Compact Calendar

This is the new Compact Calendar home page, which you can bookmark as http://davidseah.com/page/compact-calendar. I've made some small updates to the calendar to make it easier to update, and have added ISO 8601 week numbers to the "day starting on monday" version of the calendar.

» Impatient people: skip to 2008 COMPACT CALENDAR DOWNLOAD

About the Compact Calendar

I find myself doing more project planning these days, so I dusted off my old compact calendar from several years ago. It's just a simple printable calendar, packaged like a candy bar o' time, but the design justification runs more deeply than you might think.

The Candy Bar Theory of Calendar Design

I evolved this technique while still working at ActiveEdge, when I was doing a lot of on-the-fly estimating for proposals and production. The problem with traditional calendar design is that they chunk time in months, not continuous days. I generally am thinking of things like:

• How many days are available, including weekends?
• When are critical deliverables?
• How much calendar time is needed to finish a task?
• What are the specific days we have to work around?

One way to do this is to use a long timeline, like a Gantt chart. All the days line up one after the other in a long horizontal format, which makes it easy to see how long something takes; distance is directly equatable to duration. The drawback of the Gantt chart is its lack of compactness.

How To Use the Compact Calendar

Download the Microsoft Excel templates (they are .XLT files) and double-click them to open. If you're using a Mac, you may have to open them manually from Excel. Select the "Calendar" worksheet and print it out. If you don't need the entire date range, you may also select just a few rows; just make sure you choose "print selection" from Excel's print dialog box.

When I'm doing impromptu planning, I just circle dates and underline ranges, writing notes in the empty space on the right. It is basically a form of doodling your schedule. I find it's a great planning tool in meetings too; just whip out a few of these sheets out at a client meeting to do a quick thumbnail schedule on-the-spot.

The advantages of the Compact Calendar:

• The days are all packed together visually, so "distance" corresponds directly to time. This makes visually estimating how much time you need much easier, an visual advantage shared with the Gantt chart.

• The calendar for an entire year can fit on a single piece of paper, with plenty of room for notes. You can also just print out a section of it, for short projects.

• It still largely retains the monthly calendar format, with days of the week in columns, so it's a bit easier to use than a Gantt chart.

• Saturdays and Sundays are shaded differently, so we are not as tempted to plan our work schedule on them.

• It's easy to count weeks too. "Unit weeks" tend to be the building blocks of longer-term projects.

• You're forced to break up project tasks to fit into each 5-day work period. Gantt charts, by comparison, tend to draw long lines through the weekend because that's what lines want to do. Even if you don't work on the weekend, from a visual perspective it seems to imply that you should be working. This has always bugged me, from the perspective of visual gestalt and information design.

• Because we retain the days of the week in the same column, it's easy to mark recurring events that are tied to them. "Oh, every Friday we have a company meeting." Easy to see where they'll be; not so on the Gantt chart.

The main drawback of the Compact Calendar is that you can't easily show dependencies or overlapping tasks. It's also not so good for detailed planning. For those cases, I would use my Excel spreadsheet version of the Gantt chart, which is much prettier than the ones that come out of Microsoft Project.

Another drawback of this approach is that it's hard to shift tasks around, but you know what? Project is terrible at that too; it's a glorified outliner with pretensions toward being a resource allocation tool, and it isn't very competent in either role. To be fair, I haven't looked at the more recent versions of Project. I have a license of it that I should install to see how it's evolved...but I digress.

Printing the Compact Calendar

It's an Excel spreadsheet template. Unzip CompactCalendar.zip and double-click the resulting CompactCalendar.xlt file to open a new copy of it.

Then print it out as-is. I keep a few printouts handy in case I need to do some on-the-fly planning. I will then go back and make an "official" version for distribution.

Anyway, there's three worksheets in the Excel file: Instructions, Calendar, and Tables. Usage notes are written in the Instructions sheet for your reference. Calendar is the actual sheet itself, and Tables contains the Holiday Lookup Table that highlights the right days in the Calendar sheet.

If you'd like to modify the calendar, here's some tips:

• If you need to change the year, just modify the date of the first day in the calendar. This will recalculate all the days using Excel's own date calculations (therefore, it will handle leap years). In this version, you still have to manually shift around the month and holiday labels, but a future version may apply conditional formatting so that's no longer necessary.

• You can add holidays to the HolidayTable on the Tables worksheet. This table is an Excel Named Range, so make sure that you don't screw it up.

