Can't set events to private any longer in Thunderbird calendar

[simoncbennett1]

I used to be able to set events created in the calendar in Thunderbird to Private. This seems to have gone for events that are created by selecting a start and finish time by dragging in the calendar view (rather than right-clicking and selecting new event). Is this a deliberate change or a bug? Have other users found the same problem?

To replicate, open the calendar, select a block of time by dragging from start time to finish time, enter a title, hit return. right-click on the event and select edit. In the Privacy menu select Private Event, the tick appears alongside the label, click Save and close. The event is not set to Private (spanner icon), and if it is reopened, the menu option is no longer checked.

If I right-click to create a new event, and edit it in the dialogue box and set it to Private Event that way, it seems to work, but I'm used to selecting the time visually in the calendar.

[steveenmiller07]

This looks more like a bug than a deliberate change. The Private Event option is still available, and it works correctly when creating an event through New Event, but events created by dragging across a time range appear to lose the privacy setting when saved.

I can reproduce the behavior from your steps: create an event by dragging in the calendar, edit it, select Privacy → Private Event, save and close, and the setting is not retained when the event is reopened.

As a workaround, you can create the event using New Event and set it to Private before saving. It would also be worth checking whether the issue occurs with a different calendar/provider (for example, a local calendar versus CalDAV/Google Calendar) and whether it persists in Thunderbird's Troubleshoot Mode.

If this started after a recent Thunderbird update, I would recommend reporting it as a regression with the Thunderbird version, calendar type/provider, and the exact reproduction steps. That information should help determine whether the drag-to-create event workflow is failing to save the privacy property.