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ss957916

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jun 17, 2009
861
0
My partner has an mac and uses iCal and so do I. Neither of us have (nor want) mobile me.

Is there an easy and ideally free way to allow the two icals to keep in sync so when I put in a date it shows on his and vice versa?

Thanks.
 

catachip

macrumors regular
Jun 7, 2007
224
0
Vancouver, British Columbia

ss957916

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jun 17, 2009
861
0
I've looked at google but it only syncs one way so it's no good.
 

vincebio

macrumors 6502a
Jun 27, 2005
792
48
Glasgow
this is what MobileMe is for...at a cost of course..

i have my agent make a google calender for me, it comes thru to my main computer's iCal, then i use MobileMe to sync all the computers on my network and iphones.

the only drawback is that even though i can update the calender on any device and Mobile Me syncs everything accordingly, you cannot update my Agents google calender.

small price to pay in my opinion, for a flawless workaround..
 

njl

macrumors regular
Mar 15, 2009
148
0
SAT
there has to be a way using a free service like Dropbox.

i sync my 1password apps between a macbook pro and my old macbook.

anyone try this?? i'm thinking you need to use terminal to get it to work... i think i read that somewhere..

good luck :)

oh and btw, i used mobileme on the free 60 day thing and at the time, i would lose contacts and dates.. i'm sure they are working on it and once they make it PERFECT, i'm totally going back.
 

paduck

macrumors 6502
Jul 5, 2007
426
0
there has to be a way using a free service like Dropbox.

i sync my 1password apps between a macbook pro and my old macbook.

anyone try this?? i'm thinking you need to use terminal to get it to work... i think i read that somewhere..

You can do this with DropBox. It is pretty straight forward. You need to get DropBox on both computers. You also need to install SymbolicLinker 1.3.2 (you can do it in Terminal as well, but why?).

0. Make sure you have backups of the folders referenced below. Proceed at your own risk!
1. Install DropBox on your primary computer and make sure it works.
2. Install SymbolicLinker on your primary computer.
3. Right-click on the ~/user/Library/Application Support/iCal/ folder and create a symbolic link.
4. Move the symbolic file into your DropBox.
5. Let the DropBox sync (might take few minutes the first time).
6. Go to second computer.
7. Delete everything in the ~/user/Library/Application Support/iCal/ folder leaving it empty. (remember step 0 above?)
8. Install SymbolicLinker on your second computer.
9. Create a symbolic link to ~/user/Library/Application Support/iCal/ as you did before.
10. Install DropBox on the new computer and let it sync.
11. Quit DropBox on the new computer.
12. Put the symbolic link from Step 9 into the DropBox in the exact same location as you did on the first computer. Note also that the files names should be identical.
13. Relaunch DropBox on the second computer.
14. iCal should now sync.
15. Once synced, go into iCal and see if everything is there.

Note: you probably don't want to be running iCal on both machines at the same time.

You can also do this with AddressBook.
 

njl

macrumors regular
Mar 15, 2009
148
0
SAT
once my other macbook gets back from apple (5-7 days) i'm going to try this.

has it been flawless with you?

:)
 

paduck

macrumors 6502
Jul 5, 2007
426
0
once my other macbook gets back from apple (5-7 days) i'm going to try this.

has it been flawless with you?

:)

well, it's been flawless with AddressBook. I don't use iCal that much, so that isn't a good data point. But the functionality between AddressBook and iCal for data is the same.

The trick for me was getting the sym link setup on the primary (desktop) computer first and getting the data to DropBox. Then I tweaked a little on the laptop - you know it works when you can see the data coming down via the DropBox menu. Having the empty ~/user/Library/Application Support/AddressBook/ folder also seemed important.
 

Zebrabeer

macrumors newbie
Oct 2, 2009
1
0
Doesn't work for me!

Hi Paduck,
I follow your logic and your clear instructions but it doesn't work for me so I must be doing something wrong. Sorry if I'm making a very stupid error. When I get to step 12 in your instructions and drop the symbolic link for the iCal folder on computer 2 into the dropbox on computer 2 it sees the symbolic link from the first computer there and so names the computer 2 iCal symbolic link as a copy so I can't make sure it has the same file name as per your instructions.
Sorry for probably being daft, but, what am I doing wrong please?
 
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