There are a lot of calendar applications out there and I've tried at least six now, including the Google Calendar app that comes with the phone, so I thought I'd share what I see as the advantages and disadvantages of each of them below. Dashes indicate disadvantages, while + indicates an advantage.
I must mention first that I have a certain bias against any agenda view, since my brain doesn't seem to comprehend time very well in that setup. (Agenda view is when all events are simply listed with their times under each day with no depiction of scale as to how much time occurs between them or how much time they take up.) So, take any ranting I do about agenda view with a grain of salt.
Google Calendar
+Agenda view's font makes events easy to distinguish from dates
-Month view tells you nothing. You only see there is an event represented by a dot.
-Week view shows the days in long narrow vertical strips that make the text awkward and unreadable
-Adding an event takes 3 touches as the option is in a sub-menu. (Inexcusable!)
-Day view requires you to scroll to see if you have anything
-Difficult to edit events once put in
Pimlical (Supposedly designed for Palm users)
+ Synchs with Google Calendar
+ Week view is good and readable, using an eight-square grid
- LOTS of gestures to learn and remember (location of gesture on the screen is just as important as what gesture is made)
- Events in month view are displayed too small and too limited text to read
- Includes a 4-day view with long narrow vertical strips that make text awkward and unreadable. I consider this view to be pretty close to useless, yet I have to scroll through it constantly to get to day view from week view.
- 2 touches to edit events (once you figure it out)
- Inconvenient to put in done tasks (I track what I've done each day by making a floating event that holds todo list items I've completed)
AnCal (Emulator for Palm software)
+ Very simple interface
+ Navigation with screen buttons (similar to Palm)
+ Supports inclusion of tasks, appointments, and notes
+ Easy to enter task, appointments, and notes (unknown whether notes float between days or not)
+ Takes 1 touch on a time to enter an appointment in day view (This is the GOLD standard of efficiency!)
+ Takes 1 touch on an appointment to bring up an edit box in day view! (Excellent! Why aren't other apps like this?)
+ Tasks have settings for two priority levels, alarm, and due date.
+ Appointments have alarms, a floating event setting, and repeat settings
- DOES NOT synch with Google Calendar (Sooo disappointing!)
- Day view requires scrolling to see events
- Does not show text on week view, only shows a dash for events
- Does not show text on month view, only shows a dot for events
- Tasks for future days do not show due date and only two priority settings available, and no repeats available
- Notes can't be attached to a particular day
- I personally dislike the black background
aCalendar
+ Synchs with Google Calendar
+ Week view is good and readable, using an eight-square grid
+ Has a widget which is very large, also transparent, but configurable.
- Month view doesn’t show much useful text
- Hard to edit events put in (takes 2 touches to get to edit screen)
- Can't edit events put in with other calendar apps
- Difficult to get to a dayview of the day you want from weekview. It took me a while to figure out that I had to click the right day and THEN scroll left.
Jorte
+ Synchs with Google Calendar
+ Week view is fairly readable
+ Incorporates tasks and memos
+ Can create task templates and different task lists
- Uses only one calendar view (month/week) which is set by the user. Makes it annoying to switch views.
- No day view, only agenda view, a sliver of which is shown below the main calendar. It can be expanded, but it still feels very cramped. (and did I mention that I hate agendaview?)
- Hard to get to day-specific agenda list (requires 2 touches)
- Difficult to edit events once they are input (3 touches required)
- Icons at bottom of the screen seem annoying (should have been in menu)
- Supposed to have a widget, but didn't find one in the widget list
- Tasks incorporate only 1 priority setting.
- Unable to set tasks to different task lists.
CalendarPad
+ Synchs with Google Calendar
+ Week view easy to read (8 grid boxes)
+ Month view shows events,
though only first word fits
+ Day view can be customized
to show 3 different ways, one of which shows the whole day without having to
scroll at all
+ Day view displays open
slots of time and beginning and ending event times
+ Entering events seems
intuitive (touch anywhere on the day view)
+ Has a widget which has
customizable size and customizable view of day, week, or month.
- Month view does not show event times, and only first few word(s) fit
- Entering a new appointment takes 4 touches instead of 1 to bring you to an edit box (ABSOLUTELY INEXCUSABLE!!)
- Editing an existing appointment takes 3 touches instead of 1 to bring up an edit box. Also inexcusable.
- When trying to edit,
program keeps asking what program I want to use to edit, even though I already
chose what I want by default! (Update. Okay. It seems to have stopped for some reason, so now I'm down to 3 and 2 touches to input and edit events respectively. But that's still too much.)
- Menu contents change depending on what view you are in, which is kind of weird
So far I think CalendarPad has the best views and the best navigation. I just wish it had 1-touch entering and editing of events like AnCal. I think CalendarPad will probably be what I use, although if I get discontented, I will probably try out some more apps.
After trying out all these calendars it is enough to make me wish I could make one myself. Here's what I would include:
- Synch with Google Calendar
- Month view with time and a few words of the event showing
- Week view in an 8-square grid layout
- Day view in which the whole day is visible without scrolling
- 1-touch entering or editing of appointments
- Floating appointments
- Memos for appointments
- Using the edit box to change appointments or tasks with 5 priority levels, due dates, and memos.
- A pane in day view showing tasks in priority order
- Completed tasks are tied to the day they are completed
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