events.
  • Court Rule: DocketCalendar also allows you to view the text of the procedural rules which were used to formulate the date rule on which a deadline is based and the option to include the text in the body of the calendar entry for the deadline on the Outlook calendar. The court rule consists of two components:
  • Rule Text: One or more excerpts from the rules of procedural applicable to the case.
  • Rule ID: An abbreviation for the name of the applicable rules of civil procedure followed by the paragraph or section number for each rule text excerpt. For example, CCP 412.20(a)(3); 430.40(a), referring to two sections of the California Rules of Civil Procedure.

Secondary Calendars

How to Create a Secondary Google Calendar

  1. Open the Google calendar associated with your Google account. If you have not created a shortcut to access your calendar, type "calendar.google.com" in your browser's address bar and press the Enter key.
  1. On the bottom portion of the Calendar sidebar, click "+" to the right of the words "Other calendars" to display a menu.
  1. On that menu, choose "Create new calendar".

The Settings page for the new calendar will be displayed.

  1. Enter a name for your secondary calendar and click Create calendar.

A gray banner at the bottom of the page will indicate that the new calendar is being created.

  1. After the banner disappears from the page, click the arrow to the left of Settings at the top of the page to return to the list of your calendars.

The secondary calendar will appear in the list of calendars on the left side of the page. The new calendar will now appear in the dropdown list of Calendars to which you can post calculated events.

Remove Triggers and Events

Remove Triggers and Events

You delete Triggers and calendar events by archiving them. Archiving a Trigger removes it and all of the related events from the case as well as all affected calendars—the single default calendar and the calendars of any Attendees who were added to the Trigger at the time the events were created or updated. You must archive individual calendar events from “inside” the Trigger where they were created.

Archive (Remove) Individual Triggers

  1. On the Docket Calculator Cases screen, locate the case where the Trigger was used and click the View button to open the case and display a list of its Triggers.  
  2. On the Cases Triggers screen, locate the Trigger you wish to archive and click its Edit button.

The Update Trigger(s) screen will be displayed.

  1. Click the Archive Trigger button at the bottom left corner of the screen.

DC will display a confirmation screen, asking you to confirm your decision to archive the Trigger.

  1. Click Confirm to archive the events or click Cancel to cancel.

DC will archive the Trigger and remove all related items from the calendars where they were posted.

Archive (Remove) Individual Calendar Events

  1. On the Docket Calculator Cases screen, locate the case where the calendar event was created.
  2. Click the View button to open the case and display the list of Triggers for the case. 
  3. Locate the Trigger used to create the event and click its View button.

A list of all events relating the Trigger will be displayed.

  1. Locate the event you want to archive and click its Edit button.

The Update Events screen will be displayed.

  1. Click the archive button at the bottom right corner of the screen.

The individual event will be removed from the DC case and the calendars where it has been posted.

Permanently Remove a Case from the Archive

You can permanently delete a case from DC that has been moved to the archive of cases. You should not permanently delete a case unless you are certain there are no circumstances in which you would want to restore the case or review any of the events or other details relating to it.

  1. Open the list of archived cases by clicking on the Archive Cases menu item in the Cases & Reports menu.

The Archive Cases screen will appear, showing the list of cases that have already been archived.

  1. Click the Delete button.

A confirmation screen will be displayed. Click Confirm to proceed or Cancel to cancel. The case and all Triggers and events in the case will be permanently deleted.

Updating Individual Events

Updating the Date, Attendees and Custom Text for an Individual Event

You can update the date of an individual event, add or remove the Attendees or change the custom text for that event.

Locate the Individual Event

Individual events are listed with the Trigger used to create them in the case record. There are two ways to locate the event:

  • Follow the hyperlink in the body of the event on a Google calendar where it is posted—the quickest method.
  • Find it in the event list for the Trigger used to create the event in the case record.

Locate an Event by Following its Hyperlink in the Google Calendar.

  1. Locate the event you wish to update in one of the Google calendars.

See, Finding events in the Google Calendar.

  1. Click the event’s shortcut on the calendar.

The calendar item will open, showing all of the details of the event.

  1. Click the blue hyperlink.

The hyperlink contains the unique id number for the event. Clicking on it will take you to the Update Event screen for the event, where you can update the event date, add or remove Attendees and change the event’s custom text.

Locate an Event in the Event List of the Related Trigger

To find an event in the case record, you must find the Trigger used to create it. The Trigger for an event is included in the body of the event on the Google calendar.  Once you know the Trigger, follow these steps to display the Update Event screen:

Locate the Trigger using the instructions set forth in Displaying the Trigger for Updating

Click the View button next to the Trigger.

The Trigger Events screen will be displayed.

On the Trigger Events screen, find the event you wish to update.

The Update Event screen will appear, where you can change the event date, add or remove Attendees or change the event’s custom text.

Update the Event

Change the Date of the Event

To change the date of the event:

  1. Click in the Event Date field to display the date control and choose the new date by clicking on the number of the day of the month.
  2. If the event is an appointment and you want to change the time, scroll up or down to find the time you want and click on it.
  1. If this is the only change you are making to the event, click Update Event at the bottom left side of the screen.

Change the Calendars

You can change what Calendars the Event appears on

  1. Remove an existing Calendar by click on the “x” to the left of the Calendar name
  2. Add new Calendars by selecting one or more names from the dropdown list.

If you are done making changes, click Update Event at the bottom left side of the screen.

