8 ms·

We have a prototype at Nylas which is pretty awesome, but haven't had the time to really finish it. (Focus is important!) Calendar apps are deceptively hard. V

by grinich 10y ago

We have a prototype at Nylas which is pretty awesome, but haven't had the time to really finish it. (Focus is important!) Calendar apps are deceptively hard. Very tricky UI problems alongside super complicated data transformations you need to do across a fragmented ecosystem of ICS/etc. Making something "just work" takes an incredible amount of focused time from an entire engineering team. But here's a peek anyway if you're curious: https://www.dropbox.com/s/j1ry3qar45ozj7m/nylas-calendar.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/j1ry3qar45ozj7m/nylas-calendar.png... PS: we are hiring ;) feel free to ping me directly

grinich 10y ago
Here's a blog post we wrote on RRULEs that just highlights one part of why calendars are hard: https://nylas.com/blog/rrules/ https://nylas.com/blog/rrules/
- faizshah 10y ago
  I just started with with RRULEs using pg_rrule in postgres. How do you guys handle overrides and exceptions in your schema for the sync engine?
  - priyadarshy 10y ago
    there's a lot interesting possibilities for you can handle this. for our sync engine at sunsama we've tried a few different approaches. currently, we store the "parent" recurring event as one document. then we store exception events as standalone one off calendar events that link back to the parent recurring event. unfortunately, we have to maintain two different types of exploded versions of recurring events (to handle notes on an instance). eventually, we added a bunch of extra fields to the parent event like a pointer to the next upcoming instance of this event and denormalized full list of exceptions so that we can more easily handle application logic like sending out reminders, and letting you use arrows to navigate b/w instance s of recurring events. so far with this approach of separating out the parents and children we've run into very few problems.
  - helge5 10y ago
    I think DAViCal also used to process RRULEs directly within PostgreSQL, may be worth a look: https://gitlab.com/davical-project/davical https://gitlab.com/davical-project/davical
- FragenAntworten 10y ago
  The link to the rrule.js demo is broken; it has moved here: https://jakubroztocil.github.io/rrule/ https://jakubroztocil.github.io/rrule/
- shaklee3 10y ago
  There's a book called "Dreaming in Code" which actually details how hard this problem was for a real project that ultimately failed. Good book for anyone who wants to read an account of a writer who followed an entire software team through the lifecycle of a product.
  - fmoralesc 10y ago
    I'll second this recommendation. For a shorter take on it, Joel Spolsky's review of the book[^1] is a nice read. [^1]: https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2007/01/21/the-big-picture/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2007/01/21/the-big-picture/
- helge5 10y ago
  If you do any serious calendar development, you should join CalConnect. This is where all the calendaring guys meet, work on the related RFCs (CalDAV, iCalendar) and do interoperability testing: https://www.calconnect.org https://www.calconnect.org Absolutely worth it.
  - fjdlwlv 10y ago
    Calendaring gals too.
- taneq 10y ago
  Dates are one of those "way way harder than you think they are" topics.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
mbesto 10y ago
This looks like a Sunrise replacement and that's awesome. How can I get notified when it's ready?
isaiahg 10y ago
I used to use nylas and I loved it, but the neverending upgrade to premium emails were bonkers. I still get the emails long after I've stopped using it and asked for them to stop on. ON EVERY SINGLE ACCOUNT I USED WITH NYLAS! The same email for every account. Accounts I'm fairly sure I never gave permission to be emailed at. I loved your product but tell your marketing/sales people to calm down, it drove this customer away.
- simplehuman 10y ago
  Same here. Please nylas, stop the god damn spam.
- jventura 10y ago
  Similarly, I've only added my email account to the desktop app (which should only act as a email client), and somehow they grabbed my email account and start spamming me.
yitchelle 10y ago
Is Nylas open source? The OP was looking for an open source alternative. It is not clear from you website whether Nylas is open source or not?
- firloop 10y ago
  Not the OP, but the Nylas mail client is open source. https://github.com/nylas/nylas-mail https://github.com/nylas/nylas-mail
- r3bl 10y ago
  Their clients are. However, you would gonna need their sync-engine[0] on your own servers in order to avoid contacting Nylas servers. From what I understand, it's kind of a cloud API that makes some sense out of emailing protocols. [0] https://github.com/nylas/sync-engine https://github.com/nylas/sync-engine
  - grinich 10y ago
    This is not entirely true anymore: https://blog.nylas.com/nylas-mail-is-now-free-8350d6a1044d https://blog.nylas.com/nylas-mail-is-now-free-8350d6a1044d
barryhand 10y ago
Beautiful, I'm a big fan of Nylas and feel that calendar integration is the last piece for a really nice workflow.
owenwil 10y ago
I had been REALLY hoping this might happen. Goodness, even if it's rough I would love love love to use this
AndrewUnmuted 10y ago
I would really prefer that you guys went away. Nothing you do is any good and the incessant spam I received for ever daring to try you out was completely unacceptable, as was the time it took to stop that spam after deleting my account.

