Show task due time in Google Calendar

Over the past 3 years, Iā€™ve sent increasingly frustrated emails at the rate of about once a year asking about what seems like an extremely simple feature, which is to fix the ical feed so tasks with due times show up at the due time rather than as all day events. based on the length of time the issue has going on, Iā€™m pretty sure at this point that thereā€™s absolutely no plans to touch google calendar ever again.

Itā€™s disappointing. After searching the market, Asana is still by far the best task management service on the market for what I need it to do. Itā€™s just got this glaring, gaping hole in it that continuously rubs me the wrong way.

So I ask, as an avid user and a fellow developer: ā€œWhy?ā€ Why has this bug not been fixed? Why are you requiring your users to go to completely different services, or make their own, to properly sync their data? Why are you turning your nose up at one of the most basic and obvious integrations that would benefit the majority of your customer base?

Sincerely,
Ben

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Hi Benjamin

Youā€™re totally right: Due times donā€™t appear in calendars, your tasks will always appear as all day events.

This actually has to do with the fact that tasks in Asana arenā€™t built on the backend with a duration, in order for calendar syncs to provide a start time they would require an end time. The good news is that we really want to add duration to tasks, we just havenā€™t had the resources to devote to the change yet. Unfortunately, we donā€™t have a timeline for when this feature will be made available, but itā€™s definitely something thatā€™s on our minds :thinking:

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Sunrise.am calendar had this functionality (ability to show a task at the time when it is due), but unfortunately it was bought by Microsoft for Outlook and this feature hasnā€™t yet been brought into it yet. I miss Sunrise.

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Me too, @Jarrod_Kopp. I used to love Sunrise :sunny: and also miss it- it was so clean and well organized. Hopefully weā€™ll find another comparable tool soon.

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So thatā€™s at least an explanation, which is useful. Thanks a lot for that.

I have noticed that you have a list of ā€œhacksā€ in the profile settings. If the only thing holding this back is the duration component, one solution would be to simply add a hack that specifies a default duration for tasks (or even just sets it as some very small number, like a second or something). That allows you to implement the feature without modifying the back-end storage to include duration per task. This is, by the way, essentially how Trello handles their calendar sync. Yes, I gave them just as much crap as Iā€™m giving you. Making it a hack also gives you a lot more freedom when it comes to support and development schedule.

Itā€™s not a perfect solution. Itā€™d be the wrong solution for a lot of tasks with due dates that represent traditional ā€œeventsā€, since youā€™re basically just recording the time point at which the event occurs and making sure calendar programs display it in the correct place. However, since thatā€™s really all I need, Iā€™d be satisfied with that for the time being, especially if the duration is configurable. Itā€™s certainly much easier than writing a web app that generates a custom ical.

Anyway, I hope youā€™ll consider something like this if youā€™re strapped for resources. I absolutely understand wanting to implement ā€œcompleteā€ features, not piecemeal patches, and revamping the entire system to support ā€œnativeā€ duration fields certainly sounds like a headache and a half.

Thanks again for your patience,
Ben

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Totally agree! The Google Calendar sync needs to show the due time, otherwise it makes no sense. :neutral_face: If itā€™s set in Asana, it should properly reflect on the Calendar!

Regarding the duration, it is not really a problem, is it? Like the users before have mentioned, just set a default duration time, like one second or 15 minutes. Podio uses one hour to display the task when syncing it to Google Calendar.

Step your game up, Asana! :muscle:

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Yes I love this about Podio. I still use it for important, time sensitive tasks over Asana because I trust the reminder feature on it. With Asana I cannot.

Asana, please get this together asap. It is 2018 and Google Calendar is here to stay.

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Sync due times to Google calendar please, I am not even asking for bidirectional sync.
I used Trello before and sync due datetime without a single dollar, as Trello allows users to add one ā€œPower-upā€.
However, Trelloā€™s timeline is not working and therefore I go to Asana.

What a surprise Asana does not have a such minor functionā€¦
Asana does not allow bidirectional sync. Alright, fine, I make all changes from Asana then.
But Asana syncs the DATE ONLY but not together with the TIME!
This is ridiculous.

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Hi folks, we have a solution that will handle the due date times and move them over to Asana. It also does bi-directional synchronization so you can move tasks around in the calendar and it will update Asana. You can find out more here:

http://bit.ly/2Hfj4Ut

Is the only solution to this really a paid third-party app?

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So I can have 5-7 tasks in a day but where is the feature (or field) to be able to give that tasks a timeframe or block like you would an event in Google Calendar? This way you could literally plan your day by tasks.

For instance, Monday:
TaskWeekly Meeting & KPIā€™s review (reoccurring task on Mondays) from 9 AM-10AM.
Task Review Customer Calls and actions from 10:30-11:00 AM

And so on. Asana is a great tool but it leaves a lot to be desired as a time management tool. Itā€™s easy to overschedule and get overcrowded on your daily tasks. Is there a solution already out there I am missing?

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I have Asana synced to my Google Calendar.

Currently all tasks appear as ā€œall dayā€ tasks. Is there any way to assign a time frame to tasks and have them appear on my calendar as a timed event?

Thank you!

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Welcome to the Community Forum @Sabrina_Khan and thanks for sharing your feedback! We already have a thread on this topic, so Iā€™ve gone ahead and merged your post into this main thread to consolidate feedback. Feel free to add your vote to this main thread by clicking on the ā€œVoteā€ button at the top of this main thread! :slight_smile:

Thank you, Marie.

I see there is currently no direct solution. Appreciate your time.

Thank you

The Google Calendar sync needs to show the due time, otherwise itā€™s almost useless.
Iā€™m concerned about the duration time necessity to sync due time to Google Calendar. But I, and a lot of other users, believe that a ā€œsimpleā€ hack/workaround setting a default duration time, like one hour, should do the trick.

You guys should consider spend some time to solve this issue and make so many of us a lot happier with Asana! :smiley:

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Thanks for the feedback @FelipeL and apologies for the trouble. We already have a thread on this topic so Iā€™ve gone ahead and merged your post with this main thread to consolidate feedback on this subject. Have a look at the solutions provided above, you might find some useful!

I agree, I was shocked to find that it doesnā€™t sync the time into my calander. I thought it was broken at first.

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Iā€™m pretty disappointed that a hack hasnā€™t been released for this in close to 2 years. Even without a default duration, you could put things on Google Calendar with the same start and end time as the due time. To me, that would be better than having ā€˜All Dayā€™ tasksā€¦ removing the integration for now because it just clutters the top of my calendar.

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This is definitely missing in Asana.
Would support this matter and love to see it soon.

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Hi @Korbinian_Gabriel, have you tried hiring a dev to (or if youā€™re a dev yourself, building) an integration between Asana and Google Calendar that will sync the task to your calendar? Both Asana and Google Calendars have pretty good APIs that shouldnā€™t be too difficult to wire them up together.

If not, Iā€™m working on something that integrates apps together, and Asana and Google Calendars are two of them. This specific integration was in the backlog, but if youā€™re interested I can build it now and keep you posted when itā€™s done.

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