• There are two conditional formats in use: one that makes the background of the day blue for the first day of the month, and another that makes the day number itself bold and blue for holidays in the Holiday Table.

• The Month Labels and Holiday Labels are not automatically positioned. You will need to do that yourself, but the HolidayTable should help you position them very easily.

• If you don't need the entire year, you can select the range of rows you want, then when you print check "Selection" in the "Print What" part of the dialog box. The headers will print automatically at the top of the sheet, and it will also print a little larger. Useful for shorter projects.

Compact Calendar Workflow

Here's an example of the calendar in use...click the photo to zoom in!

In general, I use printouts as a thinking calendar, doodling in estimated times and circling dates, dependencies, and deliverables. You can see how I use lines to connect with the notes on the right side of the paper.

At client meetings I can use the calendar to note other dependencies, deliverables, and ask about company meetings and other potential conflicts like vacations. It's a lot easier to pass the sheet around than a laptop; people can contemplate paper more easily.

After I get things worked out, I will sometimes make a "clean" version of the schedule using a new sheet and give it to the client to photocopy.

When I'm managing other people in person, sometimes I'll use the Compact Calendar to quickly note their deliverables and the dates on this sheet. I'll also sometimes point out dependencies, and then they have this sheet they can just stick up on the wall and follow. I find that people just need to know when something is due so they can tackle the work; if they have to read a detailed spec or the proposal to find this critical information just slows things down. Specifics of course matter, but that's a post for another day.

Download the Calendar Template

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Download using the link below, unzip the archive. In the Excel folder, you'll see files named something like CompactCalendar.xlt. This is a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet template.

2. Double-click the file (Windows) and a new spreadsheet will be created based on the template.

3. Print it out, or annotate the calendar within Excel. Again, I just print them out; you could make a fancier "production calendar" too and print that instead, if you're that type of person.

4. Optionally you can copy the .xlt file into your Microsoft Excel templates folder. This gives you the ability to create new calendars using Excel's New Document command.

US Version

USA 2008 by Dave Seah
Includes Sun-Sat and Mon-Sun (w/ ISO8601 week numbers) versions in ZIP archive. You can also download the PDF Sun-Sat and PDF Mon-Sun versions too!

UPDATE: Michael has created an Apple iWork Numbers Template Version on his template solutions site. Go Numbers Go! :-)

International Calendar Versions

Many individuals have taken the time to provide the following localized country versions of the calendar...thank you everyone! If you would like to be added to the list, you must write a post on your own blog for me to link to. I had been providing impromptu tech support for people without blogs or their own file storage to help get the calendars online, but this has created a support headache for me and I am unable to process these files in a timely manner.

Argentina 2008 via Jeroen Sangers

Australia 2008 by Seth Yates
Australia 2008 (by State) by Leah Maclean

Belgium (NL) 2008 by Tijl Kindt

Brazil 2008 by Nicholas Almeida (w/ São Paulo holidays too)
Brazil 2008 by Carla do Brasil

Canada - Alberta 2008 by "Dave"
Canada - British Columbia 2008 by Canuck

Chile 2008 via Jeroen Sangers

China (PRC) 2008 byiWorm

Colombia 2008 via Jeroen Sangers
Colombia 2008 by Javier Ferrand

Czech Republic 2008 by arnarey

Denmark 2008 by Henrik Fylking-Nielsen

Ecuador 2008 by timoleon
Ecuador 2008 via Jeroen Sangers

Fiji 2008 by Neil Krish Goundar

France 2008 by Le TisseurDeToile

Guatemala 2008 via Jeroen Sangers

Germany 2008 by problemloeser

Hungary 2008 by Zoltan Till

India 2008 by Shikhar
India 2008 by Venkat Mangudi

Indonesia 2008 by Eka

Italy 2008 by Luca Magnani
Italy 2008 w/ ISO 8601 Weeks by Paolo Ciarrocchi
Italy 2008 w/ week column by Alexander Reif

