Before you start, check to make sure that the JEvents Component is installed.  You can check by logging into the administrative console of Joomla, going to the Components Menu and looking to see if there is a menu entry called "JEvents MVC".  If you are using an older version of JEvents, this menu item might just be called "Events".  It should look something like the picture below.

After the initial setup of JEvents, you may see a scree that looks like the screen below.  If so, simply click "continue"

Now you should see a screen that looks like the following.

If you start trying to use the program and you see the blue bar appear on the preceding screen, this means that JEvents hasn't been configured yet, and you need to save a configuration.  I encourage you to go through the settings and make sure they are setup as you wish, however, it is also ok to just click the save button on the top right part of the screen and save the default settings.  Once you have done this you will see a screen that looks like the following.

At this point we are ready to create our first calendar.  Click on the "Manage Categories" button, you should see a screen that looks like the following.  Notice how there is already a default category created.  This is good, it means we don't have to setup a category to get started.  In previous versions of JEvents, you had to create a category before you could start creating events.  We'll move on to the next step, creating events.

Go back to the JEvents Control Panel.  When you are there, click the button entitled "Manage Events".  The screen should now look like the following

Click the "New" button at the upper right hand part of the screen and you will be presented with the following screen that allows you to create a new event.

Be sure to click on the "Calendar" tab on the previous screen to fill out the date and time information.  This screen should look like the following

Click the save button in the top right hand part of the screen once you have filled in the appropriate date-time information and you should be taken to a screen that looks like the following.

There are many ways to display your calendar on the site, so many in fact that the subject of laying out pages deserves several tutorials/howtos in it's own right.  Instead of trying to teach you every possible way to layout a calendar on your website, we will simply show one way that is simple and will suffice for most people.  Bear in mind the Joomla is a flexible system, and will pretty much allow you to build pages in any way you want, so if you want something different from what we present in the remainder of this howto, it's probably do-able without much effort.

In our example, we assume that the main purpose of your joomla website it to present a calendar to your users.  (Note you can also have forms on a website that is setup this way).  We will perform the following steps.

1. Disable the main menu module so the main menu doesn't display anymore
2. Change the home page menu item type to be of type JEvents

To disable the main menu, go to Extensions -> Module Manager and you'll see a screen that looks like the following.  if there is a green check mark next to the Main Menu item, click on it and it will turn into a red X.  The screen should look like this when you're done.

Now we need to switch the home page so that it points at our calendar.  Go to Menus --> Main Menu and you should see a screen that looks like this

Click on the Home link and you should see a screen that looks like this

Click the button "Change Type".  It's located near the large text that says "Front Page Blog Layout" you should be taken to a screen that looks like this.

Select the item that says "Monthly Calendar", then after that, click save.  Now if you look at your website, it should look like this