Google Calendar Caldav support dropped?

[Virgo Pärna]

For a some time it's been recommended to use CalDAV for Google
Calendar. But in the light of
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-second-spring-of-cleaning.html
it seems, that Google is closing CalDAV access.
Does that mean, that now Provider for Google Calendar should be used
instead?

--
Virgo Pärna
virgo...@mail.ee

[Peter Lairo]

On Do. 14.03.2013 11:41, Virgo Pärna wrote:
> For a some time it's been recommended to use CalDAV for Google
> Calendar. But in the light of
> http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-second-spring-of-cleaning.html
> it seems, that Google is closing CalDAV access.

The article only mentions developers ("will be shut down for other
developers on September 16, 2013"). Does that mean that Lightning can
still access Google calendars via CalDAV? Should mozilla apply to be
whitelisted to maintain CalDAV access? Are they shutting down CalDAV
altogether? What would be the new "better-than-iCal" solution?

> Does that mean, that now Provider for Google Calendar should be used
> instead?

Or, as Google seems to recommend, use the "Google Calendar API"[1] to
develop client applications?

[1] https://developers.google.com/google-apps/calendar/
--
Regards,
Peter Lairo

Bugs I think are important:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=467153 Google Cal Setup
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=769476 Sync Reordering
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=446444 Sync for Thunderbird
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=391057 Write to Mac AB

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Israel: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/myths2/
Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster: http://www.venganza.org/
Anthropogenic Global Warming skepsis: http://tinyurl.com/AGW-Skepsis

[Philipp Kewisch]

On 3/14/13 12:23 PM, Peter Lairo wrote:
> On Do. 14.03.2013 11:41, Virgo Pärna wrote:
>> For a some time it's been recommended to use CalDAV for Google
>> Calendar. But in the light of
>> http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-second-spring-of-cleaning.html
>> it seems, that Google is closing CalDAV access.
>
> The article only mentions developers ("will be shut down for other
> developers on September 16, 2013"). Does that mean that Lightning can
> still access Google calendars via CalDAV? Should mozilla apply to be
> whitelisted to maintain CalDAV access? Are they shutting down CalDAV
> altogether? What would be the new "better-than-iCal" solution?

I have already applied for access. From what I've heard, it will still
be possible to access Google via CalDAV afterwards with a few changes to
Lightning itself.

In the meanwhile, the Provider will of course continue to work.

Philipp

[gNeandr]

It's frustruating to see Goggle is moving away from standard methods.
Also it's good to know there are other services out there to support
ICS/CalDAV. We recently started to support CalDAV with Reminderfox
(reminderfox.org) and tested it successfully to communicate with
Lightning via Remote Calendar systems: GoggleCalendar, fruux.com,
ownCloud.org.
And -- if the Remote Calendar doesn't natively support devices -- there
are tools to sync also those other Remote Calendars with devices
(iPhone, iPad, Android) .. we tested fruux.com for that aspect and it
works like a charm. So, also Google would not whitelist Moz/Lightning or
Moz/Reminderfox there are other ways ..

Günter

[Virgo Pärna]

On 14.03.2013 21:29, gNeandr wrote:
> It's frustruating to see Goggle is moving away from standard methods.
>

What's even more ridiculous about it, that only little while ago, when
Google closed up ActiveSync, they were very big about using open
standards and so on. That Windows Phone should support CalDAV to access
Google calendar and so on. An now this.


--
Virgo Pärna
virgo...@mail.ee

[Virgo Pärna]

On 14.03.2013 19:59, Philipp Kewisch wrote:
>
> I have already applied for access. From what I've heard, it will still
> be possible to access Google via CalDAV afterwards with a few changes to
> Lightning itself.
>

The thing is, that I don't understand, how they are going to limit the
access. Does this mean, that applications developed by approved
developers must provide some token to identify when connecting server?
How such thing can actually achieve anything with open source software.

--
Virgo Pärna
virgo...@mail.ee

[Peter Lairo]

On Do. 14.03.2013 11:41, Virgo Pärna wrote:

> For a some time it's been recommended to use CalDAV for Google
> Calendar. But in the light of
> http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-second-spring-of-cleaning.html
> it seems, that Google is closing CalDAV access.

One thing that needs mentioning is that if the Lightning developers had
made it easier to set up lightning with a Google CalDAV calendar, then
Google would have many more users and would thus have been much less
likely to abandon CalDAV. so I put part of the blame on the Lightning
developers.

See bug 467153: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=467153

BTW: The Apple Calendar program already does this.

> Does that mean, that now Provider for Google Calendar should be used
> instead?

I've always dreaded the idea of needing an add-on for an add-on. Plus,
the add-on for the add-on only uses iCal, which is like using POP3 when
you could be using IMAP.