Change Event Custom Text

To change the Event Custom Text field, add text to the field or edit any text that may already be there. When you are done, click Update Event at the bottom left side of the screen.

Confirm Your Changes

To confirm that changes, click the Update Event button at the bottom left of the screen. The update will make changes to the event as it appears on the applicable Google calendars.

Remove (Archive) Triggers and Events

You can remove all Deadline Events from our Calendar by using the Archive Trigger Button. To remove an entire trigger Update the Trigger and use the Archive Trigger button.

Adding or Removing Calendars from a Trigger

Any Calendars selected when creating the case will appear on the Docket Calculator screen when you calculate events. They will receive meeting invitations for all events using a trigger that will appear on their calendars. On the update trigger screen, you can add or remove Calendars. If you add an Calendar, their Google Calendar will be updated with all of the events related to the trigger. You can add or remove Calendars on the trigger update screen independently of updating a trigger with a new date. 

Add or remove an Attendee

  • Select update trigger.
  • Remove an existing attendee by clicking on the "X" to the left of the attendee's name in the attendees dropdown box.

  • Add new Calendars by selecting one or more names from the dropdown list.
  • Click the update button; or, alternatively,
  • If you are changing the date of the trigger, you can also make that change then click the recalculate button.
  • The Google calendars for the events relating to the trigger will be updated.

Recalculate a Trigger

Note--Changing Just Attendees: Adding or removing Attendees whose calendars will be updated with the events can be done separately or at the same time as recalculating the Trigger using a different date. To update Attendees separately, see Adding or Removing Attendees. Once the Update Trigger screen is being shown:

  1. Click in the Trigger Date field to display the date control and choose the new date by clicking on the number of the day of the month.
  1. Select "use new date" from the Recalculated Events dropdown box.
  1. Click the Recalculate button.

The events with the recalculated dates will appear on the next screen.

From there you can:

  • Review the date rule used to calculate a specific event and the procedural rules where those calculations are specified.
  • Exempt an event from the recalculation by unchecking its checkbox.

Note: The original event will remain on the Google calendars where it was first posted.

  1. Click the Update Calendar button.

A confirmation screen will be displayed, showing the details of the Trigger calculation and listing the events that were updated. The Google calendars of the Attendees and the default calendar for the case will be updated.

Case Triggers and Events

Case Triggers and Events

View the List of Triggers for a Case

  • Open the list of cases by selecting docket cases from the cases and reports menu.
  • The Docket Calculator cases screen will open.
  • Locate the case whose triggers you want to view.
  • Click the view button for the case in question.
  • From the case triggers screen, you may return to the docket calculator cases screen by clicking the docket cases shortcut, or print the list of triggers.

View All Events Relating to a Single Trigger

  • Display all triggers relating to the case in question.
  • Click the view button next to the trigger you want to view.

View all Events and Deadlines Across all Cases

  • Click Docket Cases from the Cases & Reports drop-down menu.
  • Click the case events shortcut in the upper right corner of the screen.
  • The calendar events screen will be displayed, showing all events from all cases in the system.

Date Calculator

The Date Calculator tool allows you to simulate the calculation of a deadline in a particular Jurisdiction, employing the same computer logic that DC uses when calculating a deadline automatically based upon a Trigger. This allows you to run through the calculations required by a particular procedural rule to determine a deadline without having to select a Trigger and perform a date calculation in DC. To use this tool, you specify a hypothetical Trigger date and the same parameters DC uses when performing date calculations and DC will calculate the date of the resulting deadline. In performing a calculation, the Date Calculator uses the following terminology:

  • A Holiday Set--the list of holidays recognized in the Jurisdiction where the calculation will apply.
  • A Start Date--the date on which you will base your calculation, the date of a hypothetical Trigger date.
  • A Time Period--the number of calendar days, court days, weeks, months or years.
  • Whether to Count Forward or Backward--whether you are counting forward from the Start Date to calculate a future deadline or counting backward from the Start Date to determine the date of an action that must be taken a specified period of time before the Start Date.
  • Whether to Roll Forward/Backward/Not at All--if the calculated deadline falls on a weekend or holiday recognized in the Jurisdiction, whether to force it forward to the next court date (a date that is neither a holiday nor a weekend) or backward to the previous court date or to accept the deadline calculation without regard to whether it lands on a court date.

To calculate a hypothetical deadline, using the holidays of a particular Jurisdiction:

  1. Open the Docket Research screen from the Tools menu.
  2. Click the Docket Calculator shortcut in the upper right corner of the screen.

The Date Calculator Screen will be displayed.

  1. Select a Jurisdiction from the Holiday Set dropdown list.
  2. Enter the Start Date in the Start Date field.

Just like a Trigger Date, this is the date upon which you will base your calculation: e.g., 30 days/weeks/months before or after the Start Date.  

  1. Enter the number of time increments you will be counting--.e.g, days, weeks, months, etc.--in the blank field directly below the date field.
  2. Determine whether the time period is measured in calendar days, court days, weeks, months or years and select the applicable radio button on the screen.

Typically the procedural rule you are trying to simulate will specify the time period.  If the rule specifies "days", it will normally means "Calendar Days". Remember that Court Days excludes weekends and the holidays recognized in the selected Jurisdiction.

