iSync, Therefore I Am

  By Bill Davies Sacramento Macintosh User Group

2003 is to be the year of synchronization. Both Apple and Microsoft are furiously working on it. So far, Apple is first to market with a technology.
What’s it all about? PC users, after all, have long been synchronizing their laptop to their desktop, and their Palm PDA to their Outlook contact file. Apparently Apple realized that if their “digital hub” strategy was to have any meaning, the Mac would need to synchronize with smaller, portable digital devices that carry data, such as laptops, cell phones, and PDA devices. This is news?

Enter iSync. This is a new synchronization technology introduced with Jaguar (OS X 10.2). "We see value in delivering services," said Joe Hayashi, Apple's applications product marketing director. "Our strategy is to provide a complete solution. We give you a great deal--integrated into the software, in the OS--that provides the great experience, that encompasses things like synchronization, calendar sharing, traditional home-base sharing."

That’s the marketing-speak. How does it really all pan out when you try to use this technology?
One thing’s for sure — the user needs to understand what iSync is, and is not. Traditionally, Mac users would buy a Palm or Handspring PDA, and then use address and calendar software provided by the vendor, such as Palm Desktop 4.0. Some third parties (Now Software and Chronos) also wrote address and calendar software, and then wrote “conduits” to get those programs to synchronize with a PDA. And after doing a bit of research, I was able to determine categorically that if you want to keep your contacts and calendar in Palm Desktop, Now Up To Date/Contact, or Chronos Group Organizer, at the present time iSync is nothing but an impediment to synchronization. In fact, more than one person noted that they lost their ability to sync with their PDA after Apple’s Software Update put iSync on their computer, because it messed up other conduits that were working. Translated, that means that if you had Palm Desktop speaking flawlessly to your Palm PDA, installation of iSync may cause that to stop working, because the Palm conduit expects to talk to the Palm data file, and iSync ignores both and wants the device to talk to the Jaguar (system) address book.

Apple’s new iSync technology turns all of this established way of doing things on its head. The marketing literature suggests that iSync will let you sync your Palm Pilot with OS X, but they leave out one small detail: iSync will synchronize what it finds on your Palm PDA and move that data into the OS X Addressbook program. iSync will not talk to your old data file in Now Contact, Palm Desktop, or whatever. So iSync is not so much a system-level synchronization technology as it is Apple’s attempt to drive more and more people to use the core services provided by Jaguar, such as the system-wide address book. In other words, “yes you can synchronize,” but only if you do it Apple’s way.

I’m not trying to dismiss iSync, because I do think it’s an important technology. I just want people to understand what it will, and will not do. I’m assuming that over time, third parties will revamp their products and data files to work better with system-level synchronization. So iSync is kind of like the “MacPaint” approach, where Apple put out a paint program, and left it to third-party developers to create some really compelling version of the technology.

Let’s look at some of the positives of iSync. For those of you totally on the cutting edge, you’ll need a Sony T68i cell phone and a new 2003 Mac with a Bluetooth adapter on board. If you’re in that category, you can type all your contact name and addresses into the Jaguar address book program, and you can use iSync to replicate your data to your cell phone using wireless Bluetooth technology. That’s very cool, if you own all the right equipment to make it possible.

Another thing that iSync makes possible is synchronization of data in your OS X Address book with the address book on your .Mac mail account. So if you pay Apple $200 per year for a “dot.Mac” account with webmail, then you can use iSync to make sure that all your e-mail addresses show up not only locally on your computer, but also in your .Mac webmail account when you’re traveling.

And of course, if you don’t have five years of data in Palm Desktop, iSync can synchronize your Palm Pilot or Handspring PDA with the Jaguar address book. Keep in mind, it only talks to the PDA, and ignores the Palm desktop data file on your hard disk.

The biggest joke of the bunch is iSync’s ability to get your MacOS X address book to show up on your iPod. So now Apple’s portable music player can double as a portable rolodex. There’s only one problem, which is that the iPod lacks any method of doing input. So while you can carry your contacts around with you and browse them on an iPod, you can’t enter in a new contact while on the road, or correct a phone number in the data.
Finally, the big loser here is people who share contacts and appointments between multiple computers. My wife and I each have access to one central database of addresses and phone numbers. For that to keep working, I have to keep using Now Contact/Up To Date. Were I to move all this data into the Jaguar address book and use iSync, my wife would not be able to have current information when I change an address or phone number.

I suspect Apple’s answer would be that my wife and I should both get $200/year “dot.Mac” accounts, use their iCal software, and then she could see my calendar, and I could see her calendar. I’m not sure how we would share names and addresses; quite frankly, I don’t think Apple has worked that one out yet. The marketing material states that “iSync also can be used to synchronize data between two computers using a .Mac account.” I’m not clear if that means my desktop and my laptop, or whether it means that my wife and I can both access a common data file for our contacts and calendar.

What I do know is that Now Contact/Up To Date work well for us without needing to get into iSync. For now, my wife and I will choose to avoid Apple’s way of doing it, and continue sharing calendar and contact info the way we’re doing it now — without iSync, and without each of us needing a $200/yr “dot.Mac” account.

Bill Davies is the former president, and current newsletter editor, for MacNexus, Sacramento Macintosh User Group. http://www.macnexus.org/