Just made an iCal event from "Smart Text" in Mail... wow!

Well, I just made a real-life application of the new smart-text thingy in Mail.

It worked beautifully. For those interested this is what happened:

I got an email that contained the line "Monday around 11 am". That's all it said, notice. Not which Monday, and not a specific time, just "Monday around 11 am".



I clicked on that line to see what might happen, and was pleased to see Mail recognized "Monday around 11 am" as a date. I clicked "Create new iCal event" and was very pleased it let me set the details of the meeting right there in Mail... it didn't just bounce me to iCal. I got a little window right there in Mail to set my options.

Very cool.

I was also very surprised that it took the Subject line of the email and made it the Name of the event and managed to figure out the address of the person who requested the meeting from their signature and added that as the location of the meeting.



Even better is that I could manipulate any of these fields before it put the event in iCal. It still never bounced me to iCal... this was all done in mail.

I went and checked the event in iCal and sure enough, there it is... on the correct Monday, and scheduled for 11 am.



Notice the URL "Show in Mail". It opened the email message from which this event was made, so if there's any details in there you might need it's just one click away.

Wow. This might be one of those sleeper features that doesn't really get attention but really, really works and is really, really helpful.

Nice job with this one Apple.

 

Thanks a bunch, koobcamuk.

 

Probably because some of us use dd/mm and some use mm/dd.

 

Yeah, I was thinking about that too, but it still won't work because even though you aren't global, e-mail is.

What if I (in Canada) send you an email (in let's say the UK). Email isn't a local thing, so there's a very good chance you'll receive a message with dd/mm even though in your country you might use mm/dd.

I would like to play with it more though... see how "off" a date can be for it to be recognized. will "Mar 4" work? I heard "next wednesday" is supposed to work. I'll send myself a test message later if I get a chance.

 

Local for whom? (is my point). MY local and YOUR local may be different.


Anyway, in the name of science I went a did a test e-mail to myself. Here's what it "liked":

Phone numbers formatted as "416.555.1234" as well as emails formatted as "416-555-1234".

Dates that worked: "April 9", "4/9/2008" SHOWED UP in iCal on April 9th, so I don't know if that's because of my settings or what, but it's what i intended, also "Jul 23 1975" AND "last Monday" both showed up on their respective days in the PAST.

An address typed as "145 Dupont Ave' worked, and when hovered over offered to get me a Map as well as the regular options.

The only stuff I tested that didn't do anything (that I guessed *maybe* it might) were names of people in my Address Book (first names, didn't try last names as well..), businesses like "McDonald's" or "Apple" (was hoping for a URL jump or Google Search or even a Map??), and