  1. Determine whether you are counting forward or backward and make the appropriate selection. Your choice depends upon the purpose of the date calculation.
  • Counting Forward. You are trying to calculate a deadline which will occur after the Start Date--e.g., the last day to file an answer after the date of the service of the complaint (Start Date); the last day to file a notice of appeal after the date of the entry of judgment (Start Date).
  • Counting Backwards. You are trying to calculate a deadline which will occur before the Start Date--e.g., the date of the last day to file proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law before the date of trial (the Start Date).
  1. Determine whether you want the calculated deadline to "Roll Forward" or "Roll Backward", if it lands on a holiday or weekend day.
  2. Roll Forward. If you select "Roll Forward", the Date Calculator will move a date to the next court day--a day that is neither an official holiday nor a weekend day.  Most procedural rules grant you until the next court day, if a deadline lands on a weekend or holiday, if you are calculating a future deadline.
  3. Roll Backward. If you are calculating a deadline that must be met prior to the Trigger Event, such as filing a brief or other submission for the court, the procedural rules might specify that if the calculated date occurs on a weekend or holiday, the deadlines should be moved to the previous court day. If that is the case, then choose "Roll Backward".
  4. No Roll.  If you are only interested in knowing the date of the deadline, regardless of holidays and weekends, then leave the default selection at "No Roll".
  5. Click the Calculate button when you are done.

The Date Calculator will display the date and day of the week of the deadline.

Service Type Offsets

Service Type Offsets

The procedural rules for most courts add a specified number of days to respond to deadlines based upon service of pleadings and other case documents, utilizing certain methods of service, on the opposing party. DC refers to this additional period of time, measured in days, as the "offset". The offset takes into account that there may be a delay in receiving court papers served using certain methods of service, justifying adding more time to a deadline to respond. DC recognizes six methods of service:

  • Personal or In hand--Usually no offset
  • Electronic--Usually no offset
  • By Fax--Usually no offset
  • Service by Mail on a Party Outside the State--usually an offset.
  • Express or Overnight--Usually an offset
  • Regular Mail--Usually an offset

DC automatically takes these offsets into consideration when you perform docket calculations. The Service Types tool accessible from the Docket Research screen, allows you view the offsets prescribed in a particular Jurisdiction.

To view a list of Service Type Offsets:

  1. Open the Docket Research screen and click on the Service Types tab.
  2. Choose the Jurisdiction whose Service Type offsets you wish to view from the Jurisdiction dropdown box.

Only the Jurisdictions in your DC subscription will appear in the list.

  1. Click the Find button.

DC will display a list of the Service Types for the Jurisdiction and the number of days, if any, of the applicable offsets.

View Jurisdiction's Holidays

View Jurisdiction's Holidays

Virtually all courts have rules that specify what happens when a deadline lands on an official holiday. What holidays are recognized for the purpose of rules calculations varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction and when certain holidays are observed may vary from year to year, if they fall on a weekend. DC automatically takes these holidays into account when calculating a deadline, but there will be times when you might want to view the actual list of holidays used by DC and when they are observed, particularly if you practice before multiple courts. The Holiday tool, accessible from a tab on the Docket Research screen, allows you to do this.

To view a list of Holidays for  a Jurisdiction in your subscription:

  1. Open the Docket Research screen and click on the Holidays tab.
  2. Choose the Jurisdiction whose holidays you wish to view from the Jurisdiction dropdown box.

Only the Jurisdictions in your DC subscription will appear in the list.

  1. Specify a date range by inserting a Start Date and End Date in the date fields, or accept the default date range of one year from the current date.
  2. Click the Find button.

DC will display a list of the holidays for the Jurisdiction and the dates on which they fall or are observed.

Trigger Search

Sometimes, it is not obvious which Trigger to use to calculate particular deadlines in a case. Docket Research is a research tool that will help you locate the correct Trigger to use for docket calculations by searching for keywords in the Triggers, Events and the Rules of a particular Jurisdiction. 

How to Search for a Trigger Using Docket Research

To search for a Trigger:  

  1. Click on Docket Research in the Tools menu to open the Docket Research Screen.

The Docket Research screen will be displayed.

  1. To perform a search:
  2. Select the Jurisdiction of the case in question from the dropdown list.

The list will include all rules sets in your subscription.

  1. Enter a keyword or phrase.

Use as few words as possible, or the root of words, remembering that DC will be looking for an exact match. For instance, if you type "appeal", you will find "appealable", but if you type "appealable", you will not find "appeal".

  1. Choose whether you want to search any Triggers, Events or Rules within the Jurisdiction by clicking on the applicable checkboxes.
  2. Trigger: This option will search for all Triggers in the Jurisdiction that include the keywords.
  3. Event: This option will search through all events--deadlines and court events--in the Jurisdiction that include the keywords and find the Triggers used to calculate them.
  4. Rules: This option will search for the keywords in all excerpts of procedural rules in the Jurisdiction that relate to events that are calculated using Triggers.
  1. Click the Find button.

DC will search through the information you have selected and display a list of Triggers.

Modify Search Result View

This topic will show you how to configure the Outlook Instant Search so that you can use it to find calendar events created using DCO. From the list of search results, you will be able open, update, delete or apply one or more Categories to DCO events. To enable the Instant Search to search the information DCO adds to an Outlook appointment, you must modify Outlook's default Table View to include DCO fields--Trigger, Case and Event--as additional columns. This topic will also show you how to add a "filter" to the modified Table View to limit the Instant Search to DCO events occurring in the future. In this article, we will cover:

  • Modify a Table View to Include DCO Fields
  • Add a Filter To the Table View to Select Future Events

Modify a Table View to Include DocketCalendar Fields

To be able to search for events by the data in DocketCalendar-specific fields, such as Case Name, Trigger and Jurisdiction, you must add them as columns to the table that is displayed when you conduct a search, using the Instant Search. See, for example, Figure 1, where a search for the keyword "Return Day" yielded all of the CRO events based upon that Trigger.

