Little Marauder challenges iCal with Caliander
updated 04:05 am EST, Sat January 8, 2011
Timeline-based cal uses natural-language parsing
A developer who was dissatisfied with iCal and some of the alternatives has created his own vision of how a personal calendar should work, named it Caliander and put it on the Mac App Store. It uses a refreshing "timeline" type interface that allows panning and zooming, a perceptual mode, faster event creation using plain English and a global keyboard shortcut to allow adding events while in other applications.
The timeline approach allows busy days to have the space they need to show all events, while quiet days do not take up wasted space. The program uses the same calendar database as iCal, so events are automatically synced and does not require setting up new calendars. New events can be created rapidly in the program: command-n, followed by a plain-English description such as "Lunch at Moxie's friday 5pm" or "june 8-10 honeymoon" and press return. Event creation in the usual manner is also supported. Setting a global hotkey for Caliander allows event creation even when the app is not running.
Caliander is $19 from the Mac App Store and requires 10.6 or higher (the Mac App Store requires 10.6.6). It currently only supports Gregorian calendars, does not work with Entourage calendars, and can work with -- but not sync -- CalDAV calendars unless iCal is launched to perform the sync. A 30-day free trial is available from the developer's website.
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Apr 2008
Need an iPad version
And it needs built-in To-Dos as good as "To-Do" on the iPad.
But please do it, you've made a terrific start.
If you're new to the Mac, please check out Claris Organizer from way-back-when for some ideas.