Multi-session events

You can set up an advanced event consisting of multiple sessions occurring on different days. You can add individual sessions manually and/or specify the schedule of regularly recurring sessions.

You can add up to 120 sessions per event.

Adding sessions manually

To add individual event sessions manually while setting up an event, click the Add sessions button within the When and where section of the event details screen.

On the dialog that appears, enter the starting and ending date and time of the first session, then click Add session to add more sessions.

You can click the calendar control to select a date from the calendar. To remove sessions, click the X button beside the sessions you want to remove, or click the Remove all button to remove all event sessions.

Once you are finished adding sessions, click the Save button. The sessions will now be listed within the When and where section of the event details.

Adding repeating sessions

If event sessions repeat on a regular schedule – e.g. the 1st Monday of each month – you can quickly add multiple sessions by specifying the session schedule. To specify the schedule of repeating sessions, click the Add repeating sessions button within the When and where section of the event details screen.

On the dialog that appears, you can provide the details of the repeating sessions.

After specifying the first session date and time, you click Repeats and choose how often the session repeats. For example, if the session repeats on the same day every week, you'd pick Weekly as your Repeats option. For other examples, see Repeating session examples (below). If the sessions span multiple days, you can check the Multi-day session checkbox and specify the number of days over which the session takes place.

Finally, you indicate how many sessions make up the event by either specifying the total number of sessions in the Ends field or selecting an end date from the calendar control.

If you want the sessions you are adding here to replace any sessions already set up, check the Replace all existing sessions checkbox. If this option is unchecked, these sessions will be added to any existing ones.

Here is a complete list of the options appearing on the Repeating sessions dialog:

Starts on
The start date of the first session to be added.Session timeThe start and end time of the session(s) being added.

Multi-day session
If sessions span multiple days, check this box and specify the number of days over which the session takes place.

Repeats
Controls whether the sessions repeat daily, weekly, monthly, or annually.

Repeat every x days/weeks/months/years
Controls the number of days, weeks, months, or years between repeating sessions. For examples, sessions that take place every other week would be set to repeat every 2 weeks.

Repeat on
For reasons that repeat weekly, controls which weekdays the sessions repeat on.

Repeat by
For sessions that repeat monthly, controls whether the sessions take place on the same day of the month (e.g. October 15th) or the same day of the week (e.g. the third Thursday in October).

Ends
Controls whether the sessions end after a particular number of sessions have taken place, or on a particular date.

Replace all existing sessions
Controls whether the repeating sessions you are adding at the moment will replace the sessions already set up for this event, or will be added to the existing sessions.

Once you are finished specify the repeating session schedule, click the Add button.

The sessions will now be listed within the When and where section of the event details.

After adding event sessions, you can modify or delete them, or add more.

Repeating session examples

• Every other day for a total of 10 sessions
  
• Every third Saturday over a 12-week period
  
• Every month on the 15th
  
• Every month on the third Thursday
  
• Every 4 years on New Year's Eve until 2028
  

Modifying sessions

After you have added event sessions – whether manually or through the Repeating sessions dialog – you can modify and delete them, or add more. To modify event sessions, click the Edit sessions button within the When and where section of the event details.

From the dialog that appears, you can add, modify, and remove event sessions.

To add an event sessions, click the Add session button. To modify an event session, click within the box displaying the start or end date or time and enter a different value, or click the calendar control to select a date from the calendar.

To remove sessions, click the X button beside the sessions you want to remove, or click the Remove all button to remove all event sessions.

Scheduling emails for multi-session events

When scheduling reminders for multi-session events, the Schedule dialog allows you to choose whether to send before each event session, or just before the first session.

If the first session has already taken place then the only option will be to send the reminder before each session.

If the first session is taking place later today, you can choose to send a reminder before each session or before the 1st session only by entering 0 as the number of days.

If a subsequent session is taking place today, you can send a reminder before each session, including this one, by entering 0 as the number of days.

Multi-session event email macros

The following macros can be used in event announcements and reminder emails but not event confirmation emails.

Event_UpcomingSessionDate
The start date of the next upcoming session. Can be used only in reminders.

Event_UpcomingSessionTime
The start time of the next upcoming session. Can be used only in reminders.

Event_UpcomingSessionEndDate
The end date of the next upcoming session. Can be used only in reminders.

Event_UpcomingSessionEndTime
The end time of the next upcoming session. Can be used only in reminders.

Event_SessionsList
A list of all sessions (including past ones) using the following format:
#1 <date range>
#2 <date range> ...

How multi-session events appear to the public

Within an upcoming events gadget, each session will be displayed separately, with the session number automatically appended to the event name.

If you want, you can hide the session number within the upcoming events gadget (see below).

Within event calendars, the summary of multi-session events will include the number of sessions.

Within calendar view, individual sessions will appear separately.

Within the event details, the entire session schedule will be displayed.

When a visitor clicks the Register button to register for the event, the event summary that appears on various registration screens will include the number of sessions, as well as the start and end dates.

Visitors register once for all event sessions. They cannot pick and choose which sessions they want to register for.

When exporting the event to an external calendar program, each session will appear separately, with the session number and the total number of sessions automatically added to the event name.

Hiding the session number within upcoming events gadgets

Within an upcoming events gadget, the session number is automatically appended to the event name. To remove the session number, follow these steps:

1. Within the Website module, click the Settings option at the top of the screen then choose the Global JavaScript option (under Site settings).
   
2. On the Global JavaScript screen that appears, copy and paste the following code:
   <script type="text/javascript"> $(function() { if( $('.WaGadgetUpcomingEvents').size() ) { $('.WaGadgetUpcomingEvents a:contains("(session")').each(function() { var text = $(this).html(); var newText = text.replace(/(\s+\(session[\w\s]+\))/, ""); $(this).html(newText); } ); } }); </script>
3. Click Save.

Checking in attendees at multi-session events

Currently, checking in attendees takes place at the event level, so attendees cannot be checked in for individual session.