an iCal viewer.

iCalViewer displays iCal calendar events as boxes dynamically moving towards a finish line which is now. It can do this on the desktop, in a window, or even over your screen-saver.

icvWindow1 icv screen 3

Aim

The aim is to display a user's iCal events in a pleasing, compelling, and useful fashion.

Features:
  • You set a lookahead time horizon and events starting within it appear on the display and move slowly across the window or desktop towards now.
  • Displays in a window or on the desktop.
  • Also displays iCal to do's*.
  • An exposé hotkey brings the display quickly into view*.
  • Better than watching grass grow, but only marginally!
(* Demonstration or paid-for version only)

How it works

Look at the yellow lines on the left of the screen shots. They show where you are in the calendar. The events start at the opposite edge of the display and move towards and past this line.
Look at it another way: in the preferences, you can specify how far to look ahead (say one week). This means that all events for the coming week will be visible in the display. The events which are due to start soon (e.g. within an hour) will be close to the line. Those due to start later (e.g. in 6 days' time) will be further away from the line.
The pending to do items are listed in a similar-looking box which can be sized and positioned according to user preferences. If there are too many items to fit in the box at once, they will cycle through in pages.

Exposé

Whether you have one or a hundred windows on the screen, chances are that it will cover up the part of the iCalViewer view you want to see - whether it is the desktop, window or list view.
With Exposé, you can reveal your desktop with the 'reveal desktop' hotkey or mouse function. This operation will also reveal your desktop view if you are using this mode.
iCalViewer has its own hotkey (F8 by default) to 'expose' its view. This operation will bring whatever view you have to the front and shade the rest of the screen. It provides a convenient and fast way of accessing your calendar information.

Special Events

The space from the finish line to the opposite edge of the display is where the events within your lookahead time (one week by default) are placed. But what about important events beyond that? For example, if the lookahead for the display is set to 6 hours, it won't show tomorrow afternoon's special meetings or birthdays in the coming week. To overcome this, iCalViewer has a special events list box specifically for events that would not normally be displayed. It can be thought of as a list of events which are 'over-the-horizon'.
This is done by specifying a separate, special lookahead for a calendar or an individual event. For example, the lookahead for a 'birthdays' calendar might be set to 2 weeks. All events in the birthdays calendar within the next 2 weeks will then go into the special events list.
Here are some examples of how this might be used:
  • Your display lookahead is set for 24 hours but you have a calendar of birthdays and you want to know about them at least a week in advance, so you set the special lookahead for the birthdays calendar to be 10 days.
  • You have an iCal calendar for a project and you really want to be reminded of the final date as well as milestones along the way, so you specify the lookahead for the end date to be 6 months and the milestones to be 3 weeks.

Try it for yourself!

iCalViewer has three operating modes and is easy to download and try out (via the link at the top of the page).
When iCalViewer is first run, it will start in demonstration mode. This is a fully featured mode, intended to show its capabilities so you can choose whether to buy a license or not. There are no restrictions or registration requirements other than an event showing that it is in this mode, and that it will remain so for 21 days.
If you have not decided to buy a licenese after the demonstration period, iCalViewer will revert to a restricted, free mode. This is the same application, but with several aspects disabled: viewing to do items, interactivity with iCal and several colour preference options.
At any time, you will be able to purchase a serial number via a menu option or the iCalViewer web site. This will place iCalviewer in full mode. It will have no restrictions or extra events.

Requirements


Version 1.x


- Mac OS X 10.2 or 10.3
- iCal 1.5.1

Version 2.x


- Mac OS X 10.4 or later
- iCal 2.0.1 or later