Spanning Sync
For those of you out there who use Macs and like both iCal and Google Calendars, there’s some very good news: a company called “Spanning Partners” is developing an Internet application that will “seamlessly” sync the two. It’s called Spanning Sync, and the public beta will begin in about a week. You can sign up to be notified to join. One site says that only 100 people will be allowed into the initial beta testing, but I can’t be sure that’s the real limit.
Still, whenever it becomes available, it’ll be good news. I use iCal, but have trouble syncing it–I don’t have a .mac account (the usual way to sync iCal between two Macs), nor would I want to pay $25 for the only working shareware I could find for the purpose. But to be able to sync with Google Calendar (and hopefully, through that, between my two Macs) would be great. if I could also share my calendar with my students and let them actively make appointments, which would then show up automatically in iCal… that would be a cool app. So long as it doesn’t become too costly in the post-beta releases.
I’ll let you know when I find out more about this.
Update: the limit of 100 testers is confirmed; they will add that many people to the testing program to see how their servers react to the load. If everything goes well, they’ll add more people in groups of 100 until all who have signed up are added. Of course, this begs the question: why would this app put a load on their servers? The app is supposed to sync your Mac’s iCal with the Google Calendar web site; how does this app’s web site get involved?
Update II: Answering some of my questions, a person claiming to be involved in the project said that: (a) this software would allow for syncing iCal on different Macs via the Google Calendar; (b) changes in one calendar (additions, edits, deletions) would be automatically reflected in all linked calendars; and (c) the software will be pay software, the price being “less than .Mac [$100] and more than free.” That leaves a huge space for the fee, of course, which is not too encouraging…
I think the gov’t should regulate the phones, pda’s, internet calenders, computers in cars (e.g. navigation), and application program calenders to the extent required to get them All to sync. Or, perhaps that will happen naturally w/o the gov getting involved. I think that would be Very handy. Also, if one can sync w/ something like google, then they have backup. And if they have backup, they may be more likely to keep their stuff (e.g. addresses, phone #’s, appointments) in the system.