This site is rarely updated. benbrophy.com is more up-to-date. - Ben
Online Calendars
Jason Fried posted a note asking "Should calendars online look like calendars offline?"
I thought the same thing when designing Stellar 1.0 eons ago, I decided to forgo the grid calendar, and opt for the list of dates I saw in Syllabi instead. Mostly this was to handle the challenge of people creating events with long titles, which would then some how be crammed into a little calendar grid. Years later, the schedule tool is little improved. Few people use it, fewer complain about it, it has remained a low priority.
But now Sloan School representatives have reported that having a grid calendar is highly desirable. If you read the comments on Jason Fried's note you'll see a majority of people speaking up for the old grid calendar. It's not just the grid, people have come accustomed to seeing weekly views and day views as well.
When the time comes to bring a new Calendar into Stellar/Sakai (Sakai is much closer to what people want). It's going to take a lot of work to deliver the calendar people now expect. Ideally I think the solution would be to not have the calendar appear in the course management system, but instead appear on a institutional calendar (like Tech Time at MIT) so class deadlines appear side by side with other events.