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Here Today, Gone Tomorrow

Why would Apple remove this handy feature?

Here’s what we’ve lost in iOS 4.2. Try the following on any iOS device (iPad, iPod Touch, or iPhone) running iOS 3.0 through 4.1:

1. In Safari, tap this link to a shared Google calendar of enterprise IT events
2. iOS will pop up the window above, asking if you’d like to subscribe
3. If you tap “Subscribe”, it will set up this calendar in the Calendar app, and new events will be added automatically

Oops! Safari in iOS 4.2 no longer knows what to do with ICS links!

But this no longer works in iOS 4.2! Instead, iOS reports an error and does nothing. ICS calendars still work fine in the Calendar app, and the links are handled perfectly in Mail and when using “webcal://” instead of “http://”, but most don’t use that access method. Although “webcal” is a de-facto standard for ics links, it is not an official one and is not used by many ics providers, including Google.

Subscribe to ICS Calendars in iOS 4.2

ICS auto-subscription still works fine for links in the Mail app

Here’s the new (convoluted) way to subscribe to an “.ics” calendar feed found on the web in iOS 4.2. Note that this also works pretty much the same in versions 3.0 through 4.1.

1. Tap-and-hold on the .ics link in Safari or Mail or wherever
2. Select “Copy” to copy the link onto your clipboard
3. Open “Settings”
4. Open “Mail, Contacts, Calendars”
5. Tap “Add Account…”
6. Tap “Other”
7. Tap “Add Subscribed Calendar”
8. Tap-and-hold to paste the .ics link you copied previously

That’s a much-longer process, and puts it out of reach for the average iPhone user. Who would know to tap “Other” or that a .ics link is a “Subscribed Calendar”? It’s totally unintuitive.

Sure, .ics links still work fine in Mail, but emailing yourself a link isn’t really obvious, either. And .ics links are so long and ugly, no one’s going to want to type one in.

Stephen’s Stance

Considering that this works fine in Mail and in Safari with “webcal” links, I bet this is a bug. Perhaps in adding support for HTML 5 and launching third-party apps from Safari broke this feature somehow. But Apple developers are notoriously difficult to contact, and I have no idea how to report this bug in a way they would hear. So I’ll just make it public here, along with the workaround, and hope someone is listening!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2011. | Apple Breaks ICS Calendar Auto-Subscription In iOS 4.2
This post was categorized as Apple. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Here’s how to enable Safari 5 extension support:

1. Install and launch Safari 5
2. Click the “Safari” menu and select “Preferences…”
3. Select the “Advanced” tab
4. Click the checkbox next to “Show Develop menu in menu bar”
5. A new menu now appears with the puzzlingly non-specific name, “Develop”
6. Click the new “Develop” menu and select “Enable Extensions”
7. You can now add extensions: Just double-click the “.safariextz” files you download
8. There’s also a new preferences tab called “Extensions”

And that’s it. It’s oddly obscure. I guess Apple doesn’t really want “the normals” adding extensions to Safari.

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2010. | How To: Enable Extensions in Safari 5 for Mac OS X
This post was categorized as Apple. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Rather than adding YouTube to the blocker whitelist or allowing each video individually, a new option is now available: You can opt-in to an HTML5 beta with desktop browsers, allowing you to view most YouTube videos without Flash at all!

It’s simple! Just go to http://www.youtube.com/html5 and click the link at the bottom to join the HTML5 beta test. This works with Chrome/Chrome Frame and Safari 4. Videos with ads won’t work, apparently, and some other videos appear to not yet be available.

Vimeo also has an HTML5 version, and it’s easier to get to. Just click “Switch to HTML5 player” below any video on the site. Simple!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2010. | How To: Use YouTube Without Flash In Desktop Browsers
This post was categorized as Apple, Personal. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

Update: Google Gears is not compatible with Snow Leopard and will not install. We’ll have to wait for an updated version.

Google Gears is awesome for users of Google Reader and Google Mail, but Apple’s latest updated browser seems to disagree with Gears for some reason. But follow these steps and you will have Gears up and working in no time!

1. Uninstall Gears
   1. Launch Terminal
   2. From the command prompt, enter the following:

      /Library/Internet\ Plug-Ins/Gears.plugin/Contents/Resources/uninstall.command

2. Reinstall Gears
   1. Visit http://gears.google.com/?platform=mac#
   2. Click “Install Gears”
   3. Accept the license agreement
   4. Launch “gears-osx-opt-3.dmg” once it’s downloaded
   5. Install “Google Gears.mpkg”
3. Restart Safari

That’s it! For some reason, the Gears install from Safari 3 wouldn’t work in Safari 4, and the gears homepage refused to show the installer. Weird!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2009. | How To Install Google Gears in Safari 4
This post was categorized as Apple. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.