Figure 1--Search for Trigger "Return Day" with DCO Fields Added to Table View

Create a New Table View by Copying the Default Table View

When you first install Outlook, it includes a single default Table View. Rather than modifying that view, it is preferable to copy it and then modify its settings.  

  1. Log into the Outlook account where the view will be copied.
  2. Open the Outlook calendar if it is not already open.
  3. Click on the View tab of the Ribbon menu at the top of the screen.
  4. Click on the Change Views button to display the Change Views menu screen.
  5. Click on Manage Views.

The Manage All Views screen will be displayed, showing a list of all existing views applicable to the current user

  1. Select the List view from the list and click the copy button.

The Copy View screen will be displayed.

  1. Enter a descriptive name for your copy of the Table view, such as CRO Search--Future Events.
  2. Click the OK button.

The Advanced View Settings will be displayed.

From this menu, you have access to all of the configuration settings for the view, including the placement of columns and creation of filters.

  1. If you know how to use the configuration settings, proceed to add the DCO columns to the view and, if you wish to do so, create one or more filters to limit the records you will display.
  2. If you want to wait to configure the columns, click the OK button to return you to the Manage All Views screen.

You will see the new Table View selected in the in the list.  You can click Apply if you want to immediately view your current calendar as a list.  Otherwise, click the OK button to return to the Calendar view.

Add the DCO Columns to the Table View

You will not be able to perform an Instant Search using DCO event information, such as Triggers and Jurisdiction, unless they are added to the columns of the Table view.  The DCO event description and the case name are exceptions, because DCO places these fields into the Outlook subject field by default.

Note:  In Configuring Options--Appointment Tab, you can change the default setting to remove the case name from the Outlook subject.  

  1. If the new Table view has been applied and is visible on your screen, click the View Setting button on the Current View section of the View menu. Otherwise, you will need to Open the Advanced View Settings Menu as follows:
  • After logging into Outlook, open the Outlook calendar.
  • Click on the View tab of the Ribbon menu at the top of the screen.
  • Click on the Change Views button to display the Change Views menu screen and then click on Manage Views.
  • Select the new Table view from the list and then click Modify.

The Advanced View Setting Menu will be displayed.

  1. Click Columns on the Advanced View Setting screen.

The Show Columns Screen will be displayed.

  1. Determine what DCO specific information fields you want to appear on the columns in addition to the fields Outlook places on a Table view by default.

The most useful fields for use with the Instant Search in conjunction with the standard Outlook fields are:

  • TriggerItemDescription. Meaning: Trigger. Useful to find all events related to a Trigger
  • JurisdictionDescription. Meaning: Rules Set Description. Useful to see all events relating to a particular Rule Set (Jurisdiction.
  • JurisdictionCode. Meaning: Abbreviation for Jurisdiction. If you recognize it, use it to conserve space on the Table columns.
  • CaseName. Meaning: Case Name. Not needed if Subject contains case name.
  • Text. Meaning: Variable. It could contain Key Words, but Categories are more useful.
  1. Determine which of the Outlook standard fields you want to include. We recommend that you retain the following Outlook fields:
  • Start: this is the date and time field.
  • Subject: by default this includes the case name and event description.
  • Location: this contains the content of the DCO location field; remove it if you do not use that field
  • Categories: leave it, particularly if you decide to use Categories to classify your events.
  1. Select the columns in the right panel that you want to remove (suggested: Attachment and In Folder).
  1. Click Remove.
  2. Repeat for each column you wish to remove.
  3. Next, add the DCO fields you decide to use for columns in the Table view from the left panel.
  • To find the DCO fields, select "User-defined fields" from the filter drop-down list above the Available columns panel on the left side of the screen to display the list of CRO fields.
  • Select a field and click Add to move it to the right panel.
  • Repeat until all of the fields have been selected.
  1. Then, move the fields up and down in the right panel using the Move Up and Move Down buttons until they are in the correct order.
  2. Click OK to return to the Advanced View Settings List and then click OK again to close the screen.
  3. You should now see the Table view with the columns you added on the screen.
  • Adjusting Column Sizes. You can adjust the width of the columns by dragging the vertical line that marks the border between two column to the left or right.
  • Re-ordering the Columns. You can re-order the fields by dragging them from one location to another. Adjust the column sizes so that the information for each column fits on the screen.

Add a Filter To the Table View to Select Future Events

You can install a filter on the Table view to remove past events from Instant Search results. You will find detailed information on creating filters, in Using Filters.

To create a filter that limits the Instant Search to future events, including today:

  1. Open the Advanced View Settings Menu for the Table View you created.
  2. Click the Filter button.

The Filter screen will open

  1. On the Advanced tab, click on the Field button to display the field group list and select the Start field from the Date/Time fields grouping.
  2. Select  "on or after" from the Conditions drop-down .
  3. Enter the word "Today" in the Value field.
  1. Click OK to return to the Advanced View Settings screen and then OK again to close it.

The filter has been added to the Table view.

Using Reports

Reports can be printed, converted into a pdf file or exported in a spreadsheet format.

How to Generate a Report

The Report Tool has access to all of the events in those cases to which the logged in User has access—that is, all cases to which the User has been assigned as a User when a case is created. To create a report, you follow these steps:

  1. Click on the Cases & Reports menu and select Reports.

The Report Tool screen will be displayed.

