Check it out! How To Keep Your Family Activities In Sync With A Shared Google Calendar

For the most up-to-date information, see my iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Guide!

This post is part of my series focused on integrating the iPhone with Microsoft Exchange using ActiveSync:

• iPhone OS 3.0 information:
  1. First Look: iPhone 3.0 And Exchange ActiveSync Integration
  2. How To Subscribe To Internet Calendars In iPhone OS 3.0
  3. How To Access LDAP Directories In iPhone OS 3.0
  4. iPhone 3.0 Exchange ActiveSync: Better But Not Perfect
• How To Set Up iPhone Exchange ActiveSync
1. A Few iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Gotchas
2. Can the iPhone Sync With Multiple Exchange Servers?

This is really a major advancement for the iPhone platform. With 3.0, you have many different calendar synchronization options and can mix and match, using all or none as you see fit:

How to Subscribe to a CalDAV Server (Like Google Calendar)

CalDAV is a powerful open protocol for calendar event synchronization. Lots of services support it, including Google’s free Calendar application, which is part of gmail and Google Apps. It’s a mash-up of WebDAV and ICS and supports two-way synchronization, notes, alerts, and such. iPhone OS 3.0 includes CalDAV as a supported protocol for over-the-air subscription and synchronization, so it can seamlessly synchronize your Google calendar with your phone calendar. Unlike ICS, however, you can create and edit CalDAV entries on the phone and the changes will quickly show up in your Google calendar.

iPhone 3.0 includes direct over-the-air use of CalDAV, ICS, and LDAP servers

Setting up CalDAV, though hidden, is pretty slick. Follow these steps:

1. On the iPhone, select “Settings”
2. Select “Mail, Contacts, Calendars”
3. Select”Add Account…” under “Accounts”
4. Select “Other” at the bottom
5. Select “Add CalDAV Account”
6. Enter “www.google.com” for “Server” – the iPhone will automatically identify this as a google CalDAV server!
7. Enter your gmail user name (e.g. “sfoskett”) or full google apps username and domain (e.g. “stephen@fosketts.net”) for “User”
8. Enter your password for “Password”
9. Optionally modify the description
10. Select “Next” and you’re done!

The iPhone recognizes Google Calendar – it’s smart enough to “know” that when you enter “www.google.com” as the CalDAV server it needs to correctly format the URL for Google. Other CalDAV server types might need some tweaking, which you can do in the Advanced tab of the CalDAV’s account in Settings.

All CalDAV calendars are bi-directional, meaning you can create or edit entries and they will (eventually) synchronize on both the phone and calendar server. In my tests, items modified on the iPhone showed up almost immediately, while changes made on Google’s calendar server took a few minutes to show up.

Two notes on CalDAV:

1. Although the documentation says it’s read-only, my Google Calendar absolutely, definitely, is read/write: I can create and modify appointments in the Google Calendar on the iPhone and it shows up online.
2. The “Sync events x weeks back” limit in settings does not apply to CalDAV or ICS! Large numbers of events will cause Calendar to be very, very slow. Beware!

Other popular apps also support CalDAV, including Apple Leopard Server’s iCal Server, Yahoo Calendar, and Zimbra.

I use this capability as a shared family activities calendar. What ideas do you have?

How to Subscribe to an iCalendar Server/.ICS feed

iCalendar is an older calendar subscription format, and many servers offer .ICS feeds of calendar entries. I particularly love TripIt‘s free travel itinerary service, which is available as an ICS feed. iPhone OS 3.0 also includes iCal as a supported protocol for over-the-air subscription, so you can view your ICS feeds right in your phone calendar. Note that iCalendar is read-only, like an RSS feed, so you cannot create or edit items on the phone.

Tap a link to a .ics file and the iPhone will ask to subscribe

The simplest way to subscribe to an ICS feed is simply to email the link to yourself. The iPhone interprets any URL ending in “.ics” as a iCalendar feed and asks if you want to subscribe. This ensures that the link is typed correctly.

