Calendar not opening file? OSX Mavericks

HI Guys,

Very late to this but on the same theme. Just upgraded to Sierra and finding this Calendar open file function not working well. I saw the tip regards iCloud and this makes sense, I now created new calendar on my mac and it works but intermittently. I have many open file calendar events - actually opening Filemaker apps that take some action.

I have deleted all calendars, created new one then recreated events - they open files sometimes and not others though they all set up the same. Any guidance?

I have a similar problem.

Using OSX, I’m trying to get calendar to launch an automator workflow each morning at 7:30am. In Automator, I've setup a workflow using “New Calendar Event”, which is set to open an automator app at this time every day. However, this does not seem to be triggered.

All power save settings are off, and my Mac Pro does not log out. I’ve also tested the workflow by changing the time in Calendar while I am at the computer to a minute in advance, and the file open command is triggered fine. It just doesn’t seem to work the next morning.

We’ve recently upgraded to the latest version of Sierra 10.12.5. We setup the automator workflow, because I think there were some changes to the security settings to stop applications or scripts opening using keyboard shortcuts (we use fast scripts). However, I’m beginning to think that they have made a change that stops Calendar from opening files using scheduled events as well.

Anyone else having this problem in Sierra? I'm going to try an application called Scheduler for Mac and will let people know the results.

Ive hd a little success by updating my filemaker apps - just a dummy edit so that the file modification date changes to after I installed Sierra. My theory is that the calendar now sees the app. It is working better but not quite every time so more work to do. Let me know how scheduler for Mac gets on, may be interesting alternative.

Can a launchd script do the job?

https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/MacOSX/Conceptual/BPSystem Startup/Chapters/ScheduledJobs.html

You want only the Hour and Minute entries in StartCalendarInterval in order to have it run every day. Eg:

<key>Hour</key>
<integer>7</integer>
<key>Minute</key>
<integer>30</integer>

Name the file something like backup-webserver.plist and put it in ~/Library/LaunchAgents to have it register at each login, or load it with "launchctl load (filename)" in Terminal.

Anyway, please send feedback to Apple on this bug, if you haven't allready: http://www.apple.com/feedback/macosx.html

David

You don't say how you're trying to get Calendar to open a file, but the right way to do it is to create a Calendar Alarm in Automator.

I just updated to Maverick and I'm having this same issue. In the event >alerts>custom>

After updating my imac, the alert is automatically set to "Message with Sound". When I click on that pulldown bar, there is the option to "Open File". At first nothing would happen when I clicked "Open File". I deleted the event and created a new one. Now, I can access finder to open and select the song, however calander does not show that I have chosen the file (which it did in the past). And the alert does not launch the song in itunes.

For many many many years, my calendar has be set to open a song in itunes. This was my alarm. Now since upgrading, it no longer works.

Has anyone found a solution to this other than automator?

I can't tell from the information you've provided if you're having the same problem I had, but it sounds like it may be similar.

When my Calendar event triggered the alert that was supposed to open a file (in my case it was an Automator workflow) I got a message telling me that Calendar couldn't open the workflow file, which didn't tell me very much. Looking at system.log with Console, though, showed a whole bunch of messages from the lsboxd process about "security assessment verdict was denied". After a lot of screwing around (as is usual in cases like this, huh?) I finally ran across the section "Launching Helpers with Launch Services" in App Sandbox Design Guide: App Sandbox in Depth, which led me to try running the workflow "manually" (i.e., by opening it directly in Finder). Once I'd done that Calendar seemed to be able to open it.

I hope this helps.

Hey Alan!

I appreciate your attempt to help. But it is quite simple.... The calendar application has a feature that allows you to choose a file to open at a specified time within the alert option on an added event. This option used to work, however since upgrading to Mavericks, it does not. Though the option is still there, it does not seem to function.

This has worked just fine without the use of automator or some other 3rd party app.

Just click on the event and you'll see the option here:

http://screencast.com/t/PcLiWBwuDn

Click on the Alert pull down bar and you'll see the option to open a file:

http://screencast.com/t/f1S5LLZ7S3

This option is still there but does not work anymore. The only solution I have found thus far is to downgrade back so snow leopard.

Thanks but apparently this is not a priority issue so I doubt apple will fix it anytime soon. In the meantime, reinstalling snow leopard will.

CellaMar -

My response was to the original post, not to yours. I understand everything you explained. It just happens that the file I'm opening with my alert is an Automator-created app, whereas yours is (I gather) an MP3.

I don't think you'll need to downgrade to Snow Leopard (though I understand that there are many annoying "features" of Mavericks, particularly in Calendar and Mail).

When you write that Calendar "does not show that I have chosen the file" I think you're probably having the difficulty described in How to see filename for Mavericks...: Apple Support Communities. See my post there.

What you haven't told us is exactly what does happen when the event occurs. Do you get a message that Calendar was unable to open your MP3 file? Have you looked in system.log (using the Console app in the Utilities folder) around the time of the event?

Hey Alan

I have not found any "annoying features of Mavericks." It all works fine minus the Open File in the Cal Alert option. This feature has been around since well before Mavericks. It stopped working after upgrading. But apple obviously did not get rid of this feature since it still visibly exists in Mavericks.... it just no longer functions.

I looked at the link you pasted and yes that is what happens, however the only soluntion that was presented in that conversation was to report this issue to apple. Which I have done and still does not solve my problem.

Like I said, I appreciate your attempt to help and I'm not going to do digging around in some console app.

I reinstalled Snow Leopard and it works fine now.

Thanks and good luck.

I don't think there's anything I can say to someone who'd rather reinstall Snow Leopard than spend 30 seconds looking at system.log, but, for the benefit of anyone else who might read this thread, I want to correct the misinformation that there's no solution (to the problem of not being able to see the name of the file to be opened by a Calendar alert) in that other thread I referenced. (I suggested reading my post, not the last post.) Let me reproduce it here:

You need to click on "Open file...", which gets you a drop menu. Clicking on "Custom..." at the bottom of that menu should show you the name of the file.

Cheers to all.

Thank you Linc! I was worried they had gotten rid of a nice feature, turns out they just made it better! Good to know.

I haven't seen anyone else mention this as their specific problem, but when I try to add an Open File alert to a calendar event (the file is an Automator calendar workflow) it disappears after a bit, presumably after my calendar syncs to its CalDAV server. I got it to work a few times, but when I tried to schedule an event with such an alert a couple of days in advance, the workflow never launched and when I examined the event it didn't have the alert set anymore.

A little late to the game on this but I just tried this repeatedly. The documentation I've seen says it should open any file. Not only does it not work, it reverts back to a visual pop-up. I went and successfully set it to a file via the browse option it gives but no matter what it reverts to a simple notification.

Hi

After all the trawling on forums on Mac on this issue without luck, I tried with Automator. I created an 'application" on it to get a song from my iTunes and Start Play iTunes and saved as an Application in my user folder. In Calendar I set the time and selected this 'app' through Open File - Other. I also got my mini to Sleep and set on Energy Saver to wake up 1 minute before the Alarm. It worked in my trial setting today afternoon. I just tried again and it worked. Hope it will continue.