4 ms·

Calendars are one of those things where I just don't get why tech companies can't work together to make them interoperable. Maybe in 10 years, once the EU mana

Calendars are one of those things where I just don't get why tech companies can't work together to make them interoperable. Maybe in 10 years, once the EU managed to make messengers interoperate, they can do the same for calendars. I don't understand why I can't just share calendars between iCloud users and Google users, or like here, let Google users easily subscribe to 3rd party calendars.

tracker1 4y ago
Lock-in... CalDAV has been a thing for a long time, and many (most) calendar apps outside google's own (and MS) do support this format. It's a bit wonky and sharing/interop are less than great. In the end, nobody is going to come up with a great server solution to calendar/mail/contacts because in the end, every effort I'm aware of has turned into a commercial solution because it takes a lot of time, effort and support. If I ever won a significant lottery amount, I would probably work on such a thing. Not sure I'd see any big benefactor for this any time soon.
CharlesW 4y ago
> Calendars are one of those things where I just don't get why tech companies can't work together to make them interoperable. iCalendar standard: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICalendar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICalendar (RFC for iCalendar standard: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/rfc5545/ https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/rfc5545/) With macOS it's easy to publish¹ and subscribe² to calendars in this standards-based format. AFAIK, there's wide support for the iCalendar in other apps too, including Google Calendar, Microsoft Outlook, and Mozilla Thunderbird. ¹ https://support.apple.com/guide/calendar/publish-or-unpublish-calendars-on-mac-icl1017/11.0/mac/13.0 https://support.apple.com/guide/calendar/publish-or-unpublis... ² https://support.apple.com/guide/calendar/subscribe-to-calendars-icl1022/11.0/mac/13.0 https://support.apple.com/guide/calendar/subscribe-to-calend...
- newaccount74 4y ago
  Just like you I thought this was a solved problem, but when I wanted to try it in pactice, I ran into two issues with this: 1) The calendar subscriptions aren't read/write, they are read only for subscribers. You can't share calendars between Google and iCloud read/write. 2) Android apparently doesn't support CalDAV! I tried, but I couldn't get an iCloud published calendar to show on an Android phone, not even read only. The only way that I managed to use a shared calendar between iPhone and Android was to use a Google account on both phones.
  - danuker 4y ago
    > 2) Android apparently doesn't support CalDAV! I tried, but I couldn't get an iCloud published calendar to show on an Android phone, not even read only. I have been syncing my Android calendar with NextCloud using CalDAV for years. I use DAVx⁵ - https://f-droid.org/packages/at.bitfire.davdroid https://f-droid.org/packages/at.bitfire.davdroid

tracker1 4y ago

Lock-in... CalDAV has been a thing for a long time, and many (most) calendar apps outside google's own (and MS) do support this format. It's a bit wonky and sharing/interop are less than great. In the end, nobody is going to come up with a great server solution to calendar/mail/contacts because in the end, every effort I'm aware of has turned into a commercial solution because it takes a lot of time, effort and support. If I ever won a significant lottery amount, I would probably work on such a thing. Not sure I'd see any big benefactor for this any time soon.

CharlesW 4y ago

> Calendars are one of those things where I just don't get why tech companies can't work together to make them interoperable. iCalendar standard: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICalendar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICalendar (RFC for iCalendar standard: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/rfc5545/ https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/rfc5545/) With macOS it's easy to publish¹ and subscribe² to calendars in this standards-based format. AFAIK, there's wide support for the iCalendar in other apps too, including Google Calendar, Microsoft Outlook, and Mozilla Thunderbird. ¹ https://support.apple.com/guide/calendar/publish-or-unpublish-calendars-on-mac-icl1017/11.0/mac/13.0 https://support.apple.com/guide/calendar/publish-or-unpublis... ² https://support.apple.com/guide/calendar/subscribe-to-calendars-icl1022/11.0/mac/13.0 https://support.apple.com/guide/calendar/subscribe-to-calend...

newaccount74 4y ago
Just like you I thought this was a solved problem, but when I wanted to try it in pactice, I ran into two issues with this: 1) The calendar subscriptions aren't read/write, they are read only for subscribers. You can't share calendars between Google and iCloud read/write. 2) Android apparently doesn't support CalDAV! I tried, but I couldn't get an iCloud published calendar to show on an Android phone, not even read only. The only way that I managed to use a shared calendar between iPhone and Android was to use a Google account on both phones.
- danuker 4y ago
  > 2) Android apparently doesn't support CalDAV! I tried, but I couldn't get an iCloud published calendar to show on an Android phone, not even read only. I have been syncing my Android calendar with NextCloud using CalDAV for years. I use DAVx⁵ - https://f-droid.org/packages/at.bitfire.davdroid https://f-droid.org/packages/at.bitfire.davdroid