  1. On the Report Tool screen, choose the Filters that will select the event information you wish to include in the report.
  2. Choose the columns for the report you would like to see under Add Columns.
  3. Reports always display the case, date and time and a description of each event.
  4. If you want the report to include additional information, click one or more of the other items under Add Columns, such as the Jurisdiction or Attendees.
  5. Click the View button when you are done.

The output of the Report will appear at the bottom of the screen.

  1. Determine what format you want for the Report and click one of the output buttons.
  2. Copy.  Clicking Copy will copy the Report to your computer's clipboard, where it can be pasted into a word processing document.

Note: DC will download files in CSV and Excel format to the default location where your browser keeps files that have been downloaded from the Internet. This is usually the "download" directory on your computer.

Selecting Event Data Using Report Tool Filters

The Report Tool includes a variety of filters that allow you to select the deadlines and other case-related events you want to view in a report format. The following is an explanation of the more important filters.

Date Filters

Date filters allow you to select the events generated by DC in a specified range of dates. You can choose the beginning and end dates of the date range or use a pre-configured date ranged, called a "Quick Pick" on the Report Tools screen.

Date Picker

Case Filter

Choose this filter to display all events in a particular case within the specified date range.

Jurisdiction

You choose this filter from a dropdown list of all Jurisdictions to which your firm has subscribed. This filter will give you all events relating to cases where the specified jurisdiction has been selected for the case.

Filtering by Staff--Users and Attendees

You can create a report to show events in cases where one or more staff members are assigned to the case as Users or Attendees.  Click in the applicable dropdown box and select one or more staff members.

Using Filters Without a Dropdown List

Several of the filter fields--Trigger, Event Type, Location and Custom Field--allow you to filter by a single value entered into these fields during docket calculations, but do not provide you a list of values in the form of a dropdown list.  However, DC will locate each distinctive value entered into one of those fields during date calculations and aggregate them into a list "behind the scenes." To use one of these fields, type in a few letters or a word that is included in the value you are using for filtering. For instance, if you are looking for all events based on the Trigger "Hearing on Motion", typing the word "Hearing" in the Trigger filter field will display all Triggers that include that word.

Location

Since Location is a text field, it can filter any text saved in the location field.

Filtering by Staff--Users and Attendees

You can create a report to show events in cases where one or more staff members are assigned to the case as Users or Attendees. Click in the applicable dropdown box and select one or more staff members.

Calculating Deadlines

Calculating Deadlines

  • Choose Docket Calculator from the tools menu to open the Docket Calculator screen.
  • Select a case from the matter case dropdown list.

  • Ensure that a jurisdiction is selected in the jurisdiction field.
  • Select a trigger from the trigger item field. 

  • Pick your trigger date.

  • If the trigger item will take place at a specific time, such as a trial, hearing, or deposition: enter the time of the event.
  • If the trigger is not an event scheduled for a specific time: do not fill in the time. 
  • If the trigger involves the service of a pleading or other document, the service type field will become active. (Note: In some jurisdictions, certain types of service, such as service by mail, may affect the length of deadlines for particular events, such as responses to motions.)

  • Fill out the location field if necessary.
  • Once you have completed filling out the fields, click the calculate button at the bottom of the screen.

  • The deadlines and events calculated using the trigger will appear at the bottom of the screen.

Creating and Managing Cases

Every date calculation made in DocketCalendar is linked to a case.  

Creating a New Case

From the Docket Calculator Screen:
  • You can create a new case from the Docket Calculator screen in the process of running a rules calculation.

  • Click the add new case shortcut, located to the right of the matter case drop-down list.

From the Cases Screen:
  • From the tools menu, select Docket Cases.
  • Click the add new case shortcut at the top of the list.

  • Enter the name of the case. In most cases, you will use the case name in the form used by the court. If you want, you can also include the docket number assigned by the court—for example, Coburn v. Adelphi Corp., Civil No. 19-308478-MLK.
  • The case name you create will appear in the list of cases on Docket Calculator screen when you are asked to select case.

Show/Hide Case Name:
  • This field controls whether the case name will appear in the list of cases on the Docket Calculator screen, when you undertake docket calculations. It is set to show by default. If for any reason you want to prevent the case name from appearing in that list, click on the show/hide drop down list and change the value to hide.

Add Calendars to Your Case

Calendars are can be people or groups who will receive deadlines on their assigned Calendar when a deadline or event is created through the Docket Calculation process.

When you click "Save to Calendar" each deadline or event will be sent to the Gmail Calendars assigned and will simultaneously appear on the Google calendar associated with the case.

  1. Click in the Add Calendar Users to case box.

A list of all Calendars you have in your Utilities/Calendars listing will appear.

  1. Click the Calendars you want to add to the case

     
  1. To remove a Calendar, click the “x” next to a name in the box above the dropdown list.

Select the Jurisdiction

Select the jurisdiction where your case is pending from the dropdown list.

Location and Custom Text

These text fields can be left blank, or you can save information here to be automatically entered on the Docket calculation screen when you select a case. You can remove the default information or add to it at the time you calculate deadlines.

Setting Reminders

Two settings--Email Reminders and PopUp Reminders--allow you to establish on the case level when the two types of Google reminders will appear in connection with events created in the case. The default values for these reminders is set in the DocketCalendar Preferences settings and will automatically appear in these two fields. You can change the length of time prior to the occurrence of events these two types of reminders will appear.

