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Too monochromatic and other nits
Authored by: Clint MacDonald on Sep 10, '02 11:20:09AM

I played with the new iCal for about twenty minutes this morning before work -- only long enough for a brief impression. For comparison, I have been a happy user of Palm Desktop/Claris Organizer for many years. I had no problem exporting my Palm Desktop calendar in vCard format then importing it to iCal.

I have a few criticisms. First, there seemed no way to categorize events (Work, Personal, School, etc.). There was a column on the left with what looked like categories, but they weren't obviously linked to individual events. I hope someone can correct me and tell me how it can be done.

Second, the color scheme is far too subtle and monochromatic. Every event is light blue or light green, with very little contrast. I don't know how to change the color scheme. Anyone know how?

Third, every aspect of an event must be accessed through a large "Get Info" pane, which seems clumsy to me. Within this pane, one can "invite" folks to the event by dragging their names from the Address Book, but it is not clear what this accomplishes. I would much prefer the ability to link events with names by a direct drag-and-drop onto the event (not the Info pane), which does not work.

So far, I do not see a compelling reason to switch from Palm Desktop. With the forthcoming introduction of iSynch and calendar sharing, I might reconsider.

Best wishes,
Clint



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Too monochromatic and other nits
Authored by: kyrrigle on Sep 10, '02 11:30:01AM

the "Get Info" pane can do most of what you ask.
click on the calendar name (top left) and you can set the color
click on an event and you can choose the calendar to associate with (this can also be done with the context menu)



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Too monochromatic and other nits
Authored by: gumse on Sep 10, '02 11:38:40AM

The categories to the left are linked to the events, the selected categorie to the left becomes the "owner" of new events that you create.

If you open the "Show People" in the window menu, you can drag directly to the event to invite people. They get an email with an .ics file that, when clicked, puts the event in their calendar.



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Too monochromatic and other nits
Authored by: Clint MacDonald on Sep 10, '02 12:06:39PM

Thanks for the corrections (kyrrigle, gumse and others). I can see by Apple's Web site <http://www.apple.com/ical/> that I was premature in my complaints about the categories and colors. I hope i was wrong about everything else, too. :-)

Best wishes,
Clint



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vCal import not working?
Authored by: jweinberger on Sep 10, '02 04:17:32PM

I tried this morning to import my calendar from Palm Desktop to iCal by exporting a vCal file from Palm Desktop.

When I tried to import it, nothing happened. iCal behaved as though it was going along fine, but then when i clicked "import" it just did nothing.

I spoke to Apple tech support (applecare), and was finally turned over to a product specialist, who experienced the same problem importing a vCal file.

I'm not sure (still) if I have any special circumstances that would prevent this operation from succeeding, but it seems that iCal can't (as advertised) import vCal files.

(suggestions aer welcome - if you have succeded!) Or it seems I get to wait for iSync until iCal becomes useful...
--Jeff



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vCal import not working?
Authored by: Arrakis on Sep 11, '02 04:39:57AM

I have exactly the same problem! Nothing happens. And ical is quit slow on my machine (powerbook G4 764Mb Ram, OSX 10.2). Ical is useless for me until isynch. I was so waiting for that app to replace my paml desktop :-(



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