Appointment Book — Config Builder

Conference Identity

Required

Conference Full Name *

Used in the page header bar

Conference name is required

Conference Short Name *

Used on the printed cover page

Short name is required

Denomination *

Denomination is required

Year Tag *

Shown in gold in the page title bar

Year tag is required

Year Range *

Shown on cover page, e.g. 2026–2027 (use an em dash –)

Year range is required

Effective Date Display *

Written out, used on cover page

Effective date display is required

Effective Date *

M/D/YYYY format — used for data filtering logic

Effective date is required (M/D/YYYY)

NEW Badge Date Label *

Shown in the legend: "appointment beginning 7/1/2026"

NEW badge date label is required

Bishop

Required

Bishop Name *

Bishop name is required

Bishop Title *

Bishop title is required

Branding

Optional

Conference Logo URL (optional)

Full URL to your conference logo image. Shown on the printed cover page and in the live page nav bar.

Conference Website URL (optional)

If provided, the logo in the nav bar becomes a clickable link to your conference website.

Nav Bar Background

Top navigation bar background color.

Nav Bar Accent Color

Year tag, button borders, and accent bar color.

QR Code Image URL (optional)

Links to the digital version of the book. Leave blank to hide.

QR Code Label (optional)

Caption shown below the QR code when printed

Data Sources

How to set up your BRT data exports click to expand

The appointment book reads data from two separate BRT Publish exports — one for Charges (local church appointments) and one for Appointments (extension ministry, leave, etc.). Both must be set up in your BRT admin and published as JSON. The fields below must be included exactly as shown for the data to process correctly.

Important: Your BRT instance must have the same relationships and fields populated for this to work. If your conference does not use a field (e.g. GCFANumber or ClergyStatusRecords), those fields can be omitted, but the core name and appointment fields are required.

1. Charges JSON Export

Create a Publish on the Contacts table using the Charges view, with these fields:

Field Path	Required?	Purpose
Name	Required	Charge name
StartDate	Required	Charge active start
EndDate	Optional	Charge active end (blank = still active)
Churches.FirstName	Required	Church display name
Churches.GCFANumber	Optional	GCFA number shown in parentheses
Churches.ChurchStatus	Optional	Used to exclude closed churches
Churches.District.Name	Required*	Church's current district assignment in BRT
Churches.FutureDistrictDataCore.Name	Required*	Church's incoming district for next conference year (standard UMC Data Core field)
Churches.Appointments.StartDate	Required	Appointment start date
Churches.Appointments.EndDate	Optional	Appointment end date
Churches.Appointments.AppointmentPosition	Required	Senior Pastor, Associate, etc.
Churches.Appointments.People.FirstName	Required	Pastor first name
Churches.Appointments.People.LastName	Required	Pastor last name
Churches.Appointments.People.MiddleName	Optional	Middle name/initial
Churches.Appointments.People.NameSuffix	Optional	Jr., Sr., III, etc.
Churches.Appointments.People.ClergyStatus	Required	Clergy status field (fallback)
Churches.Appointments.People.ClergyStatusRecords.StartDate	Optional	Status log start (for date-based resolution)
Churches.Appointments.People.ClergyStatusRecords.EndDate	Optional	Status log end
Churches.Appointments.People.ClergyStatusRecords.ClergyStatus	Optional	Status log value

2. Appointments JSON Export

Create a Publish on the Content table using the Appointments view, with these fields:

Field Path	Required?	Purpose
StartDate	Required	Appointment start date
EndDate	Optional	Appointment end date
AppointmentPosition	Optional	Role/position label
ExtensionMinistry	Required	Organization/ministry name
ExtensionMinistryPositions	Required	NCC category label
Church.FirstName	Required	Used to exclude church-based records
People.FirstName	Required	Pastor first name
People.LastName	Required	Pastor last name
People.MiddleName	Optional	Middle name/initial
People.NameSuffix	Optional	Jr., Sr., III, etc.
People.ClergyStatus	Required	Clergy status (fallback)
People.ClergyStatusRecords.StartDate	Optional	Status log start
People.ClergyStatusRecords.EndDate	Optional	Status log end
People.ClergyStatusRecords.ClergyStatus	Optional	Status log value

3. How to publish as JSON

In BRT, go to Contacts - Charges and Content(UMC) - Appointments. Create and save a search in each with the fields shown above.
Add each required field using the field paths listed above
Save the Search, then More Actions -Publish Data
Click on the JSON publish link, and copy/paste the results in to notepad. Save using a .json file type -switch to All Files (*.*) Ex: Charges.json
Repeat for Appointments. Upload each saved .json file in the corresponding spots below

Validate your BRT query XML

After setting up your BRT publish, BRT will show you the query XML it generated. Paste it below to automatically check whether all required fields are included. You cannot paste WPA's XML into BRT -- this tool compares your XML against the required fields and tells you what is missing or different.

