Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Apple Implements the CalDAV Standard For MobileMe

Posted by kdawson on from the camel's-nose-under-the-enterprise-tent dept.

Vermyndax writes "Apple announced the new MobileMe Calendar beta on July 6th. The mainstream press picked up the story and plugged the gorgeous new iPad-like interface for all devices. It seems, however, that they missed the real story: MobileMe's new Calendar application is an implementation of CalDAV, the proposed calendaring standard. This may be the same implementation that exists in Snow Leopard Server and is open sourced. The hidden gem in all of this is that Apple plans to bring this CalDAV connectivity to Outlook users on MobileMe. Where might they take it next?"

20 of 152 comments (clear)

  1. Unpossible by Rational · · Score: 3, Interesting

    As everybody knows, Apple is a closed and evil company, therefore the headline is misleading and the story inaccurate. QED.

    --
    "Be nice, veer left, and never stop thinking" Iain Banks - Walking On Glass
    1. Re:Unpossible by Goaway · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Pointing out that Slashdot is full of anti-Apple fanboys means your "braiin was washed in Apple juice"?

    2. Re:Unpossible by cheesybagel · · Score: 4, Funny

      Try pointing out any negative trait on Apple products. Then do the same for Microsoft products. Then for Linux. Then watch how you get moderated. The results are... interesting.

    3. Re:Unpossible by leamanc · · Score: 5, Informative

      Yeah, I know because Apple never gives anything back to the open source community at all!

      --
      :q!
    4. Re:Unpossible by mean+pun · · Score: 4, Informative

      Agreed.

    5. Re:Unpossible by DJRumpy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      A year ago I would have agreed with you, as things tended to be pretty balanced, and pretty fair, with initial flambait, troll mods balanced out after a few hours. One of the most recent posts about Apple tells a different story with any positive posts about Apple all being modded down as troll or flamebait regardless of content.

      http://apple.slashdot.org/story/10/07/06/1839240/More-Trouble-In-Apples-App-Store

      Look at the above link, at what's being modded 'Insightful', 'Informative', and on the opposite side, trolling and flamebait.

      Claiming that things are pretty even handed looks a little ridiculous. The above link is about a story where someone hacked an iTunes account and bought his own app. It immediately turned into a slew of Apple is Evil, the Walled Garden doesn't work, the app store is a failure, all modded insightful and informative, when it had nothing to do with apps other than the guy hacking the accounts bought his own app.

      Slashdot has become a haven for anti-Apple trolls. Look through that link and tell me that the posts deserved Insightful, and that the trolls deserved the bashing. It's pointless anymore to even enter an Apple thread as it is immediately filled with FUD, "Apple Sucks +Insightful", and "Evil + Informative".

      I particularly like the one stating "WTF, did you suck Steve's dick or something" being modded Insightful and Informative.

    6. Re:Unpossible by nine-times · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I've done that, and I have to say that I think people misjudge the bias on Slashdot. I've posted positive/negative comments about Google, Apple, Microsoft, and Linux, and I'll tell you that the response can be fairly random. You can get modded up for posting positive things about Windows and you can get modded down for posting positive things about Linux.

      Beyond that, the trends aren't what most people assume. In my experience, interesting and insightful comments about any of these companies/products can get you modded up, but annoying snide cliched complaints will probably get you modded down.

      If there is a bias, I think it's most heavily anti-Apple, but in a specific way: irrational and ignorant complaints against Apple are more likely to get modded up than irrational and ignorant complaints against anything else (at least within the sphere of computing. Irrational complaints about religion are probably most likely to get modded up (no, I'm not religious)). I think the reason (if I had to guess) is that there are still a fair amount of Windows/Linux/Android users who are so anti-Apple that they won't give the products a fair shake and never really use them or learn what the situation is. On the other hand, most Apple users have used other operating systems.

      As a result, complaints against the one-button mouse get modded insightful and complaints against WGA/WAT get modded overrated (I guess because people think you're just piling on).

      That's my interpretation, but I guess you could accuse me of being biased.

  2. iCal by 99BottlesOfBeerInMyF · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Apple was one of the three companies that wrote the CalDAV RFC and they implemented it immediately in iCal in 2007. (iCal is the built in calendaring app in OS X.) Previous to that that iCal already used WebDAV. They offer an OSS CalDAV server in OS X server. Why would anyone find it surprising that the rewritten WebApp version of iCal is using CalDAV?Apple has already been pushing it as hard as possible as an open standard alternative to Exchange.

