HOWTO add birthdays to UpcomingBirthdays
October 14th, 2005 | Published in Development | 40 Comments
The most common question I get about the UpcomingBirthdays widget is, “How do I add birthdays to the widget?”
UpcomingBirthdays exclusively pulls all of its birthdays from the Address Book built-in to OS X. If you’ve never entered a birthday into your Address Book, it’s a very simple thing to do.
First, launch Address Book and select the person whose birthday you’re going to enter. Next from the menu bar, select Card->Add Field->Birthday. Here’s a quick screen shot of that menu (click the image for a larger version).
Now type the birthdate into the Address Book. Be sure to include the year they were born so you’ll always know the person’s age. When you’re done, the birthday will always appear in the person’s AddressBook entry, like this example:
An added benefit of putting your birthdays into Address Book is that then you can automatically have them appear as a separate calendar within iCal. To do this, make sure you have the iCal version 2.0 or higher. Then, open up iCal’s Preferences, and select the box that says “Show Birthdays calendar”
Now all the birthdays in your Address Book will automatically appear in iCal.
In other news, I should have a new release of UpcomingBirthdays in the next few days with loads of new features and bug fixes. Check back soon for more details on that.
UPDATE – May 2007 – I’ve released an update to UpcomingBirthdays. Use the sidebar on the right to make sure you have the latest version.
UPDATE – Dec 2007 – There are reports of bugs with this widget and Leopard. Details here.
May 9th, 2007 at 10:43 am (#)
it dos’t wrok really well
May 10th, 2007 at 6:33 pm (#)
i don’t really like it. it’s waaay more confusing than it needs to be. it’s coming off my dashboard
May 11th, 2007 at 11:26 am (#)
what about people who don’t have e-mail addresses and are not in your address book? I think there needs to be a way to add people to the birthday list without them being in the address book.
May 11th, 2007 at 11:38 am (#)
and what about anniversaries?
May 14th, 2007 at 3:29 pm (#)
Yes-it’s not too convenient, not to be able to add family/children’s birthdays into the address book. Also not everyone has a computer!
May 15th, 2007 at 3:34 pm (#)
I’ll try and let you know if it worksé
May 17th, 2007 at 12:19 pm (#)
I found it to be pretty easy. No big problem adding birthdays. I would like to be able to modify wording so anniversary is included.
May 21st, 2007 at 12:19 pm (#)
I look forward to the next version that hopefully won’t rely on Address Book!!!
May 25th, 2007 at 11:35 am (#)
I have BD in my addy book but nothing is showing up on the widget and I did what the web page said
May 26th, 2007 at 2:20 pm (#)
I like it. I don’t mind the fact that it relies on Address Book, and I don’t really use Address book that much. There’s no reason that the address card you create for an individual has to have a computer or an e-mail address, so I presume earlier comments were made about earlier versions of the software (it’s my brother’s birthday next week, and that birthday is showing up despite the fact that he has no e-mail address).
May 30th, 2007 at 6:30 pm (#)
I love it! It’s extremely easy and it works. Thankfully as I’ve forgotten too many b’days in the past!
June 2nd, 2007 at 5:27 pm (#)
Great widget. I really like it. In my opinion it is great that it picks up the Birthdays from the address book as that makes it easier to manage the data from a single source as even iCalc and other packages also pick up the birthday details from the address book… so I suggest from experience it is good that you are picking the birthday details from the address book and hope that you do not change this.
However, I do see a point from the earlier comments with regard to the anniversaries, it is an issue for looking into as this cannot be updated – but this is a indeed a birthday monitor!!! not an annual reminder monitor….
For those who do not have computers or e-mails, I suggest users that you could still add the addresses, phone numbers etc in Max OSX address book itself. This would also be useful to sync with your other devices such as mobile phones etc…. really useful.
One request would it be possible for an option to change the skin or the colour of the widget….
Thanks once again, all the best for the future…
Pradeep Esteves, Bangalore, India
July 8th, 2007 at 10:35 am (#)
Works fine for me, no problem at all. I like it; it’s handy, free, and all anniversaries, etc. I need that aren’t in address book, well I entered them manually into iCal in another color, and I keep track of things that way.
Hopefully I am not the only one who thanks you for something basic, simple and easy to use: Thank you!
Pam
July 8th, 2007 at 5:12 pm (#)
I really like the fact that you put in the age. That’s really helpful for all my nieces and nephews.
I’m only using Address Book for the birthdays – I have a different address book for addresses, emails, etc.
July 29th, 2007 at 4:30 pm (#)
i like the widget, but i don’t like how in iCal, the birthday calendar is not able to be edited.
August 8th, 2007 at 5:25 pm (#)
I love it a great application…but still so extreamly ugly interface…I would understad if it was an app for PC, but for Mac without style?
August 13th, 2007 at 9:37 am (#)
Can this be used with Entourage mail program?
