Print Beautiful Custom Calendars in Linux With Photo Calendar - page 2

Installation

The default calendar is very nice. But what if you want to change something -- maybe add your own holidays?

Fortunately Photo Calendar is very customizable, and it has nice clear documentation in a file called custom.html.

For instance, there's a file called personal.js where you can add dates you want to have show up on your calendar. As shipped, it includes some helpful comments plus one example:

Notation.add_date( "31 July", "Harry Potter's birthday", Notation.Disable );

Notation.Disable relates to the checkboxes you saw in the calendar setup window. Harry Potter's birthday will be hidden by default and won't show up in your calendars, but you can show it with the click of a mouse.

If you have events that fall on different dates (for instance, the first Monday in February) there are ways of specifying details like that. See custom.html for the full details. There are also separate files where you can set up family dates like birthdays or business-related dates, so you can print several different types of calendars and maintain those date files from year to year.

Printing without headers

There's one more task left. By default, Firefox puts headers and footers on pages it prints. You won't want those on your calendar pages. So in the Print dialog, go to the Options tab (Figure 3) and make sure all six of the Header and Footer fields are -blank-. You may have to change them back afterward.

figure 3

Other calendar options

Photo Calendar produces a very pretty page, but its calendars are a bit small if you like writing appointments in the squares. Are there options besides Photo Calendar?

Sure, lots of them! For instance, Open Office has a long list of Open Office calendar templates -- some of them load into Writer, some into Calc, and you can customize them from there before printing. If you want even more, a web search for free calendar template will give you dozens of options, including PDF files that are ready to print.

Experiment a little -- between Photo Calendar and the online templates, you're sure to find the perfect calendar this year.

Akkana Peck is a freelance programmer and the author of Beginning GIMP: From Novice to Professional.