    1. Re:iCal by ZERO1ZERO · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Apple always seems to 'take ages' to implement stuff. This applies in hardware, software, services etc. The upshot is that when they do it's usually implemented properly, in a nice easy to use way, with a shiny interface layer on top. Look at Ipod. When they firstbrought it out people said it was lame and it had less space than current competing mp3 players. But what they did have was solid. And there wasn't even an itunes store at that point. A few revisions later and they dominate the mp3 player space. iPad will be the same. Look at some of there software offereings and it's the same story.

    2. Re:iCal by Mononoke · · Score: 5, Funny

      Look at Ipod. When they firstbrought it out people said it was lame and it had less space than current competing mp3 players.

      NO WAY! Someone really said that? In public?!? ^_-

      --
      NetInfo connection failed for server 127.0.0.1/local
    3. Re:iCal by dgatwood · · Score: 4, Informative

      In order to use the name UNIX, an operating system is required to pass a strict set of conformance tests. Therefore, Mac OS X is UNIX in far more than just a trademark sense.

      --

      Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.

  3. Google and Apple by Irick · · Score: 4, Interesting

    People seem to forget these two companies actually press open standards above proprietary formats. For two companies that are pitted against each other so much by the media and marketing, they really do remain nearly seamlessly interoperable. I have no problems switching between Apple's default software to alternative applications just because of how standardized it is. Mail, iCal, etc.

    1. Re:Google and Apple by ducomputergeek · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Apple became the white knights of Opensource by adopting a BSD-based userland (It wasn't Linux but it gave the Linux fans the ability to say "See, Apple is doing it we can too"). Then Apple embraced and extended CUPS. But it's been how many years and they've not extinguished it. CUPS is used by every Linux distro I've tried and Apple has done nothing to stop them. Same with all their other technologies, they embraced the open standards and contributed a lot to different projects, but still held parts to be propitary. They were "open" but not "open enough" for some people. But largely the early appeal of OSX was to the geek crowd. Every LAMP developer I knew at the time left Linux for OSX as their desktop (usually laptop) of choice. I was one of them after spending 2 years trying to get printers and my sound card to work with Linux I got tired and just wanted something that worked. So I bought an iBook and never looked back.

      Then things changed when Apple forked KHTML. For some reason, that was seen as suspicious by the /. crowd. I'm not sure why. Eventually Apple created Webkit and offered it back to the community with the KHTML folks eventually adopting it (iirc). But that's when the negativity began and then continued with the iPods.

      But then, there was iTunes and the iTMS. Apple was against DRM, but added just enough DRM to get labels to sign up. And the DRM they added never once got in my way. If I wanted to burn to CD to listen in my car, I could. I could copy to a number of computers and iPods and listen to what I had purchased and the biggest factor was I could buy the couple tracks I wanted from a CD and not the entire album for $.99. It didn't mesh with some peoples idea of "freedom", but to the masses it became having cake and eating it too. Apple was the first company that was able to put it all together in a package the average person could use.

      And because Apple was for the masses now and no longer aimed for the "geeks", the /. crowd began hating Apple as Apple found more and more success with more people. It was OSX that was becoming the *iux of the masses, not Linux. This continued with the iPhone. Although at first it was more of a shrug, then came the iPhone 2 with the App Store and it was full on rabid hatred. Mainly I think because, again, Apple developed a product that went over extremely well for the masses, but ignored what the "geeks" might want.

      And so the Geeks went to Google. What was not to love about google, lots of geeks, lots of geeky tools made by geeks for geeks. And so, Google is now the company that replaced Apple about 2007 as the great "white knight". It will last another 3 - 5 years, and then Google will become the new "Evil company that must die" replaced by someone else. Who knows, maybe by that time the new white knight will be Microsoft. Stranger things have happened.

      --
      "The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other people's money" - Thatcher.
    2. Re:Google and Apple by Maury+Markowitz · · Score: 3, Interesting

      > Unfortunately for Apple, the iPhone4 hasn't really killed Android

      Was anyone outside the US's tech boiler-room really expecting this?

      Here in the GWN all of the major carriers, and their fighter brands, carry the iPhone. That's been true since Bell and Telus switched to the GSM stack late last year, just as Android was really coming out.

      Since then I have seen exactly three Android devices in use, and one of them lies dormant in a drawer for 99.9% of its life. I don't believe this is a particularly biased sample. RIM and Apple completely own the mobile market here. I have not seen a single one in use in the UK, although that is a slightly more biased sample (two weeks does not make for a strong numbers base).

