Ascend Documentation

Appearance

Availability ​

Tell Ascend when you're bookable. Two layers: a recurring weekly schedule and date-by-date overrides for the exceptions.

Quick Start ​

  1. Open an event type and click the Availability tab.
  2. For each weekday card, click + Add time.
  3. Pick a start and end time (e.g. 09:00 – 12:00) and click Save.
  4. Add a second window (e.g. 13:00 – 17:00) on the same day if you want a lunch break gap.
  5. Use Copy Monday to weekdays to fan one day out to Tue–Fri.
  6. Click Publish changes in the toolbar to make the new hours live.

Weekly Schedule ​

The default view shows seven rows — one per day. Each day card holds zero or more time windows.

DetailBehaviour
Multiple windowsAdd as many as you like (e.g. 09:00 – 12:00 and 14:00 – 17:00). Slots are generated inside each window separately.
Back-to-backAllowed: 09:00 – 12:00 and 12:00 – 17:00 are two windows touching at noon — fine.
OverlappingRejected: you can't add 09:00 – 11:00 and 10:00 – 12:00 on the same day. Edit or delete the existing window first.
Cross-midnightA single window can't span 23:00 – 02:00. Use Split this for me to make 23:00 – 23:59 today + 00:00 – 02:00 tomorrow automatically.
DefaultsThe picker pre-fills the next slot — e.g. if your last window ends at 12:00, the picker defaults to 12:00 – 13:00.

One row per day

The day cards are stacked vertically with chip-style time windows. The "Add time" button opens a popover so the picker has room to breathe regardless of screen width.

Date Overrides ​

Use overrides for exceptions to the weekly rule:

  • Holidays — block out 25 December.
  • Half-days — switch Friday to 09:00 – 12:00 only this week.
  • Off-days — block out the dates you're at a conference.
  • Extra availability — open Saturday for one weekend.

Adding an override ​

  1. Click Add override for date.
  2. Pick the date in the calendar.
  3. Either:
    • Click Mark unavailable — the day is fully blocked.
    • Click + Add time to define one or more windows for that specific date (overrides the weekly rule entirely for that day).
  4. Save.

Overrides take priority over the weekly schedule. A date with an override ignores the weekly rules for that day completely — if you want to add hours on top of the weekly schedule, define the existing weekly hours plus the new ones together in the override.

Schedule Constraints ​

The Schedule tab holds the booking-side rules that filter which slots are actually offered:

SettingWhat it doesDefault
DurationHow long each meeting is.30 min
Slot incrementThe grid spacing for offered slots. 15 means slots start at :00, :15, :30, :45.15 min
Buffer beforeEmpty time padded before every booking — protects against back-to-backs.0 min
Buffer afterEmpty time padded after every booking — same idea.0 min
Minimum noticeThe shortest lead time you'll accept. Slots within this window are hidden.0
Scheduling horizonHow far ahead bookings can be made. Slots beyond are hidden.60 days
Max bookings per dayCaps the daily count. Once hit, every remaining slot for the day disappears.unlimited

Why slots disappear

Ascend offers a slot only if it satisfies all of: inside an availability window, outside every existing booking + its buffers, beyond the minimum-notice window, before the horizon, and (for collective) inside every host's calendar. If a slot you expect to see isn't there, walk this list.

Calendar-Connected Free / Busy ​

If a host has connected Google or Microsoft Calendar (see Calendar Integrations), Ascend hides slots that conflict with events on their external calendar — not just other Ascend bookings.

The check happens twice:

  1. At slot generation — bookers don't see conflicting slots in the picker.
  2. At commit time — if someone tries to grab a slot that just became busy, the booking is rejected with "This time was just taken".

This double-check protects against race conditions: two people opening the same slot at the same time can't both succeed.

Calendar is optional

You don't need to connect a calendar to start taking bookings — Ascend will still respect your weekly availability and other Ascend bookings. Connect later when you want external-calendar conflict-detection.

Multiple Time Zones ​

The picker shows times in the host's timezone (set per user, or per team). The booker sees slots converted to their timezone automatically.

If you publish hours of 09:00 – 17:00 in Pacific/Auckland, a booker in America/New_York sees the equivalent local hours (typically the previous afternoon / evening). Daylight-savings transitions are handled correctly — you don't need to re-edit your schedule twice a year.

Copying Schedules ​

Two helpers:

  • Copy Monday to weekdays — clones every Monday window onto Tue–Fri (handy when you keep the same hours all week).
  • Wipe a day — click the trash icon on every chip to start over.

Copying schedules across event types isn't supported yet — for now, set the schedule per event type. If you have a "personal default", consider duplicating an existing event type and renaming.

Saving Behaviour ​

Availability changes auto-save like every other tab. You'll see a "Saved" indicator after each change.

The new windows take effect on the public page only after you click Publish changes in the toolbar. Until then, the public picker shows the previously published hours.