Nutcracker 2026 – My Schedule (auto-synced)

A phone-friendly page where a parent picks their dancer's role and cast and subscribes their calendar. Every 6 hours a GitHub Action downloads the Ballet Arkansas master Google Sheet, rebuilds the page and the 44 calendar files, and publishes them — so subscribed calendars follow the master automatically.

sync.py                 downloads + parses the master sheet, validates, writes docs/
template.html           the page; sync.py injects the data into it
docs/                   the published site (GitHub Pages serves this folder)
docs/ics/*.ics          one calendar per role + cast
CHANGES.md              appended by every sync that changed something (what was added / removed)
.github/workflows/      the schedule

One-time setup (about 10 minutes)

1. Create the repo. github.com → + → New repository → name nutcracker-2026, Public, no README. Create.
2. Upload this folder's contents (Add file → Upload files, drag everything in including the .github and docs folders — or git init / git push from a terminal). Commit to main. Note: the GitHub web uploader can't upload the hidden .github folder by drag-and-drop from some file managers. If it's missing after upload: Add file → Create new file → name it .github/workflows/sync.yml and paste the contents of that file.
3. Turn on Pages. Settings → Pages → Source: Deploy from a branch → Branch main, folder /docs → Save.
4. Let the Action push. Settings → Actions → General → Workflow permissions → Read and write permissions → Save.
5. Run it once by hand. Actions tab → Sync from BA master schedule → Run workflow. It should finish green in about a minute and (if the master differs from the bundled copy) commit an update to docs/.
6. Open https://<your-user>.github.io/nutcracker-2026/. That's the link.

From then on it runs on its own every 6 hours. You don't need to do anything.

What happens when Ballet Arkansas changes the sheet

• The next run picks it up, rewrites the calendar files, and commits. Phones that subscribed pull the change on their next refresh (iPhone: roughly daily by default; Google Calendar: up to ~24 h).
• CHANGES.md gets a dated entry listing exactly which events were added or removed. If you want a heads-up, watch the repo (Watch → Custom → Pushes) or just glance at the file.
• If the sheet's layout changes in a way the parser doesn't understand, the run fails instead of publishing guesses — the site keeps its last good version and GitHub emails you a failed-workflow notice. Open the failed run, read the SYNC ABORTED – … line, and either fix sync.py or send the error to Claude.

How it decides what things are

• Roles: tag() in sync.py maps the sheet's wording ("All Soldiers", "Battle", "Party", "ACT I", …) to the 22 community-cast roles. If BA introduces a new group name the run will abort with no role recognised in '…' and tell you which text needs a rule.
• 1st rehearsal (mandatory): the first time a role + cast appears in the weekend grid.
• Mandatory w/ Company: anything in the weekend grid after Thanksgiving, or marked "w/ Company".
• Costume fitting: any entry containing "Fitting". The backup fitting date is shown to every role.
• Production week: parsed line-by-line from the December cells (call times, time ranges, section headings).
• Cast: "Cast A" / "Cast B" in the entry text; otherwise both casts.

Testing locally

pip install -r requirements.txt
python sync.py --check                 # download + parse + validate, write nothing
python sync.py --file some_copy.xlsx   # build docs/ from a local copy of the sheet

Keep it private

Ballet Arkansas asked that this not be shared as a separate source. It's set up for one household's convenience; the master schedule, the weekly emails and the BA portal remain the official word.