      Does anyone really think that Android would have got the foothold it has if the iPhone was available on CDMA? I don't. It's different now that it's out there in the wild, but I don't believe it's success is anything other than Apple's failure to get onto Verizon.

      Maury

  4. Re:syncml by metamatic · · Score: 4, Informative

    Yeesh. SyncML? Have you ever looked at that standard? Ghastly.

    Besides, converting CalDAV to SyncML on the server side shouldn't be hard, since CalDAV is iCalendar files in a set of directories on a WebDAV server, and SyncML is iCalendar files wrapped in XML and sent to a SyncML server across whatever protocol the vendor chooses. In fact, a quick Googling suggests that there are already numerous SyncML to CalDAV gateways, including open source ones.

    --
    GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
  5. Re:Does it matter? by HumanEmulator · · Score: 3, Insightful

    One of apple's biggest blunders is not considering mobileme a loss leader.

    Back when it was known as iTools, it was a loss leader. They gave that up after 2 years so there was a probably a good reason. Perhaps because people are willing to pay?

  6. Re:Close by abigor · · Score: 4, Insightful

    In all fairness, no platform is perfect, let's face it. You seem to be commenting on OS X (hard drives, 3d performance, etc.), so let's see:

    If you want non-working cut and paste (the general case is it only works for text), no 3d performance at all, barely any wireless support, no commercial software support including de facto standards like MS Office and Photoshop, no games, amateurish and inconsistent guis, etc. ad infinitum, then run desktop Linux.

    If you don't mind a pretty substandard operating system in return for all the software you could ever want and you don't need Unix, run Windows.

    If you want a usable, well thought-out desktop Unix with lots of commercial software (though much less than Windows), good open source and open standards support, and you don't care about games, run OS X.

    As cliche as it sounds, it's all about what works best for you.

  7. Re:Close by copponex · · Score: 4, Interesting

    As cliche as it sounds, it's all about what works best for you.

    I totally agree. I've been vocal about the shortcomings about Windows and Linux (no Quickbooks alternative!?) for a depressing amount of time. Though I wouldn't exactly put Windows in the "substandard OS" category if I wasn't throwing OS X and Linux in the same box as well.

    The issue I have with Apple is that the pride has turned to arrogance. Now you're buying "magical and revolutionary devices" that "change the world" and people are actually believing the bullshit. I mean, their phones suck at making phone calls, but good news! You can edit movies instead. And if video chat is a revolution, don't tell the Japanese consumers who have been doing it for years. Or anyone who's used Skype.

    I guess it taps into the same disappointment I have with people in general when it comes to propaganda. But maybe the only thing worse than someone who thinks a phone or an iPod Touch XL is going to change their life is the guy with so much free time he decides to complain publicly about it...

  8. Re:Close by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Sometimes the term is deserved. Look at the interface of the HTC/Android, and the newer touch RIM devices.

    Why? Just look at pre-iPhone smartphones. Only a complete moron couldn't admit Apple is a mover and shaker.

  9. Re:While I can't speak for Windows... by ToasterMonkey · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Copy and paste - not just text - is doable. Ditto for 3d hardware performance (I assume you were referring to hardware acceleration). For commercial MS Office support, you may want to check out Softmaker - it's an excellent office suite. I'm not a gamer, but I know that there are commercial games available for Linux as well. The GUI, well, I suppose that's what you make of it - at least you can tweak it to your heart's content.

    Let me guess, you found at least two applications that can copy and paste something non-text, you have an nvdia video card, you "don't need Office", and you found at least one commercial game for Linux, so everything he said is false.

    Guy, if the bar was REALLY as low as you make it out to be, Linux would be on everyone's desktop by virtue of being free, and "good enough". Clearly, "good enough" is further out of reach than you would have us believe.

    No need to sound bitter when describing something you don't use.

    More current Windows and Mac users have Linux experience than you think. Your whole "you don't get it" attitude is so 2000. Any self respecting IT nerd has at least toyed with Linux at this point, and sorry if you feelings get hurt if we think Windows or Macs are worth the price. Linux has been in the mainstream long enough for plenty of people to have extensively been there, done that, and you're not fooling us.

    P.S.
    If case you still aren't convinced the whole world doesn't love Linux. There are still a lot of resentful UNIX server admins out there that appreciate the free tools and would happily shove all Linux outside the cross-platform GNU userland up your ass for you.

    P.P.S.
    If you mod me flamebait, you "just don't get it," and you're probably a Linux shill or something.