My Palm manages to be more usable than this – on a 320×320-pixel screen. So as you move down your list of To Dos, you have to press Down arrow, Command-I, Escape – Down arrow, Command-I, Escape – Down arrow, Command-I, Escape – to even see if each To Do has a note attached, let alone read the note. Now you have to hit Command-I (or double-click a To Do) to pop up a stupid “bubble” thing, just to read its “Note” field (or indeed, to see if it has a note attached at all). In Leopard, they’ve done away with the drawer. In Tiger’s iCal, you had a side drawer that constantly showed you the current To Do’s “Note” field (as well as other info).

Bubble of doomīut here’s where Apple have made iCal even worse. Unbelievably – considering Apple have had years to fix it – there’s still the bug whereby if you scroll down the To Do pane when it doesn’t have focus, then try to click a To Do, the stupid thing jumps back to the top of the list, selecting a completely different To Do.Īt least you can now just about set the calendar of a new To Do via the keyboard (Command-K, type title, hit Return, Command-I, Tab, Tab, Tab, Tab, down arrow). This effectively makes it impossible to edit To Dos via the keyboard, unless you already happen to be in the To Do pane. In fact – and Apple have had to try really hard here – the new interface is even less usable than Tiger’s.įirst off: Still no keyboard shortcut to switch between the Calendars pane, the day/week/month pane, and the To Do pane. Unfortunately, the interface, despite its makeover, still sucks like a fleet of Hoovers. In addition, as with the new Mail, the interface feels more responsive, too. The iCal interface has had a makeover, and definitely looks and feels slicker than Tiger’s iCal. So does Leopard’s iCal mark an improvement over Tiger’s? I’ve bitched about Tiger iCal’s hideous user interface before – particularly its heinous lack of keyboard shortcuts for basic tasks. Today I’ll take a look at iCal, the calendar/task manager app that ships with Mac OS X. At this rate I’ll have to give it its own blog category.

Yes by Brad Boney