Creating a shared calendar: iCal, Google Calendar, Outlook

Here’s a quick tutorial on how to create a calendar of events that you’d like to share with others, specifically users of Apple’s iCal, Google Calendar or Microsoft Outlook.

My winter basketball league recently released the schedules on their web site. We like the web site, but it’d be nice to be able to view the events (each game) in our own calendar applications.

At the same time, the events should always be in sync, meaning if I change an event on the global calendar, the change should come across to everyone’s calendar.

I decided to create a calendar that could be shared with everyone on my team. But with people using different calendars apps, how could I please everyone?

Unfortunately due to some shortcomings of available calendar apps, not everyone will be able to “sync” their calendars with the global calendar.

Users of Apple’s iCal or Google Calendar seem to have better options available to them than users of Microsoft Outlook. The main feature missing in Outlook is the ability to sync with calendars from an external source.

However, Outlook users can still import events to their calendars, which is better than nothing.

Step 1: Create the events

First, you have to manually create the calendar of events, in a program that lets you export as iCal format, or publish on the web. I’ve tested the creation of calendars in both Google Calendar and iCal. I didn’t even bother creating one with Outlook, since I know it is much more “tied down.”

If you use iCal, go to File > New Calendar:

If you use Google Calendar, click on the plus icon in the Calendars sub-section, which creates a new calendar:

Then name your calendar and create all the events on the days they occur. Add as much helpful information as you can, such as start time, end time, and location. All of these details should be carried over to other calendars. The more details, the better.

Step 2: Exporting vs. Publishing

Sharing your new calendar involves either exporting the events to a file or publishing to a web server.

It’s important to understand the differences between exporting and publishing.

Exporting means no sync capabilities. Once the events are imported into another calendar app, any future changes won’t be reflected. You’d have to re-import the updated events in order to see the changes. Unfortunately with Outlook you have no other choice but to import.

Publishing, on the other hand, allows changes to come across. Since the “published” calendar is on the web, your local calendar app just has to “sync” with the changes.

Here is a diagram illustrating the combinations, in relation to each other:

Notice the shaded areas. For the best capabilities, use Publish/Subscribe with Google Calendar and iCal, and Import with Outlook.

(You’ll need a separate .Mac account or access to a private server in order to Publish from iCal.)

Step 3: Share your calendar

Sharing with iCal

If you used iCal to create your calendar, go to Calendar > Publish:

Type in your Calendar name, the server that you’d like to use, and any additional settings:

Now you have access to two separate URL’s for your calendar:

The first one is a subscribed URL, which users of Google Calendar or iCal can input into their own calendars, while remaining in sync with future changes.

The second one is a browser URL, which renders your calendar as a web page, viewable in any browser.

Users of Google Calendar or iCal can now subscribe to your calendar!

User of Outlook will require a separate import file from iCal.

In iCal, go to File > Export, and name the file accordingly. Then, pass that file along to Outlook users, so they can import it into their calendars.

Sharing with Google Calendar

If you used Google Calendar to create your calendar, click on the arrow next to the calendar in the Calendars sub-section and choose “Share this Calendar.”

Then under the Calendar Details section, look for the Calendar Address and Private Address. There you’ll see the links to the XML, ICAL, and HTML versions of your calendar.

Use the ICAL link for others to subscribe to the calendar in iCal. Use the HTML link for others to subscribe to the calendar in Google Calendar. The XML link is the feed address, for subscribing in an RSS feed reader.

Other resources and ideas

Some say CompanionLink helps sync Outlook with Google Calendar, but I didn’t test it.

SpanningSync is an exciting product that promises to synchronize data between iCal and Google Calendar in both directions. They’ve produced a screencast demo of the product, though it is not officially released as of this writing.

Related links

• Outlook 2007 & Gcal
• Sync Google Calendar and iPod