I just purchased a one time, or I guess I could say lifetime subscription (out of my own pocket) to Spanning Sync and awesome service by fellow Irregular Charlie Wood. I've known about the service for ages but never really had a need for it. I have a blackberry and we use Outlook at work and the Exchange server so calendar wise life was already easy. Then I became a Mac user...
"Synchronize Google Calendar and Apple iCal. Share calendars between multiple Macs. Share calendars with your coworkers, family, and friends. And while you're at it, connect Google Calendar to your iPhone, iPod, and other devices.
The Best of Both Worlds
What if you could combine Google Calendar's powerful sharing features, Gmail integration, and notifications with iCal's beautiful interface and offline operation? Now you can.
With Spanning Sync, your iCal calendars are kept in sync with Google Calendar, which means you can use the best features of both to manage your schedule."
(Via Spanning Sync - Sync iCal and Google Calendar.)
Being a Mac user was not the problem, the problem was actually the fact that for whatever reason and despite multiple attempts Microsoft Entourage stopped talking properly to the Exchange server for my calendar. It literally broke my calendar I was helpless with a lack of meeting info. I work virtually for the most part so I depend on my calendar and my blackberry to aid me in not missing anything. So I decided to switch to iCal (I mean the calendar was already broke so no one was seeing my available or busy time anyway) and since then life has been good, although still no one can see my busy time or not but that is another issue I'll have to deal with.
The remaining problem was "on the road" how do I have my calendar there and telling me what is happening? I don't have an iPhone but I do have an iPod Touch and I can easily sync my calendars to to (yes multiple calendars!), it's working perfectly and thanks to Charlie's service I now have a complete synchronized life which enables me to open my calendar back up to the community I work with if they need to contact me via Time To Meet.
2 comments:
Hi! Since a few weeks Google Calendar supports CalDAV. So you can sync Google Calendar and iCal without any other software. You can get more information at http://www.google.com/support/calendar/bin/answer.py?answer=99358
I actually gave it a try just to see but then quickly found I fall into the category of people who it did not really work well for. Spanning Sync even points out some of the reasons in their FAQ http://spanningsync.com/faq.html
For me it was a matter of trust and dependability and Spanning Sync gives me both, pure personal choice.
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