September 1st, 2007 at 4:30 pm (#)
it is awful, and very confusing!! This should be a lot easier than it has to be. Please Help:
THANK YOU
October 19th, 2007 at 3:43 am (#)
Love it, very handy and easy to use – great!
Thank you!
October 21st, 2007 at 7:12 am (#)
Any chance of developing an “Upcoming Anniversaries” Widget to accompany the Birthdays????
December 3rd, 2007 at 1:00 pm (#)
Love the programme, works nicely. Only, today i upgraded to leopard and now the lay-out is mixed-up and it even shows a birthday 336 days ago! Any change of a leopard compatible version?
Thanks, Peter
December 6th, 2007 at 7:26 am (#)
Firstly, thanks for a great little widget. I’ve never encountered any problems with it before but I have a birthday coming up on the 1/1/08 and I have it set to see birthdays up to 1 month in advance. It’s actually listing it as 339 days ago?! I’m running OSX 10.4.11. Please help
December 14th, 2007 at 7:13 pm (#)
The 336 days ago bug is also affecting me. Please note that I have not, repeat not, upgraded to Leopard.
December 26th, 2007 at 5:20 pm (#)
The widget say’s 345 days ago it was so and so birthday. It never did that before and I have it set as 1 day before and 1 month in the future can it be fixed or is it a bug?
December 27th, 2007 at 7:27 am (#)
I have the same problem as a number of others recently, the 300+ days ago so and so turned so and so age. I too have not upgraded to Leopard.
December 27th, 2007 at 5:14 pm (#)
I’m having the same problem as others. I have a b-day coming up in a week. It’s not listed but says he had one 354 days ago. I’m on Leopard.
December 28th, 2007 at 4:56 pm (#)
Same 350+ days problem. I’ve used this widget for a year now without this problem. It just started doing this. I’m on Tiger 10.4.11. Help!
December 31st, 2007 at 8:03 am (#)
Tiger has the same problem as a number of others before me, the 349 days ago instead looking forward. Any chance to improve? HNY
January 1st, 2008 at 2:15 am (#)
I love the ease of keeping track of b-days with this widget. However, it has some bugs. I’m on a 17″ PowerBook running 10.4.11. I’m currently suffering through the Dec-Jan bug. I’ve also had trouble with the entire border–except the corners–becoming transparent, and the resize corner has never worked. Near as I can recall, I originally installed in March of ‘06.
March 11th, 2008 at 10:12 am (#)
all I want is their birth dates to appear, not to how many days until they turn a certain age…..their birth dates.
April 17th, 2008 at 8:33 am (#)
I really like this little application – today it reminded me of my best friend’s birthday. So what do you want more?
The only thing I would be curious about, would be why one cannot get an alarm for the birthday. I tried to open the “birthday calender” in ical -but the alarm option is not available. I suppose, this is more a ical prob than a BD prob, but has anyone suggestions to fix this?
Thanks, Sandra
May 24th, 2008 at 11:38 pm (#)
I have “Birthdays” set at one month looking back and forward. It now exhibits four birthdays. However, it should but does not exhibit a fifth birthday which occurs on June 12. Today is May 24. Suggestions?
RB
June 10th, 2008 at 5:32 pm (#)
WORKS REAL GOOD. NO PROBLEM AT ALL.
June 30th, 2008 at 2:19 am (#)
Excellent widget. Simple and to the point.
If you ever decide to add functionality – make a separate widget.
November 11th, 2008 at 9:07 am (#)
I want to add all family members from one address card ti birthdays. It won’t allow more then one birthday. Doesn’t make sense to add another card. I can add email address for more then one member per card.
December 21st, 2008 at 2:10 pm (#)
Thanks for the clever Widget. One issue, when resizing the all the banners fall out of position. Can you set up an absolute position, rather than a percentage?
Thanks
December 29th, 2008 at 5:56 pm (#)
Loved this widget while I had Tiger. Now with Leopard the border seems to shift to the right so that the # of days is covered. I re-installed it, but nothing changed. Help!
December 30th, 2008 at 1:59 pm (#)
I loved the Upcoming Birthdays Widget. It now will ONLY tell me that, for example,
“356 days ago Joe turned 51″
It will not say “Joe will turn 52 in 9 days”. This is not helpful.
I have tried closing it, changing the number of days forward and backward. Nothing seems to work.
Please help. I miss this great widget.
Thanks,
Elaine Lee
January 30th, 2009 at 6:38 pm (#)
I can’t even figure how to put b-days on here even though I tried to follow instructions but, it still doesn’t work!!! HELP
February 28th, 2009 at 3:29 am (#)
My twin daughters share their birthday on 29 February. Last year their birthday showed up as “upcoming” but nothing. This year is not a leaf year so I got no notification of their birthday. Fortunately they didn’t let me forget but could anything be done to make the date show up on the 28th?