Calendars 5 is the latest iPhone and iPad calendar app from Readdle, the same folks who brought us PDF Expert, which I recently reviewed here on iLegalPad.com. Calendars 5 is a universal app, meaning it works on both iPad and iPhone, with just one purchase ($6.99 on the App Store). I used Calendars 5 on both my iPhone and my iPad for a few weeks and what impresses me overall is the attention to detail paid by Calendar 5’s designers, who have added subtle touches that make it intuitive and easy to use, in all of its various views and on both types of devices, as well as its integration of tasks and appointments into one application. Calendars 5 works with iCloud and Google calendars, and works just fine with the five calendars I synced with it. Of course, you can choose to display or hide calendars on an as needed basis. Calendars 5 makes very good use of the iPhone 5 screen area, and offers a list view of your daily appointments something like the iOS Calendar app used to offer until iOS 7’s redesign. Lots of folk I know loved the list view; with Calendars 5, you can have it back, and in a visually intuitive form that shows color coding for each event to match the calendar, as well as a “slider” at the bottom of the scree showing your position in the current week, for reference. Daily, weekly, and monthly views provide detail and bird-eye views of your calendar, as needed. Whilst the iPhone version provides a number of advantages over the native iOS 7 calendar app (some of which will be mentioned shortly), my favorite iteration of Calendars 5 is on the iPad, where it really has room to shine thanks to the large screen format. I love the day view, which shows a rolling list along the left side, and the hourly calendar on the right, along with the current time displayed as a line across the timeline. Individual events show the scheduled time (e.g., under my event entitled “Work”, the blue event box also shows the times scheduled, 8:00 - 17:00). Recurring events display a small circular arrow within the event box, providing an immediate visual cue. A date slider along the bottom of the screen shows two weeks worth of dates between which you slide. On the iPhone, the list and day views are separate due to the limited screen area. The week view on both the iPad and the iPhone cleverly indicate that events are scheduled before or after the actively visible screen area with little arrow icons in the color of the calendar on which events are scheduled, to make sure you don’t overlook something that is scheduled later in the day. In the same manner as the day view, the week view has a slider across the bottom through which you can scroll through the weeks and choose which one to view. Ditto for the month and year views. The month view looks fairly similar to the native iOS app, but the year view shows each day color coded as to how busy it is: white for days with nothing scheduled, yellow, orange, and red for progressively busier days. This is great to get a bird’s eye view of the year and see when you’re booked out, at a glance. My absolutely favorite feature is the natural language input method employed (optional to use). Don’t get me wrong: I think the sliders and wheel metaphors in iOS are great and handy and all. But sometimes it’s easier to just type “Meet Jim at Paradise Bakery tomorrow at 13:00” and have it automatically know the date, time, and location, as well as the title of the event. If you’re a fast typist, this may be the easiest way to add an event to the calendar--much the way that advanced typists can do with their keyboard using shortcuts a task for which many would prefer a mouse. Of course, dictation (on those devices supporting it) works as well, so you can just speak your event into existence. The task list integrates with iCloud’s Reminders, so you can stay synced between your iDevices and your Mac’s Reminder list. The primary advantage is that both tasks and calendar events show up in one app, giving you an idea of how busy your day is, when you’ve got due dates assigned to your reminders or tasks. Other intuitive features include drag and drop for events and tasks, the ability to send SMS reminders and custom alerts for events. Event invitations can be sent from within Calendars 5 as well. Calendars 5 has a nice, iOS 7-inspired design that looks sharp and crisp. I am a fan and enjoy using it daily. You will too. Get it here: Calendars 5 for iPhone and iPad by Readdle
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AuthorRonald C. Schoedel III is an attorney, former broadcaster, student of Welsh, and Sinophile. He has lived in Alaska, Wales, and China (Hong Kong specifically), and presently calls Utah home. He has been teaching and training Mac users for nearly a decade, and started blogging as a software reviewer in 2004. Archives
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