How to stop repeating event without loosing past occurrences

[InfoLight]

Hello, and thanks for the help.

I need to stop some repeating events in Lightning, while keeping a calendar record of their past occurrences.
Unfortunately, when I delete a repeating event, its past occurrences are also deleted.
I've searched, and haven't found a solution on how to preserve the history when stopping a repeating event.
So I've come here for help.

These events were originally setup years ago with "No end date", and they occur weekly or monthly on a specific day.

How do I stop a repeating event without loosing the calendar record of its past occurrences?

Thanks for the help.

[pete of ebor]

I think the only way round this is to change the end date of the recurring event. If you do this, all previous occurrences of the event will remain but no further ones will appear past the end date. I use this for my work rota. I only have two duties, and each repeats biweekly, so I created an event on Mon,Tue,Wed,Thu & Fri one week and Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu & Sat of the following week (I get either Fri of Sat off each week) and make all them repeat biweekly with no end date. I can then know my rota as far into the future as I need to. When the rotas change however, I have to change the end date on the repeat of each of the 10 events and create 10 new events all over again. It's all a bit of a faff but it works.

[InfoLight]

Thank you, "pete of ebor", for your response.

Unfortunately, your suggestion doesn't seem to work for me.
I tested it on a repeating event that has been scheduled for years.
This event was scheduled for every Monday.
When I changed its end date, all of the past occurrences disappeared.

Below is what I did:
- Select reoccurring event
- Select: "Edit all occurrences"
. Select: "Repeat: Custom..."
. Under "Range of recurrence" change:
From: "[CHECK] No end date" <- original
To: "[CHECK] Repeat until <tomorrows date>" <- new
- OK
- close the window by clicking "X" in upper right hand corner
. "Save"

Unfortunately, all previous occurrences disappear.

This procedure is one that I tried before posting to this forum.
At your suggestion, I tried it again (hoping that I'd just done something wrong earlier, unfortunately same result).
If I'm doing something wrong, please tell me.

Thanks for your help.

[mgagnonlv]

Hello,
Peter Of Ebor's technique works on my side. I see two potential issues that might create a problem on your side:

1. My series of events was a perfect one. In other words, all repeating events were identical and never modified individually. There might be issues if some of the weekly events had been modified individually.

2. Is it a local calendar or a network-based one? Network-based calendars also depend on the way the calendar is stored on its host. Google and WebCal calendars have their own particularities.

[InfoLight]

Thank you for your response, mgagnonlv.

In answer to your questions:
1) My events are not "perfect". They span years, and there have been times when individual events were cancelled. (The reason I'm trying to preserve them is because they span so much time.)
2) It is a local calendar, not a network-based calendar.

I'd appreciate any suggestions.

[DN123ABC]

I've also run into this, and would find an elegant solution useful. It would be nice if it allowed "convert past events to individual events", or something like that.

[InfoLight]

Summary of further tests:
Repeating events CREATED TODAY can be terminated without loosing prior occurrences.
But repeating events CREATED YEARS AGO can NOT be terminated without loosing prior occurrences.

I've tried exporting and importing the calendar to fix possible database issues.
It didn't make any difference. New repeating entries still worked. Old repeating entries still failed.

How do I update or cleanup the database so that new entries and old entries behave the same?

Thanks for the help.

-----------------------

Tests:
1) I exported the calendar (to .ics format), and imported it back into an empty calendar.
>>Selected an old repeating even with "Edit all occurrences".
Changed "Range of recurrence" to 1/17/2017.
All of the prior events are deleted, same as before.

2) I exported the calendar (to .ics format), and imported it back into an empty calendar.
>>I created a new repeating event, starting in 2003.
Selected this new repeating even with "Edit all occurrences".
Changed "Range of recurrence" to 1/17/2017.
IT WORKED! All prior occurrences remained.

3) I exported the calendar (to .ics format), and imported it back into an empty calendar.
>>I created a new repeating event, starting in 2003.
>>I deleted one individual occurrence of this event.
Selected this new repeating even with "Edit all occurrences".
Changed "Range of recurrence" to 1/17/2017.
IT ALSO WORKED! All prior occurrences remained.

[InfoLight]

So .... How do I update or cleanup the database so that new entries and old entries behave the same?