Event Color

Although Google Calendars can be assigned colors, you can also assign a color to the case so that multiple cases in the same calendar can be distinguished by color. This setting also overrides the default Event Color setting in DC Preferences.

When you are finished setting up your case, click the Add Case button.

Calendars

Calendars

Functionality:
  • DocketCalendar can create deadline events on multiple calendars simultaneously. Each unique calendar that requires deadlines must be shared with your primary Google calendar with edit permissions. Calendars are sharable, and multiple people can use one calendar.
  • Once a calendar has been shared with your Firm Calendar, you must then link it to a Calendar User inside DocketCalendar
  • You can assign unique deadlines to any calendar. Each calendar can be assigned to anyone in your organization. Once assigned to a case, anyone with access to that calendar will receive all deadlines for that case as they are added to the calendar by default.
  • You can create a calendar from inside your master Gmail calendar as a secondary calendar and then share it with another person through Gmail, or you can connect any calendar to Outlook as an internet calendar. You can also have any Gmail user share any primary or secondary calendar created on another Gmail account to your master Gmail account and then assign it to anyone inside DocketCalendar.

Assign a Calendar

  • Click the calendars button on the utilities menu.

  • Enter the full name and email address. 
  • Select the calendar you want to associate the user with it from the calendar dropdown.
  • Click the add button when you are done.

Deleting Assigned Calendars

  • Click the delete button to remove an assigned calendar. You should not remove an assigned calendar if it already has deadlines attached to it.

Excluded Events

Excluded Events, accessed from the Utilities menu item, provides advanced functionality that allows users to exclude events from being created during rules calculations, if they find it helpful to do so. Most firms will not exclude events, unless the rules calculations in the jurisdictions in which they practice produce a large number of deadlines that are irrelevant to their practice. For instance, some procedural rules may trigger deadlines applicable to types of cases the firm does not handle. Excluding those deadlines will speed up the review process during rules calculations. The rules in other jurisdictions may have few deadlines the firm considers extraneous, making excluding events unnecessary. You can:

  • Exclude events from selected Jurisdictions.
  • View the excluded events.
  • Restore the excluded events if they were excluded by mistake or need to be included for any other reason.

Add Events to the Exclusion List

  1. Open the Exclude Events screen from the Utilities menu by selecting the Exclude Events menu item.

For help to open the Tools menu, see Navigating the DCG Menu and Dropdown Lists.  

The Exclude events screen will appear.

  1. Select the Jurisdiction that includes the events you wish to exclude from the Jurisdiction dropdown list.  (The Jurisdiction you chose as the Default Jurisdiction in Docket Calendar User Preferences will be selected automatically.)
  1. Select the Trigger in the Jurisdiction that creates the events.
  1. Click the Preview Events button.

The list of the events relating to that Trigger will be displayed.

  1. Select the events you wish to exclude by checking the applicable checkboxes.
  2. Choose whether you want to apply the exclusions only to the selected jurisdiction or to all related jurisdictions that contain the same Trigger.
  3. Selecting “Apply To Selected Jurisdiction” will exclude the checked events for the single jurisdiction chosen.
  4. Selecting “Apply To All Jurisdictions” will excluded the checked events in every jurisdiction in your subscription with the same Trigger and events as selected on the screen.

Note:  Use this feature where several jurisdictions include the same trigger and related events. This will generally apply where two or more jurisdictions employ the same procedural rules—for instance, if your subscription includes several federal bankruptcy courts or district courts.

  1. Click the Save button.

The list of events is cleared from the screen. The events displayed on the screen will no longer appear for rules calculations using that Trigger in the affected jurisdictions.

View Excluded Events

You can view the events that have been excluded from Triggers in every Jurisdiction. To view Excluded Events:

  1. Open the Exclude Events screen from the Utilities menu and click the View Excluded Events shortcut.

The View Excluded Events screen will appear, showing a list of events that have been excluded from Triggers in every jurisdiction. For each entry, the list will show the Jurisdiction, Trigger and Event that was excluded.

Restore Excluded Events

Excluded events can be restored, so that they will once again show up during rules calculations. To restore excluded events, you reverse the process used to exclude them. To restore Excluded Events:

  1. Open the Exclude Events screen from the Utilities menu and click the View Excluded Events shortcut.

The list of excluded events will appear on the screen.

  1. On the Excluded Events screen, locate the event you wish to restore and note the Jurisdiction and Trigger associated with the deadlines.
  1. Click the Back shortcut to return to the Exclude Events screen.
  2. On the Exclude Events screen, select the Jurisdiction and Trigger from the dropdown lists and click the Preview Events button.

The complete list of events relating to the Trigger will be displayed. The excluded events will be shown checked.

  1. Locate the checked events you wish to restore and uncheck them.
  1. Select the Apply To Selected Jurisdiction option and click the Save button

The screen will clear and the selected events will be restored.

User Preferences

Before you begin performing rules calculation, you should review the settings on the Preferences screen to determine whether you want to change the default values. You will probably find most of the default settings acceptable. The options on the Preferences screen primarily control settings that affect the location and content of information placed on the subject line and in the body of a Google calendar entry when deadlines and appointments are placed on the Google calendars as a result of docket calculations.

Accessing the Preferences Screen

Choose Preferences from the Utilities menu.

Default Settings for User Preferences

When a User logs into DocketCalendar for the first time and reviews settings on the Update Options screen, they will already be configured as shown below and no further action is needed unless the User wants to change the default values.