Note: This no longer works in iOS 4.2! Now you have to add it in Settings. See Apple Breaks ICS Calendar Auto-Subscription In iOS 4.2.

If you need to manually set up an iCalendar feed, it’s very similar to CalDAV. Follow these steps:

1. Locate the calendar feed you want to use and copy it using OS 3.0′s new copy and paste features
   1. If you use TripIt, log into your account in the iPhone Safari browser
   2. Select the “iCal Feed” icon in your main page
   3. In the popup, select “Subscribe to calendar feed”
   4. Tap and hold the resulting URL (which begins with “webcal://”) until the “Copy” box appears
   5. Tap “Copy”
2. Go back to the hope screen and select “Settings”
3. Select “Mail, Contacts, Calendars”
4. Select”Add Account…” under “Accounts”
5. Select “Other” at the bottom
6. Select “Add Subscribed Calendar”
7. Select the “Server” box and tap “Paste”
8. Select “Next”
9. Optionally modify the description

Updates to the iCalendar feed will now show up in your calendar. These are read only, of course, but it’s awfully nice to be able to subscribe to a TripIt or Dopplr feed or the Red Sox schedule on your phone!

One more time: The “Sync events x weeks back” limit in settings does not apply to CalDAV or ICS! Large numbers of events will cause Calendar to be very, very slow. Beware!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2009. | How To Subscribe To Internet Calendars In iPhone OS 3.0
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.

The iPhone doesn't support more than one Exchange/ActiveSync pairing

One of the major advances introduced in iPhone software version 2.0 was the ability to sync over-the-air to Microsoft Exchange servers using Microsoft’s ActiveSync protocol. This was introduced to much fanfare with the iPhone 3G and is available on older updated iPhone and iPod Touch units, too. Google and NuevaSync also offer over-the-air calendar and contact syncing for the iPhone using ActiveSync.

All of these synchronization options seem like an embarrassment of riches for iPhone users. But, like so many things in life, they’re too good to be true. iPhone OS 2 and 3 can’t sync to more than one Exchange/ActiveSync server at a time! Or, at least, not in the way you’d like.

Note: iPhone OS 4.0 will allow syncing to multiple Exchange ActiveSync accounts! See How To Set Up Multiple Exchange ActiveSync Accounts in iPhone iOS 4.

For the most up-to-date information, see my iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Guide!

This post is part of my series focused on integrating the iPhone with Microsoft Exchange using ActiveSync:

• iPhone OS 3.0 information:
  1. First Look: iPhone 3.0 And Exchange ActiveSync Integration
  2. How To Subscribe To Internet Calendars In iPhone OS 3.0
  3. How To Access LDAP Directories In iPhone OS 3.0
  4. iPhone 3.0 Exchange ActiveSync: Better But Not Perfect
• How To Set Up iPhone Exchange ActiveSync
1. A Few iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Gotchas
2. Can the iPhone Sync With Multiple Exchange Servers?

The Connected iPhone

Let’s back up a minute and talk about how the iPhone integrates with mail, contact, and calendar servers. There are essentially two synchronization engines at work here:

• Like all iPods, iTunes can synchronize your contacts, calendars, and mail account information (though not the mail messages themselves) over a USB connection to the iPhone and iPod Touch. This requires a full copy of Outlook 2003 or later on Windows but works with the built-in address book and iCal calendar on Mac OS X.
• The iPhone can also synchronize some or all components of email, contacts, calendars, and bookmarks using a variety of over-the-air protocols.

