1. Understanding Calendaring
If you've ever used the Calendar component in Microsoft Outlook, shown in Figure 1,
then you're familiar with the notion of PC-based calendaring and
scheduling. Microsoft Outlook is an extremely powerful tool, enabling
you to create and manage appointments, meetings, and other events, as
well as tasks and other time-based schedules. For all its strengths,
however, Microsoft Outlook isn't perfect. First, you must pay a hefty
sum for Microsoft Outlook unless you get a version along with other
Microsoft Office applications when you purchase a new PC. Second,
Outlook is designed to work primarily with Microsoft Exchange–based
servers. Although it's possible to use Outlook as an individual, it's
not ideal, and even the latest Outlook versions offer only very simple
methods for sharing calendaring information with other people.
Meanwhile,
standards-based Web calendars have been gaining in popularity for the
past few years, and these solutions offer features that are much more
applicable to individuals than what Outlook offers. Best of all, most of
these Web-based calendars are free. For example, Apple Computer
supplies users of its Mac OS X operating system with a calendar
application called iCal that integrates very nicely with Web standards
for calendaring, making it possible for iCal users to share calendars
with family and friends from around the world. The Mozilla Corporation,
which makes the popular Firefox Web browser, is developing its own
calendar application called Sunbird, offering similar functionality to
Windows and Linux users. Alternatively, if you'd prefer to work directly
on the Web, you can use a calendaring solution such as Google Calendar,
shown in Figure 2.
Standards-based calendar
applications offer a number of useful features. First, you can create
discrete calendars in categories such as Personal, Work, Gym, or any
categories you choose and overlay them as needed on the same Calendar
view to see how your entire schedule plays out. You can share calendars
with others, via a publish and subscribe mechanism that enables you to
superimpose your own calendars visually with remote calendars,
overlaying these on one another and your own calendars. Using this
functionality you could, for example, find a night when both you and
your spouse were free to have dinner at a restaurant together, or
compare your son's soccer schedule with your own weekend plans to make
sure you can get to the game.
More recently, Web-based
calendaring solutions have begun interacting and syncing with mobile
devices, such as smart phones. So it's easy to freely sync between, say,
Google Calendar and Apple's iPhone, two products that are made by
different companies with different agendas. The calendaring standards
that make this possible have even been adopted by Microsoft, which has
added this functionality to its Exchange- and Outlook-based
applications, servers, and services, and, more recently, to
consumer-oriented offerings as well.
The ramifications of this
support are wide-reaching. Because these standards-based calendars are
becoming so popular, many organizations and individuals publish their
own schedules on the Web so that other individuals can subscribe to
them. If you're a fan of the Boston Red Sox or any other sports team,
you can subscribe to their schedule and always be alerted when a game is
coming up. There are calendars out there for all kinds of events,
including regional holidays, concerts, and the like; and these calendars
can be superimposed on your own calendars within these calendaring
applications.
There's
more, of course. Standards-based calendars also typically support lists
of tasks, which can be assigned days and times for completion and
checked off as they are completed. You can print calendars in attractive
styles, and use them as paper-based personal information managers
during your work week or on trips. All of this is possible without
having to deal with an expensive, centralized server. The Internet's
enterprising denizens have gotten their hands on calendaring and rescued
it from the proprietary shackles of Microsoft Exchange.
2. Exploring Windows Live Calendar
Microsoft
isn't blind to this change in how people are interacting online via
standards-based calendars. That's why it has added a standards-based
calendaring service, Windows Live Calendar, to its ever-expanding set of
online services. Windows Live Calendar, shown in Figure 3,
replaces the company's previous stabs at online calendars, including
the horrid calendar component of Hotmail and something called MSN
Calendar.
You could pretty much
perform all of your schedule-related needs directly from this Web
interface if you wanted to, as Windows Live Calendar includes all of the
functionality one might expect from an online calendar.
Windows Live Calendar is tied to a Windows Live ID.
As you should expect by now, the calendars and to-do lists you create
with Windows Live Calendar need to be associated with a Windows Live ID.
This means that you cannot use Windows Live Calendar without first
creating such an ID, and that any calendars and to-do lists you create
after that will integrate nicely with other Windows Live services and,
if you like, be easily shareable with others, especially those who are
part of your Windows Live network.
Windows Live Calendar is part of your online persona.
As part of the Windows Live ID integration, Windows Live Calendar
becomes one of many Windows Live services you can access through your
online persona. But because it's part of your overall Windows Live
experience, it can also be themed and customized along the same lines
possible with most other Windows Live services. So if you apply a cool
theme to your Windows Live Profile, it will show up in Calendar, as
shown in Figure 4. And if you apply a theme to Windows Live Calendar, it will be applied to the other Windows Live services you visit on the Web.
Windows Live Calendar supports one or more Web-based calendars.
By default, Windows Live Calendar will provide at least one calendar,
My Calendar, but you can add as many other calendars as you'd like. If
you've been using other Windows Live services, like Windows Live People,
either via the Web or through an application like Windows Live
Messenger, you may also see a calendar called Birthday Calendar that
provides access to your contacts' birthdays.
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You can assign different colors to each calendar, making for a nice, multi-color display.
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Windows Live Calendar provides different views.
Like desktop-based calendars, you can view your schedule via Day, Week,
and Month views. But Windows Live Calendar also provides a unique and
attractive Agenda view that presents your schedule as a list, as shown
in Figure 5.
Windows Live Calendar provides tasks functionality too.
Like Outlook and other desktop calendaring solutions, Windows Live
Calendar provides a separate tasks management solution called the To-do
list (see Figure 6).
As with the Agenda view, the To-do list is list-based, but it has
provisions for such things as priorities and completion progress.
NOTE
You can rename any calendar, including the default My Calendar. To do so, visit Options => More Options in the Web interface.
Windows Live Calendar can import and subscribe to other calendars.
Windows Live Calendar allows you to import calendars that have been
saved in ICS format. This is handy if you need to import a calendar
you've archived from a previous calendaring solution. But if you want to
subscribe to an ongoing calendar—one that can change in the
future—Windows Live Calendar supports that, too. As with other
standards-based calendars, Windows Live Calendar works with iCal-type
calendar subscriptions.
Windows Live Calendar can share and publish to other calendars.
Like other standards-based calendars, Windows Live Calendar can publish
your calendars so that they can be consumed, or subscribed to,
elsewhere. In addition, Windows Live Calendar supports its own
proprietary sharing technology, meaning that you can also share your
calendars in other ways. As you can see in Figure 7,
you can share with others in your Windows Live network, with others in
your network via a read-only view, or by making your calendar public
(and thus available for view by anyone).
Windows Live Calendar offers functionality that the Calendar view in Windows Live Mail does not.
Because Windows Live Calendar is a more complete calendaring solution
than the Calendar view in Windows Live Mail, you will need to
occasionally visit the Web interface, even if you typically prefer to
use Windows Live Mail for your calendaring needs. We'll describe these
instances in just a bit. But first, let's take a look at Microsoft's new
calendaring application for Windows 7.
