Pure Calendar widget (agenda)

Summary

Most smartphones come with a stock calendar, but more often than not these stock calendars aren’t exactly the cat’s whiskers. They can’t be personalised as much as we would like and/or their widgets won’t function because we happen to be using a launcher that doesn’t support them. Pure Calendar widget (agenda) is a whole nother thing entirely and comes with a lot of features that will help create a calendar best suited to your needs. Let’s see what it has in store for us.

Test device: Samsung Galaxy Note
Android version: 2.3.6
Root: No

Installing Pure Calendar widget (agenda) is a cinch seeing as it’s only 1,18 MB. I was very pleasantly surprised to see that the developer informs users exactly for which features Pure Calendar requires access permissions. For instance, Pure Calendar wants to access the address book and contacts’ birthdays. It also wants to access the internet so that you might download skins should you want to.

A quick word of advice: when downloading the file make sure the widget is saved to the device itself and not the SD card, otherwise it won’t function correctly.

Here’s an overview of the app’s main features:

• Synced with Google calendars
• Show calendars from Google, TouchDown & Moto/LG Exchange
• Show tasks from Astrid, Ultimate To-Do List, TaskSync, CalenGoo, DGT Gtd, gTasks, Got To Do, Task Organizer, Due Today, TouchDown, Pocket Informant
• Can add bi-weekly / bi-monthly events (or more complex)
• Multiples skins and widgets sizes to make a fancy widget
• Scrollable widgets with Android 3.x/4.x and with most alternative launchers like ADW, LiveHome, Go Launcher Ex or LauncherPro
• Support Android 4.0 (ICS / Ice cream Sandwich)

In order to install the widget simply press on the homescreen a bit longer and a menu will pop up. This is where you’ll see that Pure Calendar widget (agenda) packs a mighty punch.

The widget has all the formats you might wish for and when first installing the widget you will be taken through an installation process. In the settings you will then see that you a ton of options for personalising the widget, be it how many times an update interval appears to date formats to advanced layout options. I was surprised to see how many different date formats even exist, and if ever you don’t find what you’re looking for there’s even option for creating a format.

The main tab features the following options:

• General
• Calendar: Select which calendar, time frame and details should be displayed for each appointment
• Tasks: Should you be using a task manager (e.g. Astrid, gTasks, etc.) the widget can also display the tasks you’ve entered there. The task manager I’m currently using – Any.DO – is currently not supported, unfortunately. Again, you can select which details are to be displayed for each task.
• Colours: Select colours for both texts and widgets. This helps you see at a glance which tasks are coming up, which are overdue, etc.
• System: Advanced system settings such as switching the background service or scrollable mode on/off. Please note that the widget is only scrollable on devices featuring Android 3.0 (tablets) or alternative launchers that support scrolling. Settings can be exported to the SD card

As soon as you’ve completed the settings you can select a skin. The transparency can also be adjusted. Don’t forget to save any changes you’ve made!
We do recommend exporting the whole shebang to the SD card and saving it there.

Don’t forget that you can even make changes to the widget after it’s been planted on the homescreen.

Bottom line:
Pure Calendar widget (agenda) is useful and powerful tool that will help you keep a good overview of your schedule and tasks. There are lots of options and ways to adapt the widget to what best suits your needs. The only drawback: certain task managers aren’t supported.
 

Once you’ve installed Pure Calendar widget (agenda) you will find that controls are simple. Hit the plus symbol on the right to add an appointment. You will then see a rather confusing notification labeled ‘durXh’ which stands for ‘duration’ and ‘amount of hours’. There’s also ‘durXd’ (duration + day) and durXhXYYm (duration + amount of hours and minutes).

There’s a similar option for setting appointments. The abbreviation ‘evrXw.forYm’ is short for X = week, Y = month, so that ‘22.2evr3d.for4m dur1d walk in the park’ means ‘as of 22.2. every 3rd day for 4 months go for a 1 hour walk in the park’.

The little wheel guides you back to the settings. Hit the a calendar entry and you will be able to see details or edit.

We're knocking off a point because we noticed that the app's texts and descriptions were a bit muddled in some of the available languages.
 

It’s not not having anything to whinge about for once. Pure Calendar widget (agenda) performed very well even with several widgets and skins on the display. I imagine this is good to know for those users who wish to keep separate calendars (one for business, one for downtime) and don’t want to use the same widget for all calendars.

Syncing with the Google calendar worked out very well.
 

Pure Calendar widget (agenda) usually goes for EUR1,77 which is a fair price for such a great tool. It’s our app of the week so, as always, you can score it for a great reduced price of only EUR0,79.