Update: Spanning Sync and the New MobileMe Calendars

We know many of you have been wondering about the state of Spanning Sync and MobileMe calendars, and thought it was a good time for an update.

To recap, last Fall Apple made the switch to the new MobileMe calendar format official, but allowed users to remain with the old calendars if they chose. However, on May 5 all MobileMe calendar users will be required to switch to the new format. What's different about the new format? Previously, your calendars were stored on your computer and synced to MobileMe. With the new format, your calendars are stored in the cloud with MobileMe but apps such as iCal on the Mac and Calendar on iOS can interact with these calendars through a standard called CalDAV. The new MobileMe calendars include a better web interface, the ability to share calendars, and critically important to developers, Apple does not allow developers to sync calendars to CalDAV. Since Spanning Sync does its job using Apple's Sync Services system, the change effectively breaks Spanning Sync's ability to sync with these calendars.

Obviously, since Spanning Sync worked with MobileMe calendars before, our MobileMe customers expected it to continue to work and we wanted to accommodate them. But, in the end, we decided that Spanning Sync and MobileMe calendars aren't a good fit for each other.

Why?

1) Spanning Sync was created to sync calendars on your Mac with Google Calendar, but the new MobileMe calendars aren't on your Mac. They live in the cloud, just like Google Calendar.

2) While some of our customers are clearly using both, we don't see much benefit to using two cloud-based calendaring services whose feature sets overlap almost completely. Instead, we think users will eventually choose MobileMe calendars or Google Calendar, but not both. 

3) It would take an enormous amount of resources to make Spanning Sync a full-fledged CalDAV client. Unfortunately, Apple doesn't include any libraries to help developers work with CalDAV, WebDAV, or iCalendar, which are all complex technologies and all required to make this work. It would be a lot like writing iCal from scratch, minus the UI.

So what does this mean for Spanning Sync users who also use MobileMe?

First, this change is only for MobileMe calendars. If you don't use MobileMe calendars or you don't currently use Spanning Sync to sync MobileMe calendars, then this change doesn't affect you.

Also keep in mind that there's no reason you can't put some calendars on MobileMe and keep others on your Mac for syncing to Google Calendar with Spanning Sync. For example, if you share some calendars with your family via MobileMe and others with coworkers via Google Calendar, you can still do that even with the new MobileMe calendars. In iCal, just be sure to create these calendars "On My Mac". 

And if you were syncing your local calendars to MobileMe and also to Google Calendar, it might be time to examine the reasons for having both. Remember, you can access both your MobileMe and Google calendars from any web browser, and both support sharing with others.

 

Comments

[Jim Gottlieb]

I'm still unclear on what will work and what won't. I never use MobileMe to access my calendar. I use Spanning Sync to get my calendar to MobileMe merely for its over-the-air syncing to my iPhone. So am I still OK?

I use both Google Calendar and iCal on my Mac to enter events. If I'm entering an event manually or I'm using a computer that is not my own, Google Calendar is my preferred entry vehicle. However, I find iCal is best when entering an event from Mail.app (thanks to its smart date processing) or from a website that sends me an ics file. In addition, I need Google Calendar to have the information so that I can publish my schedule for all to see.

This all means that I do really need both (at the very least I need events in the Calendar app on my phone and on my public Google Calendar page). I know the iPhone has a way to sync from Google Calendar but I am told this is read-only, which would be quite useless to me.

Can not pressure be placed upon Apple to allow third parties to be able to continue to sync to MobileMe?

[Larry Hendricks]

Jim-- You can indeed sync Google calendars directly to your iPhone and it's not read-only. It works seamlessly, actually. The setup procedure is documented here:

http://www.google.com/support/mobile/bin/answer.py?answer=138740&topic=14252

[Jonathan]

The reason I don't use Google on my iPhone as Exchange is I can only have 1 exchange account.

[Mark Knick]

The only reason I used Spanning Sync was the google cal could be shared. Now tell the truth, Apple wants everyone to have a mobile me account. That is the real deal. How much did Apple pay you to not develop a new version? More corporate manipulation.

[Reuben Partida]

Well, the reason I used Spanning Sync is that MobileMe does not sync with Exchange; I have to sync with GoogleCal, then use Spanning Sync to get that onto my MobileMe calendars.

MobileMe's Control Panel says it supports exchange, but in actuality, what it does is download the MobileMe calendar(s) and THEY can sync with copies of themselves in outlook. The primary outlook calendar DOES NOT SYNC with MobileMe, so any emailed events would not be added to the MobileMe calendars unless manually dragged and dropped. Defeats the whole purpose, and demonstrates the need for SpanningSync.
This is frustrating, now as I have no way to get my work calendar viewable on my personal Mac/iPad.

[BrianMegilligan]

Apple gives and Apple takes away.

I'm really disappointed. I can see why they would want to push everyone to their own walled garden, but right now, spanning sync was the best option to do all the required calendar sharing with google and non-mac users. Stink.

[Bert Shure]

Great summary.

I use spanning sync to get my contacts and calendar to google, and from there to my Android phone. it works great.

i get huge value from spanning tools to help find problems in my calendar or calendar. this saved huge hassles.

i turned off syncing to mobileMe on my iPad and had it switch to google. everything works.

cheers!

[Luc Van de Vyver]

Jonathan,

Maybe good news for you (and others).

I don't know when the change happened, but you can have multiple exchange account on your iPhone and iPad !

I have an exchange account for work stuff (email, agenda)
And another exchange account to sync private contacts with google.

For the private gmail sync I use an imap account, where I use a tweak to be able to send from different user-domains.

For private calendar I use a regular gmail setup

Seems to work great now for a few weeks.

I have to check how my iCal and othe mac osx apps fit in, but to be honest ... I use mail and calendar mainly on iPad, iPhone, and in the browser (gmail) on my mac. Maybe spanning sync still plays a role in syncing google with my mac-apps?

Hope this helps?
Always looking for optimisation.

Regards
Luc

[Melle Slotema]

Well,
To my dismay, I noticed that it didn't work anymore. the reason why I chose Spanning Sync is the following: I chose Android over an iPhone! I don't want an iPhone.

I use and love my macs, and they sync with MobileMe (keychains and all). But having an Android, made Spanning Sync the only tool that really worked for me: addresses and calendars, thru google on my Android.
Now they managed to mess that up too. I hate it.

I made a explicit choice not to own an iPhone. I really hate the way Apple controls every aspect of the iPhone (I have an iPod Touch)
It is my device, not theirs!

Now it doesn't work anymore, and I can start looking for a new alternative. This sucks big time.

The moment they make the App Store mandatory on their computers as well, I will abandon Apple.