Tiger Questions

[BWhaler]

Looking at the preview on the Apple site, I have a few of questions:

1. Can you activate Dashboard using hot corners a la expose? Or do you have to hit F12 or the dock?

2. It seems like iSync only syncs now with .Mac. Can you still use iSync with phones and other devices?

3. Can you still customize what gets sync'd with a phone, such as Address Book Groups?

Thanks.

 

[bigandy]

i had tiger for a while and yes, you could activate it using the hot corners, much more useful if you're a PB user and don't have enough Function keys free!

 

[wrldwzrd89]

Looking at the preview on the Apple site, I have a few of questions:

1. Can you activate Dashboard using hot corners a la expose? Or do you have to hit F12 or the dock?

2. It seems like iSync only syncs now with .Mac. Can you still use iSync with phones and other devices?

3. Can you still customize what gets sync'd with a phone, such as Address Book Groups?

Thanks.

I don't know for certain, but I'd assume Yes (since the functionality's already there - Apple just needs to expand it), Yes (There's no "iSync" anymore in Tiger - it's been replaced by a sync framework focused on .Mac. That doesn't mean the new sync system won't work with all the devices iSync currently supports, though.), and I have absolutely no idea (since I've never synchronized a phone with iSync before).

 

[Logik]

i really wish apple would allow isync to work with other things besides .mac... i pay $15/mo for a web hosting service... why not just let me provide an ftp account and a location and let isync work that way? i know i know.. they wanna sell .mac... some of us don't want .mac but want a few of the features it provides.. but won't use nearly all of them...

 

[robbieduncan]

I don't know for certain, but I'd assume Yes (since the functionality's already there - Apple just needs to expand it), Yes (There's no "iSync" anymore in Tiger - it's been replaced by a sync framework focused on .Mac. That doesn't mean the new sync system won't work with all the devices iSync currently supports, though.), and I have absolutely no idea (since I've never synchronized a phone with iSync before).

This is not quite true (at least on the Tiger versions I have played with). iSync is still there but it's built on top of the new Sync APIs. So to sync your address book with your phone you still use iSync.

 

[wrldwzrd89]

i really wish apple would allow isync to work with other things besides .mac... i pay $15/mo for a web hosting service... why not just let me provide an ftp account and a location and let isync work that way? i know i know.. they wanna sell .mac... some of us don't want .mac but want a few of the features it provides.. but won't use nearly all of them...

My guess is that's why Apple wrote the new sync framework - developers can write their own sync plugins for it to get the functionality you describe, among other things.

 

[wrldwzrd89]

This is not quite true (at least on the Tiger versions I have played with). iSync is still there but it's built on top of the new Sync APIs. So to sync your address book with your phone you still use iSync.

From what I gathered from the keynote, I thought iSync was no more. I guess I was mistaken. I wonder if that makes the above post of mine invalid.

 

[robbieduncan]

The sync APIs (there is some public documentation on this somewhere as that's where I'm getting this from) allow a developer to define custom data for .Mac sync. So you provide a kind of database of your data and whenever it changes you supply a set of changes and that can be synced to .Mac (and back down to another Mac from there). What the APIs (as I've seen them) do not do is allow you to provide alternative syncing locations. If you had a WebDav enabled remote server you could fool your Macs into using that instead of .Mac with your hosts file.

 

[wrldwzrd89]

The sync APIs (there is some public documentation on this somewhere as that's where I'm getting this from) allow a developer to define custom data for .Mac sync. So you provide a kind of database of your data and whenever it changes you supply a set of changes and that can be synced to .Mac (and back down to another Mac from there). What the APIs (as I've seen them) do not do is allow you to provide alternative syncing locations. If you had a WebDav enabled remote server you could fool your Macs into using that instead of .Mac with your hosts file.

Grrr....stupid Apple! Don't close off your sync system - that only makes your users mad

 

[GodBless]

1. Can you activate Dashboard using hot corners a la expose? Or do you have to hit F12 or the dock?

As far as I know you can use other keyboard shortcuts besides F12 that the user can define (the default being F12) and hot corners as well as the dock. I hope Tiger doesn't force people to use the F1-F12 keys along with modifier keys like Panther does for exposé. The average Mac OS X speed user needs more options than that. For a preview of Dashboard 3rd party Widgets visit The Dashboarder (http://www.thedashboarder.com), download the Widgets and open the html files that the Widgets contain. This way you will be able to preview Widgets right in your browser to get a taste of Dashboard Widgets before Tiger comes out. Unfortunately it is not possible to view all of the Widgets from The Dashboarder without Tiger, but you can at least view some of them.

 

[AdamZ]

confused??

So is there or isn't there the Application iSync anymore? I use it every day: my phone automatically wirelessly syncs daily when I come home. iPod updated when docked. All iCal stuff, address book, stickies, go to both devices without thinking about it. I think it should ultimatly be the one stop shop for linking and syncing devices. Apple should put photo and music there too when we get a phone that we can all actually buy. Hopefully with Automator i'll be able to set up bluetooth file exchange scripts for syncing music a photos to my Sony Ericson.