Japan 2008 by Yoshiomi KURISU

Korea 2008 by Hyun-soo Lee
Korea 2008 by Malbong

Malaysia 2008 by Fredy

Mexico 2008 via Jeroen Sangers

The Netherlands 2008 by Piter plus Frisian version

New Zealand 2008 by Big Nosed Ugly Guy

Norway 2008 by Jorunn
Norway 2008 by Vidar G.
Norway 2008 by Ole

Portugal 2008 by Miguel Alho

Romania 2008 by Andrei Neculau

Singapore 2008 by Chew LH

Slovenia 2008 by Kajote

South Africa 2008 by Jason Bagley

Spain 2008 by Jeroen Sangers

Sweden 2008 by Jim Carlberg

Switzerland 2008 by Claude Knaus

Taiwan 2008 by E. Sheng

Thailand 2008 by David Mould

Turkey 2008 by Dokur

United Kingdom 2008 Bank Holidays (English) by headphonaught

If you don't see your country listed here, you might check the old 2007 listing, or check back later. If you have made a version, let me know! :-)

OTHER TOOLS

You can find more printable productivity tools on The Printable CEO™ Series page.

Comments

Cool, a new version of the David Seah’s compact-calendar so this my french translation of this must have tools
is here in french : http://www.tisseurdetoile.net/blog/index.php?post/2007/11/26/Le-calendrier-Compact-de-Dave-Seah-2008
Thanks for your work
have a nice day.

The Compact Calendar is very useful for me.
Thanks~~~Dave Seah

A while ago I made a Spanish compact calendar for 2008 based on last year’s calendar, with separate calendars for the regions Cataluña, Madrid, Valencia and Lleida. After that special versions for Colombia and Mexico have been added:

http://canasto.es/2007/10/calendario-compacto-2008/

A new Italian version, including the ISO 8660 week numbers is available here:
http://paolo.ciarrocchi.googlepages.com/calendariocompatto
together with the 2007 version which I suggested in Aug.

David, I love your site and the information I’ve learned from you. Thanks for the new version of the Compact Calendar!

One question/request: do you plan to do .pdf versions again, like you did for 2007? I don’t have Excel, and MS Works Spreadsheets doesn’t like multi-sheet Excel files.

Thanks again for your insight!

Hi~ Dave
I have made a Taiwan(Traditional Chinese) compact calendar for 2008, but I don’t know how to put it on the website.
Can you tell me how can I do?

Dave, you’re a sweetheart. Thanks so much for the .pdf versions!

Hey Dave!

Thanks for posting the 2008 calendar!

I’ve put together a Portuguese (Portugal) version with the main / official holidays.

http://www.miguelalho.com/tools/CompactCalendar2008pt-ss1.zip

OK!! David

CompactCalendar2008-Taiwan

http://esheng.vox.com/library/post/compactcalendar2008-taiwan.html

Thanks

Man, David. Just found your blog and I love it. Fantastic stuff - great design, content, you name it. You probably get a lot of comments like this, but hey you deserve it. I’ll be back to dig around more ;)

Cheers,
Albert
UrbanMonk.Net
Modern personal development, entwined with ancient spirituality.

I made the hungarian translation:

http://www.hatekonysag.hu/blog/kompakt-naptar-2008-letoltes.htm

Hi Dave,

Thanks as always for sharing these ideas with us all.  I have modified the table to show the public holidays for Thailand for 2008.

http://orient-expression.blogspot.com/2007/11/technology-applied-compact-calendar.html

I made the Korean translation:

http://blog.naver.com/2kiya/44789604

Thanks for your great idea!

Hi David,

I love this calendar and I’ve made a little modification to the italian version: I’ve added a column with the number of the weeks, as long as I and my customers verry often referres to these numbers.

My modded calendar is available here (http://www.strategievincenti.net/2007/12/project-management-il-calendario-compatto/)

ciao
alex

Ciao Alex,
I already did the same and David already linked my version:
Italy 2008 w/ ISO8660 Weeks by Paolo Ciarrocchi
http://paolo.ciarrocchi.googlepages.com/calendariocompatto

Are there any differences in the two “implementations”?

That said, I like your blog :-)

Ciao Paolo,

I didn’t seen your version. I’m using the compact calendar since last year and I didn’t check back to this site lately, but only today to comunicate that I modded and publish my italian version.

I didn’t know other people had the same need as I had and already made the addition of the weeks number.

No there are no substantial changes, despite the fact that I located the number of the weeks just beside the column with the dates of Monday.

have a nice day

ciao
alex

I’ve made one for Alberta Canada, but it could be easily modified for the other provinces with different days. I also made some modifications as I like having lines to write on. I setup a light gray graph which would be useful for writing and drawing things like graphs and gantt charts. I also added a couple of lines at the top for subject heading and for the date or start/end time.

