All I Want to Do is Be Organized
I didn’t think it would be so hard to keep my calendar up to date and correct across multiple devices, but it is proving to be a bear of a time. I know I’m not the only one doing this, so here is what I want to do:
- I have an iMac that is my main computer. It is where I work most of the time. I have a calendar on it.
- I have a Macbook Pro that I am using more and more since I’m on the road and working out of the home.
- I want to keep the calendars on both of these in sync. I thought MobileMe was suppose to do this, but after a solid week I can confirm that it is not doing it properly. When I add an event to one calendar I want it to show up on the other. Both ways.
As a third thing, I’d like to update a Google Calendar every so often. This is so my wife can see my calendar to know what I’m up to and when I will be away.
I was using Spanning Sync to do the last part, but it only seems to work one way. Meaning that if something got added directly to my Google Calendar it did not come down to my computer.
There has GOT to be a solution out there that works for this. Some people suggested Busy Sync but that doesn’t seem to do it either.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
August 22nd, 2008 at 9:22 am |
Yeah. Let me know when that happens. I’ve been waiting for that ever since .Mac came out.
Pax,
Matthew
August 22nd, 2008 at 9:24 am |
I use mobile me and it is working well (although there are times when I thought I added an event and it isn’t there). I think you largest concern is going to be connecting with a gmail calendar. Can you set up a public calendar in iCal that is something you can share with your wife on mobile me?
I’ve worked with my technology director before on this issue when I was syncing Entourage with ical and then .mac. When you bring in a third party that is when things start to get weird with .mac. I try to keep everything in the .mac (mobile me) circle so everything works perfectly. I’m not sure if you are using an iPhone, but I’ve gotten used to managing my calendar on one computer and the phone. I have other functions sync but really the calendar and address book is the most important piece of that for me.
I’d be interested to know what you figure out.
August 22nd, 2008 at 9:28 am |
Not sure what’s going on with SpanningSync, but mine is definitely two way sync.
August 22nd, 2008 at 9:33 am |
Google Calendar now supports two-way syncing of your main calendar with iCal.
http://www.tuaw.com/2008/07/28/caldav-support-comes-to-google-calendar/
MobileMe should indeed be able to handle the rest of it. I believe there are still teething problems though.
Stupid question: Both of your Macs are set to auto sync aren’t they?
- Neil.
August 22nd, 2008 at 9:41 am |
It’s interesting to see how many people have had MobileMe problems, its worked great for me. In fact I recommend sticking with it, yes it has some growing pains, but they are working it out.
Keeping every phone and computer in sync everywhere is finally happening. Here is what I use currently
Calendar - Mobile Me, syncs to all my Macs and iPhone - I can create multiple calenders as well
Contacts - Mobile Me
Quick Ideas - Ta-Da - I have it on my iPhone and also on my bookmark bar in Safari on all my computers
Bookmarks - Mobile Me - all my bookmarks are on all my computers
I use OmniFocus to get things done, its a great program and the iPhone version syncs to the desktop version, its currently in public beta (which I have yet to try) but when its released I’ll have all my projects and tasks synced from Mac to iphone. I’ll replace tada with the omnifocus inbox.
email - IMAP with Apple Mail - if I have a email task, Omni focus has an Apple Mail plug-in that I can hit a hotkey and move the email into a project or task list. Using IMAP with my domain email is perfect, using Apple Mail its always in sync in whatever computer I happened to be on, including my iPhone, which is also setup to use IMAP. IMAP resides all mail on the server, however Apple Mail keeps a copy of it as well for faster access, so I am always covered.
The only thing I don’t use is the mobileme email account, if it supported IMAP or POP maybe, but now it does not.
As for a calender for your wife, you can publish any of your calenders using iCal to mobile me or to a server. Then she can subscribe to it. You can also share calenders over a home network.
Easiest thing is to add her as a mobile me user (upgrade to family plan), create a “travel” calender for example, then just share it with her.
August 22nd, 2008 at 9:50 am |
I’ve been using busysync for the last little while and have had no problems with it syncing both ways with iCal and google calendar.
August 22nd, 2008 at 10:01 am |
CC-
Spanning Sync does two-way synchronization. If it’s working right for you, please send an email to support@spanningsync.com so we can get it fixed.
Thanks,
Charlie
August 22nd, 2008 at 10:30 am |
Simplify… use Google and stop syncing all together
http://www.google.com/calendar/
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:01 am |
I should clarify too that I was having this problem when it was .Mac as well. Something somewhere is acting weird. I’m ready to start from scratch and make everything work.
Guess I should look up how to blank an iCal calendar and see what happens.
Thank you for all the advice and suggestions. I’m seeing a lot of people telling me to check out http://www.calgoo.com too
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:04 am |
What CC didn’t mention is that The Advance Guard uses Google Calendar for business, so all remote members of our team need to be able to view CC’s calendar, whether they are Mac or PC people, so I’m still thinking a sync to Google Calendar is an essential part of the solution.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:42 am |
Google Calendar now supports CalDAV; check the help files. You can set up iCal to access your Google Calendar via CalDAV and it’ll automatically be synced cross all the Macs, without Mobile Me or Spanning Sync.
August 22nd, 2008 at 2:41 pm |
Good to get an update on MobileMe. Haven’t touched that yet, and don’t think I’ll put in the time to vet it now.
August 22nd, 2008 at 3:25 pm |
Mobile Me has been driving a close friend of mine nuts = once installed it has wiped out all calendar and contact info, (using the Apple apps), and prevents her iPod Touch from syncing up in iTunes - it’s a shame as she’s a recent Apple user and is having such a bad experience - Mobile Me, (mm? m2?), doesn’t seem ready for ‘prime time’.
September 1st, 2008 at 12:36 pm |
This has been driving me crazy lately as well. I haven’t talked to a single person that has managed to get Mobile Me working right. This really shouldn’t be so hard. I will be keeping an eye on this thread to see what the solution turns out to be.