by grinich 10y ago

grinich 10y ago

Here's a blog post we wrote on RRULEs that just highlights one part of why calendars are hard: https://nylas.com/blog/rrules/ https://nylas.com/blog/rrules/

faizshah 10y ago
I just started with with RRULEs using pg_rrule in postgres. How do you guys handle overrides and exceptions in your schema for the sync engine?
- priyadarshy 10y ago
  there's a lot interesting possibilities for you can handle this. for our sync engine at sunsama we've tried a few different approaches. currently, we store the "parent" recurring event as one document. then we store exception events as standalone one off calendar events that link back to the parent recurring event. unfortunately, we have to maintain two different types of exploded versions of recurring events (to handle notes on an instance). eventually, we added a bunch of extra fields to the parent event like a pointer to the next upcoming instance of this event and denormalized full list of exceptions so that we can more easily handle application logic like sending out reminders, and letting you use arrows to navigate b/w instance s of recurring events. so far with this approach of separating out the parents and children we've run into very few problems.
- helge5 10y ago
  I think DAViCal also used to process RRULEs directly within PostgreSQL, may be worth a look: https://gitlab.com/davical-project/davical https://gitlab.com/davical-project/davical
FragenAntworten 10y ago
The link to the rrule.js demo is broken; it has moved here: https://jakubroztocil.github.io/rrule/ https://jakubroztocil.github.io/rrule/
shaklee3 10y ago
There's a book called "Dreaming in Code" which actually details how hard this problem was for a real project that ultimately failed. Good book for anyone who wants to read an account of a writer who followed an entire software team through the lifecycle of a product.
- fmoralesc 10y ago
  I'll second this recommendation. For a shorter take on it, Joel Spolsky's review of the book[^1] is a nice read. [^1]: https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2007/01/21/the-big-picture/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2007/01/21/the-big-picture/
helge5 10y ago
If you do any serious calendar development, you should join CalConnect. This is where all the calendaring guys meet, work on the related RFCs (CalDAV, iCalendar) and do interoperability testing: https://www.calconnect.org https://www.calconnect.org Absolutely worth it.
- fjdlwlv 10y ago
  Calendaring gals too.
taneq 10y ago
Dates are one of those "way way harder than you think they are" topics.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

mbesto 10y ago

This looks like a Sunrise replacement and that's awesome. How can I get notified when it's ready?

isaiahg 10y ago

I used to use nylas and I loved it, but the neverending upgrade to premium emails were bonkers. I still get the emails long after I've stopped using it and asked for them to stop on. ON EVERY SINGLE ACCOUNT I USED WITH NYLAS! The same email for every account. Accounts I'm fairly sure I never gave permission to be emailed at. I loved your product but tell your marketing/sales people to calm down, it drove this customer away.

simplehuman 10y ago
Same here. Please nylas, stop the god damn spam.
jventura 10y ago
Similarly, I've only added my email account to the desktop app (which should only act as a email client), and somehow they grabbed my email account and start spamming me.

yitchelle 10y ago

Is Nylas open source? The OP was looking for an open source alternative. It is not clear from you website whether Nylas is open source or not?

firloop 10y ago
Not the OP, but the Nylas mail client is open source. https://github.com/nylas/nylas-mail https://github.com/nylas/nylas-mail
r3bl 10y ago
Their clients are. However, you would gonna need their sync-engine[0] on your own servers in order to avoid contacting Nylas servers. From what I understand, it's kind of a cloud API that makes some sense out of emailing protocols. [0] https://github.com/nylas/sync-engine https://github.com/nylas/sync-engine
- grinich 10y ago
  This is not entirely true anymore: https://blog.nylas.com/nylas-mail-is-now-free-8350d6a1044d https://blog.nylas.com/nylas-mail-is-now-free-8350d6a1044d

barryhand 10y ago

Beautiful, I'm a big fan of Nylas and feel that calendar integration is the last piece for a really nice workflow.

owenwil 10y ago

I had been REALLY hoping this might happen. Goodness, even if it's rough I would love love love to use this

AndrewUnmuted 10y ago

I would really prefer that you guys went away. Nothing you do is any good and the incessant spam I received for ever daring to try you out was completely unacceptable, as was the time it took to stop that spam after deleting my account.