The iCal challenge

Woody Allen famously quipped that 80 percent of success is showing up. If your life is ruled by appointments, then you need a good calendaring program like Apple's iCal. On the other hand, the big problem for some people isn't showing up--it's getting things done. If you're one of these folks, your life is ruled by deadlines, and meeting those deadlines involves juggling many projects and priorities.

While the calendar-oriented person can't be in two places at once, the task-oriented person could well be working on three (or 13) projects simultaneously. For the task-oriented person, 80 percent of success is managing competing demands on time, and you may need more power and flexibility than iCal's to-do list provides. And then there is a third group of people whose obligations are fairly balanced between an overwhelming welter of tasks (with or without deadlines) and a never-ending list of appointments. These poor folks need all the help they can get.

We reviewed nine programs:

Objective Decision Contactizer Pro 3.6.1

Marketcircle Daylite 3.7.3

Google Calendar

Apple iCal 3.0.3

Now Software Now Upto-Date & Contact 5.3.2

Chronos SOHO Organizer 7.0.2

Mozilla Sunbird 0.8

Objective Satisfaction What ToDo 1.3.2

Yahoo Calendar

These apps tend to fall into one of three categories: calendars, task managers, or hybrids. Six of the nine programs are heavy on calendar features and lighter on task management. Four of those six are Mac desktop applications (iCal, SOHO Organizer, Now Up-to-Date, and Sunbird); the other two are online calendar programs. One of the nine programs (What ToDo) is mainly a project- and taskmanagement tool with few calendar features. Finally, two programs--Daylite and Contactizer Pro--try to do everything: organize calendars, manage projects and tasks, and much more. Be aware that while we reviewed the latest versions of these applications, some of them are updated frequently, and the versions reviewed here might have been updated since we went to press. iCal is all about intelligent and attractive presentations. The Day view nicely accommodates multiple concurrent events. The Week view shows you all your appointments and deadlines in easy-to-read, color-coded blocks.

The iCal Standard

Comparing these programs is a bit tricky, because they are all pretty good and each serves a somewhat different set of needs. Let's take Apple's iCal as a starting point, since it's free from the maker of Mac OS, and it's an excellent program. The question is, do you need anything other than iCal? The answer may indeed be yes. While all of these programs are great for individuals, three of them (Daylite, Now Up-to-Date, and Contactizer Pro) are designed for multiple users and really shine in collaborative environments.

Calendars

Apple's iCal is very easy to use and yet remarkably versatile. You can create as many calendars as you like. You can ask iCal to notify you before an event occurs via e-mail or a pop-up alert. If you want to invite a couple of colleagues to a meeting, iCal can automatically get their e-mail addresses from OS X's Address Book; also, the invitees will automatically have access to any documents you attach to an event. You can easily sync iCal with your iPhone or iPod. You can also share calendars easily on a peer-to-peer network or even by putting your calendar on a calendar server. While you can sync your calendar to your MobileMe account, at press time the service did not support syncing events in calendars you've subscribed to or published. In Leopard, you can even create iCal events and tasks while you are using Mail, and Mail's data detectors will help you pull appointment information from an incoming message. In short, iCal does most of what you'd want a calendar to do.

SOHO Organizer's interface is soothingly familiar, yet it is much more powerful than iCal's. For example, you can create new tabs showing widely separated months, and switch between each view with a click.Or maybe not.