Calendar and meetings

Patter reads the calendars already connected to your Mac. Google Calendar works through macOS Calendar; it does not need a separate Google Cloud project or Patter Calendar OAuth client.

Connect Google Calendar

1. Open macOS System Settings → Internet Accounts, add your Google account and enable Calendars.
2. Open Apple Calendar and confirm that your meetings appear there.
3. In Patter, choose Settings → Calendar → Connect calendar and allow full Calendar access.

Connection errors appear beside the button. Expand Connection help for Calendar permission and Internet Accounts shortcuts. If access was denied, use Calendar permissions, enable Patter, return and reconnect. Check again reads the current status without requesting access. See the permission guide if Patter is missing from macOS settings.

Patter reads events without changing them. Connecting Drive backup is a separate action and does not connect your calendar.

Open notes or join a call

Select a meeting under Upcoming to create or reopen its linked conversation. Patter keeps the event's title, time, calendar and available links with the note. Reopening the same event reuses the existing conversation, including an archived one.

Use Join under Upcoming, or Join meeting in a linked conversation or reminder, to open a Google Meet or Zoom link. Patter looks in the event's URL, location and invitation notes. Zoom passcodes in the URL are preserved. The link opens in your default browser, which can hand a Zoom call to the Zoom app. Events without a recognised meeting link have no Join button. Joining a call does not start recording.

Use Record… beside an Upcoming meeting, or open its notes and choose Record here. The sidebar’s Record also targets the selected conversation. The confirmation names the destination; Record a new conversation instead starts a separate note. Recordings append to the same conversation, preserving its notes and earlier audio. A failed start can be retried without creating another conversation. Record… from a meeting reminder uses the same linked conversation and asks for confirmation.

Configure reminders

After connecting Calendar, open Settings → Calendar → Reminders:

1. Enable Notify me before meetings and allow macOS notifications.
2. Choose Remind me: at start time, or 1, 2, 5, 10, 15 or 30 minutes before.
3. Choose whether to Play sound and Show meeting titles in notifications.
4. Expand Calendars to limit reminders to selected calendars. An empty selection means all calendars; Use all calendars clears the selection.
5. Choose Save changes.

Use Test notification to check delivery. It does not read a calendar or start recording. Expand Notification settings if nothing appears, then check macOS Notifications and Focus. A reminder can open notes or offer recording confirmation; audio never starts automatically.

When reminders run

Keep Patter open; it can run in the background. Calendar events refresh every minute, when you return to Patter, and when you choose Refresh beside Upcoming. Refresh uses existing Calendar access and never requests new permission. Upcoming shows six events initially; use Show all meetings to see the rest. Recent contains saved conversations; opening or recording an event adds its linked conversation there. If a refresh fails, the last successful list stays visible alongside the error. Reminder timing is checked every ten seconds. Reminders stop when Patter quits and cannot run while the Mac sleeps. After waking, an upcoming meeting or one that started less than a minute ago can still produce a reminder.

All-day, cancelled and declined events are skipped. Each delivered meeting occurrence is remembered across restarts to avoid duplicates; a rescheduled occurrence can notify again. Preferences are included in library backups, but notification permission must be granted on each Mac.

macOS controls banner and sound delivery. Calendar consent has been confirmed in a packaged local test build; real calendar-triggered notifications and their macOS banner actions still need an end-to-end check.