Note that when you configure over-the-air sync, you must disable USB sync, and vice versa.

iPhone Email Sync

Configured mail accounts can synchronize email messages in one of six ways:

1. Periodically pulling message content down using the POP protocol – this is what most older ISPs and mail accounts use
2. Periodically pulling message content down using the more advanced IMAP protocol – this is what newer mail accounts, including Gmail, AOL, and Yahoo use
3. Having mail pushed to the phone using a weird combination of hidden SMS and IMAP – this is what Yahoo push mail uses
4. Having mail pushed to the phone using a proprietary notification system of XMPP (Jabber) and IMAP – this is what Apple’s MobileMe push mail uses
5. Pulling or receiving push messages using Microsoft’s ActiveSync technology – this is what Exchange servers, NuevaSync, Kerio, Zimbra, and Google’s over-the-air calendar and contact (but not email) sync use
6. The iPhone’s software seems to support IMAP Idle, which is a realtime message push technology supported by Gmail and some advanced mail systems, but the phone will not use it unless the mail application is actually open on the phone

The iPhone does not support P-IMAP, BlackBerry, or other over-the-air protocols at this point.

The iPhone can sync email messages to any number of IMAP or POP accounts without a problem, but it can only sync to a single ActiveSync server at once. So you can set up Gmail over IMAP, Yahoo over SMS/IMAP, your local provider over POP, a Gmail Apps account over IMAP, etc at the same time as your work Exchange server without a problem. But you cannot set up more than one Exchange server using ActiveSync.

iPhone Calendar and Contact Sync

Calendar and contact information can only be synced in one of (perhaps) three ways:

1. Over a physical USB connection to iTunes (as in the original iPhone 1.0) to Outlook or OS X
2. Using some unknown protocol that MobileMe uses – can anyone identify this?
3. Using ActiveSync to an Exchange Outlook Web Access (OWA) server

Yes, that’s really it. Every over-the-air calendar-and-contact sync system (other than perhaps MobileMe) uses the ActiveSync protocol, including Microsoft Exchange, NuevaSync, Zimbra, and Google’s service.

Now the punch line: The iPhone can only sync to a single ActiveSync server at once. Read that again. Now consider what that means.

So no matter how cool a service is (Google sync, Zimbra), you cannot use it for over-the-air sync if you are also connected to an Exchange server. So even though the iPhone explicitly supports multiple calendars, you can’t sync them with multiple ActiveSync systems. So I guess the iPhone’s calendar system is even more disappointing than I thought!

Pick One ActiveSync Service

The upshot is this: iPhone users much pick one (and only one) ActiveSync service.

• Need to use the iPhone for work? You’ll probably have to use your work Exchange ActiveSync server, and can forget about (usefully) subscribing to MobileMe or using Google sync. Instead, try to sync everything else into Exchange in other ways (like Google’s Desktop app) and then let Exchange handle the iPhone sync.
• A dedicated Mac head? Subscribe to MobileMe and get all of your data there, to be sent to the iPhone.
• None of the above? Google’s new Sync service looks great!

The Big Mystery

There are many mysteries lurking here, but one is really perplexing to me. The iPhone seems to maintain its own set of contacts in addition to any ActiveSync contact store. Although it doesn’t obviously have multiple contacts pools, it must maintain them internally. But you can see that it does in a simple way:

1. Set up an ActiveSync server (like Exchange)
2. Set up an IMAP email account (like Gmail)
3. Add a unique contact on the phone (call him “Steve Jobs”)
4. Add a unique contact in Exchange (call him “Bill Gates”)
5. Add a unique contact in Gmail (call him “Sergey Brin”)
6. Now turn on and off the accounts one at a time

Notice that turning off the Gmail account will, within a few minutes, cause your “Sergey Brin” contact to disappear! Turn it back on and Sergie is back. Now do the same for Exchange and Bill Gates. All the while, your “Steve Jobs” contact should stay put. And this all happens in a single contact list! If you assigned one of these to a “favorite”, their name will be replaced by their number when you remove their account.

So the is iPhone somehow syncing contacts over IMAP? Or does it use some other Google-specific protocol? And how does MobileMe’s contact sync work? Time will tell!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2009. | Can the iPhone Sync With Multiple Exchange Servers?
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.