Dave, feel free to post this up on your site:
http://demo.commerxtest.com/calendar/compactcalendar2008m-s.xls

Dave, really great calendar. I am trying to make one for Kuwait but require more space in the Tables to add more holidays.

Where can I edit the lookup table so I can make it larger?

Republic of Ireland Holidays (Download UK one and edit holidays table - copy and paste in)
1-Jan-08 New Year’s Day
17-Mar-08 St. Patrick’s Day
23-Mar-08 Easter
24-Mar-08 Easter Monday
5-May-08 May Day
2-Jun-08 June Bank Holiday
4-Aug-08 August Bank Holiday
27-Oct-08 October Bank Holiday
25-Dec-08 Christmas Day
26-Dec-08 St. Stephen’s Day

Very handy, thank you!

Hi David and everybody. A Dutch (Nederlands) and a Frisian (Frysk) translation can be found here: http://diepfries.nl/index.php/compact-calendar-2008/

Hi David,

Great job again!

I made the Brazilian translation with the national holidays and national holidays + São Paulo holidays.

http://nicholasalmeida.com/CompactCalendar2008br/

Norwegian (norsk): http://2g.no/teknologi/2007/kompaktkalenderen-2008/

Zip file:

http://demo.commerxtest.com/calendar/compactcalendar2008m-s.zip

Please edit my original post if you can.

Hi,

I’ve made a Norwegian version of the calendar available here:

http://andedam.org/2007/12/04/kompaktkalender/

Thanks for this Dave.
I’ve uploaded a Canadian-British Columbia calendar to the Wiki.
Alberta Dave: Something happened to your’s as the last tab (Tables) is missing.

Hello, Dave!

Well, looks like Nicholas has made a brazilian version already. Anyway, my version is here:

http://carladobrasil.wikispaces.com/space/showimage/CalendarioCompacto2008.zip

Thanks for sharing your idea!

I’ve made a South African version but my wordpress.com blog doesn’t allow ZIP uploads.  I’ve tried to register on your wiki so I can upload it there but after five or six attempts at entering a string that matches the CAPTCHA, I gave up.  Is there some other way I can get it to you?

Now it says I’m not authorised to perform that action when I try to register.  I got past the CAPTCHA when I posted my last comment by typing it all in upper case even though it was displayed in lower case, but that didn’t work with the one on the registration page.  I hope I get past to post this comment.

Hi Dave,

Thanks for the great calendar! Question for you: I wanted to change the font color of the conditional formatting of the holidays but after changing the font color it did not actually update the calendar. What’s the trick to refreshing the calendar (so to speak) so the conditional formatting will take place again?

Thanks!
Christi

David,

This is not a translation, but rather a port to Apple’s Numbers spreadsheet program.  I needed to use the functionality and thought it would be a good thing to share.  The functions were not compatible, so I had to do a little manual work, but visually it is the same.

It can be found here:

http://www.numberstemplates.com/2007/12/04/template-david-seahs-compact-calendar-for-numbers/

I have included links back to your site, but please let me know if you prefer I take it down.

Thanks for the great tools.

- Michael

Hi David,

Thanks for the calendar, its amazingly very easy…

I just made a India version for it, would like to share that on your website. Please let me know where can i email that.

Thanks & Regards
Shikhar

Compact calender is cool simple calendar.

I made Korean version compact calendar.
It’s little bit different.

http://opencache.tistory.com/117

Hi David. Thanks for your calendar. It’s very handy! You may find Indonesia version at http://priatna.or.id/2007/12/05/kalender-2008/

Hello David, I’ve put a Simplified Chinese version for China Mainland at

http://www.beimfenster.com/?p=401

Thanks for this great tool.

Hello David, I have to say that all your printables are making my life better and organized. Also I uploaded in the wiki a Venezuelan version too. Hope to see more printables!

Hello David

I edited and translated the compact calender into a Hong Kong version. (PS. Of course,it’s Traditional Chinese.)

And I’ve upload it into you wiki
[[File:CompactCalendar2008-HongKong.zip]]

For refer only: Gov HK:General holidays for 2008 http://www.gov.hk/en/about/abouthk/holiday/index.htm

Thank you for your calendar.
It’s simple & useful.

Yes this seems like quite a good thing

I just made a India version for it, would like to share that on your website. Please let me know where can i email that.

I’ve just made slovak version (Slovakia). It’s available on my blog - http://zapisnik.mipo.us/kompaktny-kalendar-2008-slovenska-verzia.html