Below is a list of available options. Once you have made changes, click the Update button to save your changes.

Default Jurisdiction.

If you have subscribed to the rules in more than one jurisdiction, you can select one as the default jurisdiction. When you create a case, this jurisdiction will be automatically selected. This setting would be useful to a practitioner whose litigation practice is limited primarily to a single jurisdiction. Default Setting: No Jurisdiction Selected.

Add "Court Rule" to Body

By default, the system adds text from the court rule to the body of the appointments or deadlines created on the calendar. Users can change this option as follows:

  • Don’t add: The Court Rule will not be added.
  • Rule Text: The default—rule text will be added.
  • Rule ID only. An identification code, frequently the official abbreviation used to refer to the applicable procedural rules, will be added—for example, FRCP 33(b)(2)—i.e., Rule 33(b)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

Add "Date Rule" to Body

Default Setting: The Date Rule is an abbreviated summary of the calculation used to calculate the event date. It includes how many days, what type of days (court or calendar), what direction (forward or backward), and the roll method (what to do if the date lands on weekend or holiday). By default, the Date Rule is placed into the body of the appointment or deadline on the calendar. Users can change the option to “No” if they do not want the Date Rule in the body. 

Case Location

Default Setting: Prepend to subject: This option determines where the case name will be placed in the subject or the body of the calendar entry. If you do not want to accept the default setting, select one of the other options from the dropdown list:

Prepend to subject. Puts the case name first on the subject line, before the event description. (Default and recommended setting)

Append to subject. Puts the case name after the event description in the subject line. If the event has a lengthy description, the case name may be cut off when you view the subject line in the Google calendar.

Prepend to body. Puts the case name in the body of the calendar entry, before the Court Rule or Rule ID.

Append to body. Puts the case name in the body of the event after the location of the Court Rule or Rule ID.

Note: If you choose an option that puts the case name in calendar entry, either before or after the body, the case name will not appear in the subject of the event on the Google calendar and you not be able to see it without opening the calendar entry.

Don’t add. Removes the case name from the subject and body. This option is also not recommended, because you may not be able to identify the case without the case name.

Add "User Notification" Tag

This will place a unique text string on each event that belongs to a specific Assigned Calendar.

Email Reminder

This setting assigns the default value on the Add Case screen for the length of time before an event or deadline created in a case that the Google calendar will generate an email notification for a particular event placed on the Google calendar.

Pop-Up Reminder

This setting assigns the default value on the Add Case screen for the length of time before an event or deadline created in a case that the calendar will generate a Pop Up notification for a particular event placed on the Google calendar.

Display "Events" Details:

This setting will override all event settings and remove all event details from your DocketCalendar Events.

Display Trigger Title on Calendar Body:

This setting will display the trigger Title on all related events. Default setting is Yes

Appointments w/time status

This setting determines whether a calculated event that is a court appearance or appointment will show the time slot when it takes place as “busy”, so that other people will not try to schedule other appointment at that time. The default is “busy”. It works in conjunction with Appointment length setting.

Appointment length

This setting determines the length of time that will be reserved on your calendar, when a rules calculation places an appointment event on your calendar that takes place at a specified time. The default is 1 hour. If the previous option is set to “busy”, your calendar will show that you are busy for the period of time selected.

Add “DocketCalendarDeadline” Tag

By default this setting is set to “Yes”. When enabled, the word “DocketCalendarDeadline” is placed into the body of a calendar item. When the calendar item is transmitted as a meeting invitation during the docket creation process, the presence of this tag gives the recipient the option to identify those invitations received from DC. Using the Google’s filtering function, the User is able to create a filter that can remove incoming meeting invitations and archive them or move them to another folder.

Event Color

This setting establishes a default color for events appearing on the Google calendar, as a result of Date Calculations. When a new Case is created, the selected color is automatically transferred to the Event Color field on the Add Case screen, where it becomes the default Event Color for every event created in that case. During a Date Calculation, the Event Color can be changed again, allowing all events created using a particular Trigger to have a different color than other events created in the case. By default, this setting is set to “No Color”. You can choose one of the colors from the dropdown list.

Primary Gmail Calendar

DocketCalendar requires a single Gmail Calendar to function as the hub for your firm's deadlines

Once you have set up your "Primary Calendar" You can begin using DocketCalendar.

DocketCalendar adds events directly to any shared Primary Gmail Calendar or any Secondary Calendars created on the Primary Calendar or any Secondary Calendar belonging to another Gmail account that is shared to your Primary Calendar.

Once you have added the shared Calendar to your Primary Calendar in Gmail. DocketCalendar will see these calendars and allow you to assign them to Calendar Users. See Calendar Users.

*Calendars properly shared will appear in the My calendars section.

See Screenshot: names with @gmail at the end are Primary Gmail Accounts and all others are Secondary Calendars. Any Calendar listed under My calendars can be used as an assigned calendar to any Calendar User.

All events are posted to Google Calendars using direct write to calendar.

The Google Calendar Associated with Your Google Account

The Google account you logged into after you logged into DC is automatically associated with a single Google calendar, called your Primary Calendar. If you take no further action, your primary calendar will appear in the Calendars dropdown list that is present on the screen where you assign Calendar Users.

Secondary Calendars Associated with your Google Account or another Google User

The Google Calendar permits you to create one or more secondary calendars in your Google account. Note: Like the Primary Calendar, a secondary calendar can be shared with other members of the office.  

