Plan public witnessing shifts
A public-witnessing schedule is built once and fills itself afterwards. You create a plan, add its locations, and give each location its weekdays and shifts with the number of publishers you need. Everyone with the Public witnessing eligibility then sees the free places and signs up. This guide goes through the setup once and shows how to cancel one location on a concrete date without touching the recurring plan. The feature page Public Witnessing (opens in new tab) summarises what the finished schedule looks like.
The layers of a plan
Public-witnessing planning has six layers, and knowing which one you are editing saves most of the confusion:
| Layer | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Plan | A named planning area, for example a market or a city district |
| Location | A specific public-witnessing location inside a plan |
| Weekdays | The days on which a location repeats |
| Shift | A time block with a required number of publishers |
| Signup | One publisher's entry for a shift |
| Override | A cancellation or exception for one location on a concrete date |
A plan holds locations, a location repeats on weekdays, a weekday produces shifts, and a shift collects signups. An override changes one location on one date without changing the pattern behind it.
Who may do what
- The planning page needs the Manage public witnessing permission.
- Publishers need only the Public witnessing assignment eligibility to see the days and sign up.
- Anyone with neither sees an empty state. Location data is not shown to users who are not part of public witnessing.
See Permissions for how the permission is granted.
Create a plan with its locations
- Open the public-witnessing planning page.
- Enter a plan name.
- Save the plan.
- Add one or more locations.
A plan can be active or inactive, and it can carry a valid-from and a valid-until date. Use those two fields when a plan is seasonal, rather than deleting and recreating it later.
Weekdays, times, and the number you need
For each location, maintain:
- the location name
- the weekdays it repeats on
- the start time
- one or more shifts
- the duration per shift
- the required number of publishers per shift
A new shift can reuse the previous shift's duration and required-count pattern, so a location with five identical afternoon shifts is a few clicks rather than five separate forms.
When one location is off: cancel it, do not delete it
A planner can cancel one location on a concrete date and restore it later. That location then shows as cancelled instead of vanishing, while other locations on the same date remain active. The recurring plan stays intact.
Deleting a plan or a location removes the planning structure and the signups that belong to it. When the history should stay readable, set the plan inactive or give it a valid-until date instead.
Who signs up, and when the planner does it
Eligible publishers sign themselves up from the day view. Planners can remove a signup when it no longer fits, for example after a correction or a cancellation.
With the Manage public witnessing permission you can also enter someone else into an open shift instead of waiting. Open the public-witnessing day and use Enter another person next to the shift. The picker lists the congregation's publishers, including those who do not use CongPlan themselves — a CongPlan account is not required to be entered into a shift. Capacity, duplicate-signup, and cancellation rules apply exactly as they do for a self-signup, and the person entered receives a notification.
What publishers see
Public witnessing is shown by day. A day can hold several locations, and each location lists its shifts with:
- start and end time
- the required number of publishers
- the current signups
- whether capacity is full or free
- the cancelled state, if this location occurrence was cancelled for that date
Buttons move to the previous or next public-witnessing day. Signing up takes three steps: open the day, find the location and shift, choose Sign up. A publisher can cancel their own signup unless the shift state or their permissions prevent it.
A shift someone has taken becomes part of their personal plan, next to meeting parts, technical assignments, tasks, and absences, and it is included in the calendar subscription. Reminders before a shift follow the same reminder times as meeting assignments.
Two states are worth explaining to publishers up front: Full means all required places are taken, and Over capacity appears when a signup survives a later reduction of the required number.