Rails Tip #6: Simple Calendar For Rails 3

Calendar gems for Rails are known for being kind of ridiculous. They’re typically messy and/or bundled with a whole bunch of css and js that you don’t really need or want. If you do, you’re probably going to want to roll your own anyways.

Announcing simple_calendar

Using simple_calendar is easy. You simply query for your items in the controller as normal:

  def calendar
    @events = Event.all
  end

And then in the view (for example: app/views/main/calendar.html.erb) you can display them in a calendar:

You can also add the following line to your css to guarantee that dates in the calendar have the same height and widths:

  .calendar td { height: 100px; width: 14.28%; }

And voila! You’re ready to go. If you toss up Twitter Bootstrap on the site, you can get a slick looking calendar in a matter of minutes:

In Progress

This gem is definitely just getting started. There are lots of future additions I’d like to add, and I’m sure people have great ideas for things I can add as well.

You can find simple_calendar here:

Be sure to discuss ideas in the comments!