Shared Calendar Owned by Another Google User

You can also post events on a Primary Google calendar which another Google account holder has shared with you. 

Login with Gmail

To use DocketCalendar, you will need your DocketCalendar login and password and you will need the login for your firm's main Gmail account. Without both sets of credentials you will not be able to login to DocketCalendar.

DocketCalendar will work both with a personal Gmail account (e.g., JohnSmith@gmail.com) or a Google’s G Suite (e.g., JSmith@joneslaw.com). You can have an unlimited number of users for DocketCalendar but program connects through one Primary Gmail Calendar.

1. Login here: https://tools.docketcalendar.com

  1. Enter your firm’s Login.
  2. Enter the password your firm used to subscribe to DocketCalendar.
  3. Click the checkbox, signifying that you have read and agree to the terms of the DocketCalendar end user license agreement.
  4. Click the Remember Me checkbox, if you want DocketCalendar to automatically fill in your login and password each time you access the login page.
  5. Click the Sign in button.

You will be taken to the Google Authentication Login page, where you can log into the Gmail account you have linked to your DocketCalendar Account.

  1. Log into the proper Google account:

You will be taken through the Google account log in process.

  • If prompted, enter your Google email address and account password.
  • Only the Gmail Account assigned to the firm's login combined with the login and password will grant you access to DocketCalendar.

Once you select your Gmail account, you will be logged into DocketCalendar and you will be taken to the Docket Calculator Page.

If this is your first time logging in to DocketCalendar Google we ask you to grant permission

See and download your contacts:

DocketCalendar can access your Contacts, we used read only access to contacts to populate attendees to events created by the program.

See, edit, share, and permanently dele all the calendar you can access using Google Calendar:

DocketCalendar can create events on any Google Calendar that you connect to the program, and it can remove those events as well. Although this permission that Google grants can allow for more invasive Calendar interaction, the full extent of our program's interaction is to add and remove events that the program creates only. It does not in any way interact with any other events or calendars in your Google account.

Final Confirmation Screen:

Once you grant DocketCalendar permission to interact with your Google Calendar, you can begin using DocketCalendar!

Adding a Calendar to Outlook

You may choose the primary calendar of any Outlook account shared with you, or you can create a new calendar in an Outlook account to serve as the calendar folder. You must follow this procedure, or the new calendar will not work correctly as a calendar folder with DocketCalendar.

Add a Calendar to an Outlook Profile

Log into the Outlook account where you want to create the new calendar.

At the bottom of the screen, click on the three dots and select the folders icon.

Click on the email address and choose new folder from the context menu.

Display the dropdown list in the folder contains the field and select calendar items.

Press the OK button

Name the calendar.

Display the dropdown list in the folder contains the field and select calendar items.

Press the OK button

Manually Adding the Firmwide Calendar to the Shared Calendars List

  • Open the Outlook account of the staff member and navigate to the calendars page.
  • From the manage calendars section of the main menu at the top of the screen, select add calendar.
  • To add the firmwide calendar from the Address Book, click the from address book menu item.
  • To add the firmwide calendar by opening it, click the open shared calendar menu item. Enter the email address of the Outlook account where the calendar to be shared is located.
  • Click the OK button.
  • The shared firmwide calendar will appear in the list of Shared Calendars under the name or display name of the Outlook account where the firmwide calendar is located.

DocketCalendar Add-In Vanished

DocketCalendar should appear on a separate Add-In Tab in Outlook. If it is missing, most likely Outlook has disabled it.

This happens at start up. Outlook will display a colored bar across the top of the Outlook window that says something like "Outlook encountered a delay at start up and has disabled some items. It does not show the details unless you click into the message to view the details. 


If you click "OK" it will disable DocketCalendar until you re-enable it, but if you click into the details you will see that there is an option to enable the Add-In called "Always Enable" that will prevent Outlook from disabling DocketCalendar. On some versions of Outlook it will give you the option to ignore the warning for 30 days. Either of these will prevent Outlook from disabling DocketCalendar.


Check to see if your Add-In is disabled. 

Click on the File Menu in Outlook and select Add-Ins

If it's listed as Disabled you can change the dropdown at the bottom, it says “Comm Add-Ins” to “Disabled” Items and Click Go


If it's listed as Disabled you can change the dropdown at the bottom, it says “Com Add-Ins” to “Disabled” Items and Click Go

You will see DocketCalendarForOutlook listed in Dissabled Items. Highlight it and click “Enable.” Close and Restart Outlook.

If you still don’t see it, go back to Add-Ins and click the “Com Add-Ins” button.

Make Sure that DocketCalendarForOutlook is “Checked” If it is click ok and restart Outlook. If it is not checked, check it, click OK and restart Outlook.

Recalculate Discovery

When a trial date changes, changing (postponing) Trial dates in CA courts, where CCP 2024.020 (b) provides that a continuance or postponement of a trial date does not operate to reopen discovery proceedings.

This means that if a trial date is changed, several child events, and their sub-events, should not be updated. Namely Discovery Cutoff, Discovery Motion Cutoff, Expert Witness Discovery Cutoff, and Expert Witness Motion Cutoff, and their respective sub events.

When you recalculate at trial you will be prompted to chose to move Discovery Cutoff to the new Trial date or to keep Discovery Cutoff tied to the original date.

If you need to change a Discovery Cutoff Date separately from the Trial date, you can do this by opening the Discovery Cutoff event and then Clicking on the Related Events Tab Change the Start Time date and press the recalculate button.