Introduction

The task plugin offers the possibility to run some background tasks through the core joomla task scheduler.

More information about the task scheduler can be found in the official Joomla magazine.

Task: Events sync

The event sync tasks does run an event sync of external calendars where database caching is enabled. YOu can read more about the different caching settings in the Cache Settings article.

The admin can define the following options in the parameters of the task:

• Calendars:
  The external calendars containing the events to sync.

Task: Send ticket certificates

The ticket send certificates task does send out certificates for checked in tickets where the event has been finished.

The admin can define the following options in the parameters of the task:

• Calendars:
  The calendars containing the events to check if they have been finished.

Task: Booking deletions

The booking deletions task does delete bookings on different criteria. When no criteria is set, then the task aborts. The criteria are combined, means that the bookings to delete must fullfil every criteria and not just one.

The admin can define the following options in the parameters of the task:

• Booking date:
  When there are bookings with a booking date before the given date, then they are going to be deleted.
• State:
  When there are bookings with a selected state, then they are going to be deleted.

Task: Event deletions

The event deletions task does delete events on different criteria. When no criteria is set, then the task aborts. The criteria are combined, means that the events to delete must fullfil every criteria and not just one.

The admin can define the following options in the parameters of the task:

• Start date:
  When there are events with a start date before the given date, then they are going to be deleted.
• End date:
  When there are events with an end date before the given date, then they are going to be deleted.
• Calendars:
  The calendars containing the events to delete.
• State:
  When there are events with a selected state, then they are going to be deleted.

Task: Event reminders

The event reminder task does send out mails to the event attendees and/or authors on a specific date and time in relation to the start date for specific calendars. The most important parameter is the reminder time.

The reminder time can be a relative string like +2 days or an absolute date in ISO 8601 format. When a relative string is used, this means that the reminder is sent out when the actual date and time plus/minus the relative date is like the start date and not that the relative string is subtracted from the start date. More information about relative dates can be found in the PHP docs. For a better understanding, we list here some examples:

• -2 hours for event start date 2. June 2022 at 17 o'clock. Then the reminder task must be executed on 2. June 2022 at 19 o'clock that the reminder mails are sent out.
• +1 day for event start date 2. June 2022 at 17 o'clock. Then the reminder task must be executed on 1. June 2022 at 17 o'clock that the reminder mails are sent out.

The admin can define the following options beside the reminder time in the parameters of the task:

• Calendars:
  The calendars containing the events to notify. When none is selected, all will be notified.
• Expand Series:
  Defines how series should be handled. If a reminder should be sent when the whole series starts or for every instance.
• Attendee mail subject:
  The subject for the attendee mail. The event to notify can be referenced with the Output rendering variables.
• Attendee mail message:
  The message for the attendee mail. The event to notify can be referenced with the Output rendering variables, additionally the {{sitename}} variable is available which contains the global sitename.
• Author mail subject:
  The subject for the author mail. The event to notify can be referenced with the Output rendering variables.
• Author mail message:
  The message for the author mail. The event to notify can be referenced with the Output rendering variables, additionally the {{sitename}} variable is available which contains the global sitename.

As default are language strings set in the mail options. For these strings can language overrides be done when the site is multilingual. Otherwise the plain text can be put into the respective subject and message field. There is also a button to disable sending the mail to the author or attendee. This can be useful when the admin wants to send only to one part.

As it is very unlikely that tasks in Joomla are executed every minute, the notification tasks takes into account that reminders are sent for all events which do have a start date between the last execution time and the reminder time.