TECH TIPS - COORDINATING CALENDARS MADE EASY
KEEP YOUR FAMILY SCHEDULE IN ONE PLACE ONLINE!
I come from a big family. And when I say big, I mean HUGE!
One of the challenges that seem to happen is that when we all want to get together it is almost impossible to get everyone on a phone call (can you say Free Conference Call?) let alone have them respond back via email.
Enter the fun and latest technology - online calendars. The big players -- Yahoo -->, Google --> and Microsoft --> -- all offer web-based calendar systems, plus there are promising offerings from startups like 30 Boxes --> and 37 Signals' Backpack -->.
Most online calendars (and I'm going to talk about Google Calendar) can send alerts via e-mail and SMS messages to keep you abreast of your appointments, but there are a number of other ways to track your calendars.
For Google users with mobile needs, point your phone's browser to calendar.google.com --> to get a slimmed-down interface for mobile phones. The site will even auto-detect the iPhone and deliver a version designed for the device's touch screen.
You can subscribe to your Google Calendar in any desktop application that supports the variety of formats Google Calendar offers. Just head to the "Calendars" section and copy and paste the URL into your favorite Desktop app. Keep in mind however, that most desktop calendar apps won't offer round trip syncs with Google Calendar. Mac users can invest in Spanning Sync --> ($25/year or $65 for life) which enables Apple iCal to read and write to Google Calendars. There's also a free project, Provider -->, which enables the Mozilla's Sunbird Calendar to read and write to Google Calendar.
To read even more information about this valuable tool that helps you stay on time, keep in touch and know where the family is, click here. With all these options, you can stay in touch not only with friends and family. Most importantly, almost all of it is free.
HAVE YOU GOT AN ON-LINE ITEM YOU NEED FOR FREE? Let me know so I can check it out.
DEAN'S TEAM TECH EDITOR,
CATHY MALLERS
