VCS to ICS Calendar Converter

This tool converts calender entries from the older VCS (vCalendar) format to the newer ICS format (iCalendar). Although iCalendar is mostly downwards compatible some special fields are not, for example "repeat rules". These tool will convert this fields.

It was originally written by dragomerlin and extended by me to convert my Nokia-Phone calendar files.

Author(s):

• dragomerlin
• greenflash1986

Source code: Java only
Java Version: >= 1.8 (higher versions should also work, but it's untested) Licenses: GPL Platform: multi (java runtime dependant) Interface type: command line only, console Runtime: userspace Permissions: read / write on jar's present dir for vcs and ics subfolders Internal behaviour:

• read, convert and write strings of characters into text files
• decode quoted printable strings into UTF-8
• Convert calendars to version 2.0 (remove quoted-printable)

Warning: Java may contain a bug where some letters will result in a unknown symbol when applying the org.apache.commons.codec.net.QuotedPrintableCodec.decodeQuotedPrintable routine on strings that are not totally coded in quoted printable. This shouldn't happen, and the issue was only found on windows, on vcs files provided by Microsoft Works. See dair.vcs for more details. In this case, it is recommended to use other operating system until it's solved. The program makes a quick check that is output to command line every time it is run.

Usage

How it works

It looks for vcs folder and ics folder. Under vcs folder looks for .vcs files and for each one that matches the calendar format creates the corresponding file in the ics dir. Already existent files are overwritten. Email field may be required for third party software.

Getting the vcs files

• You can send them to your computer via bluetooth from the phone, some symbian devices allow it.
• Use third party software running inside your phone.
• Connect the device to the computer via USB or Bluetooth or Wifi.
• Create a NBU, NBF, NFB, NFC and ARC type backups and extract calendar files inside with NbuExplorer.
• Get the contacts in the native database that the device uses and use third party software to parse.

How to install

You have to have Java ( >= 1.8) installed on your system or at least have a running Java executable. Please install Java according to your operating system.

Download [release 3.0|https://github.com/greenflash1986/VCS-to-ICS-Calendar-Converter/releases/download/v3.0/VCS2ICS-3.0.zip] and unzip it to an extra folder.

How to use

• Delete the ics folder
• Put the vcs files in vcs folder

Run it

with launch-from-windows.bat (will prompt for email) or directly from console

if you are running the application directly from console, email can be specified or not. To specify use -e or --email arguments.

java -jar VCS2ICS.jar will prompt for email java -jar VCS2ICS.jar <somethingstrange> will prompt as well java -jar VCS2ICS.jar -e OR java -jar VCS2ICS.jar --email will use blank email and don't ask java -jar VCS2ICS.jar -e <youremail> OR java -jar VCS2ICS.jar --email <youremail> will use that string.

Tips

• Use an application like Notepad++ or Kate to edit files and see / change the encoding of the file itself.

Known issues:

• VCS files, when using quoted printable format, it is always expected to be ASCII and UTF-8 charset even if no specified (ENCODING=QUOTED-PRINTABLE;CHARSET=UTF-8). Other charsets different than UTF-8 for printable are unsupported and non standard.
• Some applications may limit the number of characters per field when importing ics files, truncating the lines and thus resulting in a loss of data.
• Alarms are not converted since each Nokia phone may use different labels for fields or structure for specifying it. The same way, each software may automatically overwrite or skip alarm settings or automatically overwrite with a new one. Some alarm settings are not exportable because are too much specific for the device, for example using an internal ringtone on Nokia that does not exist on iCal; system pop-up notifications or vibration reminders. There are no complete specifications as well.
• Other issues may be present on third parties software due to closed specifications.

How to build

This project was (believed to be) originally build with [Gradle 2.2.1|https://gradle.org/releases/#2.2.1]. The build was tested with [Gradle 2.14.1|https://gradle.org/releases/#2.14.1] in 01/2026 and was running fine although I did not test the resulting artifact for correctness. This project does not contain a "Gradle Wrapper" which means you have to install Gradle by yourself. After doing this run gradle fatJar from the root folder of this project to create the

Disclaimer / Notes

I fixed the issues / made this project in my spare time and used this project as playground to improve some of my skills. Because of this I won't promise to do further work on this project. I provided it online on Github for you that you can use the (partially) fixed version. Hopefully it's useful for some people and / or feel free to fork or made contributions. I will do my best to honor these efforts.