Paste your Charges query XML:

Paste your Appointments query XML:

Show WPA reference XML (for comparison only)

Charges (TableId: Contacts, ViewId: Charges):

<Query TableId="Contacts" ViewId="Charges">
  <ResultFields>
    <Ref FieldId="Name" />
    <Ref FieldId="StartDate" />
    <Ref FieldId="EndDate" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.FirstName" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.GCFANumber" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.ChurchStatus" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.District.Name" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.FutureDistrictDataCore.Name" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.Appointments.StartDate" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.Appointments.EndDate" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.Appointments.AppointmentPosition" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.Appointments.People.FirstName" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.Appointments.People.LastName" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.Appointments.People.MiddleName" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.Appointments.People.NameSuffix" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.Appointments.People.ClergyStatus" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.Appointments.People.ClergyStatusRecords.StartDate" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.Appointments.People.ClergyStatusRecords.EndDate" />
    <Ref FieldId="Churches.Appointments.People.ClergyStatusRecords.ClergyStatus" />
  </ResultFields>
</Query>

Appointments (TableId: Content, ViewId: Appointments):

<Query TableId="Content" ViewId="Appointments">
  <ResultFields>
    <Ref FieldId="StartDate" />
    <Ref FieldId="EndDate" />
    <Ref FieldId="AppointmentPosition" />
    <Ref FieldId="ExtensionMinistry" />
    <Ref FieldId="ExtensionMinistryPositions" />
    <Ref FieldId="Church.FirstName" />
    <Ref FieldId="People.FirstName" />
    <Ref FieldId="People.LastName" />
    <Ref FieldId="People.MiddleName" />
    <Ref FieldId="People.NameSuffix" />
    <Ref FieldId="People.ClergyStatus" />
    <Ref FieldId="People.ClergyStatusRecords.StartDate" />
    <Ref FieldId="People.ClergyStatusRecords.EndDate" />
    <Ref FieldId="People.ClergyStatusRecords.ClergyStatus" />
  </ResultFields>
</Query>

How do you want to power your appointment book?

Export your two JSON files from BRT (Charges and Appointments), then upload them below. The data will be processed and embedded directly in your config file — no server setup required. When appointments change, simply come back here, load your config, and re-upload updated files.

Charges JSON File *

The BRT export containing charges, churches, and appointments — accepts .json or .txt

Appointments JSON File *

The BRT export containing extension ministry and leave appointments — accepts .json or .txt

District Field *

Current District reads the District field — use this when generating the appointment book for the current conference year.
Future District reads FutureDistrictDataCore — use this if your conference has already moved churches to their incoming district assignments in BRT and you are generating the book for the upcoming conference year. Both fields are standard UMC Data Core fields available in every BRT conference.
Note: changing this field requires your Charges JSON to be uploaded — a saved config alone is not enough to repopulate districts.

Validate your export files

After uploading your files above, click below to check whether all required fields are present. The tool will tell you exactly what is missing or incorrect.

A Cloudflare Worker proxy is required to fetch live data from BRT due to browser security restrictions (CORS). If you are not sure what this means, choose Option A instead.

Proxy URL *

Your Cloudflare Worker proxy URL. Must end with ?url=

Proxy URL is required for live data mode

Charges Export URL *

BRT published JSON export URL for charges, churches and appointments

Charges export URL is required for live data mode

Appointments Export URL *

BRT published JSON export URL for extension ministry and leave appointments

Appointments export URL is required for live data mode

Districts

Required

Color Theme: Applies to all districts at once — you can still adjust individual colors after.

Add one entry per supervisory area (district). The order here is the order they appear in the book. Upload your Charges file above to auto-populate. Drag ☰ to reorder.

Extension Ministry Section

Optional — uses defaults if blank

Section Label

Header Background

Header Bar Color

CSV Download — District Codes

Optional

When someone downloads the appointments as a CSV file, the first column shows a short code for each district. For example, if your Northern District should show as NO in that column, set it here. If you leave a code blank, the full district name will be used instead. These update automatically when you add districts above.

District Name	CSV Code

Generate Appointment Book

Final Step

BRT Subdomain *

The subdomain of your BRT instance — found in your BRT admin URL: yoursubdomain.brtapp.com. Used to generate clickable links to person and church records in the internal version.

BRT subdomain is required

STEP 1 Save your configuration file

Download your config file first and keep it somewhere safe. This is your master settings file — next year you load it back into this tool, upload updated appointment data, and regenerate. Without it you start from scratch.

Saves as apptbook-config-[yourconf].json

STEP 2 Generate your appointment book page(s)

Choose which version(s) to generate. Public is for your conference website — clean, no admin tools.
Internal/Admin adds the date filter, CSV download, audit tool, and direct BRT record links.

STEP 3 Create a Blank Site Layout in BRT — one-time setup, skip if you already have one

In BRT, go to Website → Site Layouts → Add Layout
Give it a name such as Blank or No Header/Footer
In the layout editor, delete all existing content and enter only:
@@RenderBody()
Save and publish the layout

This layout suppresses your site's normal header and footer so the appointment book fills the full page with its own built-in navigation bar.

STEP 4 Add the page to your BRT website

Open the downloaded HTML file in any text editor (Notepad, TextEdit, VS Code)
Select all — Ctrl+A (Windows) or Cmd+A (Mac)
Copy — Ctrl+C / Cmd+C
In BRT, create a new page and apply the Blank Layout you set up in Step 3
From Source View, click into the page content area and paste — Ctrl+V / Cmd+V
Save and publish the page

Repeat Steps 2 and 4 whenever you need to update appointments — load your saved config file, upload new data, regenerate, and re-paste.

Access Pending

Appointment Book Configurator

Please fix these issues before generating:

Conference Identity

Bishop

Branding

Data Sources

Districts

Extension Ministry Section

CSV Download — District Codes

Generate Appointment Book