[Patrick Cloke]

On 3/15/2013 5:19 AM, Peter Lairo wrote:
> On Do. 14.03.2013 11:41, Virgo Pärna wrote:
>> For a some time it's been recommended to use CalDAV for Google
>> Calendar. But in the light of
>> http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-second-spring-of-cleaning.html
>> it seems, that Google is closing CalDAV access.
>
> One thing that needs mentioning is that if the Lightning developers had
> made it easier to set up lightning with a Google CalDAV calendar, then
> Google would have many more users and would thus have been much less
> likely to abandon CalDAV. so I put part of the blame on the Lightning
> developers.

This is a totally ridiculous statement. Google doesn't WANT people to
use third party applications, they want everything to stay in their
ecosystem so they can get ad revenue: that's what's to blame.

Now, I don't necessarily think it's a bad idea, but it would be nice to
identify some of the common calendar services people use and provide
easy ways to make accounts; actually it'd be nice if, when creating a
Gmail account in Thunderbird it would just prompt me "Do you always want
to sync your contacts and calendar?". That's certainly not a simple
thing to do, however.

>> Does that mean, that now Provider for Google Calendar should be used
>> instead?
>
> I've always dreaded the idea of needing an add-on for an add-on. Plus,
> the add-on for the add-on only uses iCal, which is like using POP3 when
> you could be using IMAP.

I don't think that's a good analogy, POP3 is technically very deficient
to IMAP. I do not believe the same is try for using the Provider for
Google Calendar vs. CalDAV (i.e. they support the same feature set, just
different transfer mechanisms).

--Patrick

[Peter Lairo]

On Fr. 15.03.2013 11:44, Patrick Cloke wrote:
> On 3/15/2013 5:19 AM, Peter Lairo wrote:
>> On Do. 14.03.2013 11:41, Virgo Pärna wrote:
>>> For a some time it's been recommended to use CalDAV for Google
>>> Calendar. But in the light of
>>> http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-second-spring-of-cleaning.html
>>> it seems, that Google is closing CalDAV access.
>>
>> One thing that needs mentioning is that if the Lightning developers had
>> made it easier to set up lightning with a Google CalDAV calendar, then
>> Google would have many more users and would thus have been much less
>> likely to abandon CalDAV. so I put part of the blame on the Lightning
>> developers.
>
> This is a totally ridiculous statement. Google doesn't WANT people to
> use third party applications, they want everything to stay in their
> ecosystem so they can get ad revenue: that's what's to blame.

If it is so ridiculous, then why does Google still offer IMAP access to
their e-mail service? By your reasoning, they shouldn't. By my
reasoning, they do because many users use/demand it, whereas (in part
due to the difficulty in setting it up) very few users use CalDAV to
access their calendars.

> Now, I don't necessarily think it's a bad idea, but it would be nice to
> identify some of the common calendar services people use and provide
> easy ways to make accounts; actually it'd be nice if, when creating a
> Gmail account in Thunderbird it would just prompt me "Do you always want
> to sync your contacts and calendar?". That's certainly not a simple
> thing to do, however.
>
>>> Does that mean, that now Provider for Google Calendar should be used
>>> instead?
>>
>> I've always dreaded the idea of needing an add-on for an add-on. Plus,
>> the add-on for the add-on only uses iCal, which is like using POP3 when
>> you could be using IMAP.
>
> I don't think that's a good analogy, POP3 is technically very deficient
> to IMAP. I do not believe the same is try for using the Provider for
> Google Calendar vs. CalDAV (i.e. they support the same feature set, just
> different transfer mechanisms).

I'm not sure you are correct about CalDAV being significantly similar to
iCal. I don't remember the relevant difference, but it could be that
CalDAV is an open standard, and iCal "belongs" to Apple. <spit on them
for not allowing Firefox to use their own rendering engine>

[Marcel Stör]

On 15.03.13 10:19, Peter Lairo wrote:
> One thing that needs mentioning is that if the Lightning developers had
> made it easier to set up lightning with a Google CalDAV calendar, then
> Google would have many more users and would thus have been much less
> likely to abandon CalDAV. so I put part of the blame on the Lightning
> developers.

Huh? Can't believe you're serious about this. I couldn't disagree more.

I suppose the reason is a different one: every Google Calendar user who
uses it through anything other than the Google web interface means lower
ad revenues. Although they claim not to be evil that is against their
own interest.

Personally, I prefer the exact opposite. Separating content from user
agent is vital in order to choose the user agent that suits you best*.
That's what standardized APIs are for.

Cheers,
Marcel

* That's why I hate webmail clients and why I prefer usenet over web forums.

--
Marcel Stör, http://www.frightanic.com
O< ascii ribbon campaign - stop html mail - www.asciiribbon.org
-> I kill Google posts: http://twovoyagers.com/improve-usenet.org/

[cheekybuddha]

On Friday, March 15, 2013 9:19:12 AM UTC, Peter Lairo wrote:
> One thing that needs mentioning is that if the Lightning developers had
>
> made it easier to set up lightning with a Google CalDAV calendar, then
>
> Google would have many more users and would thus have been much less
>
> likely to abandon CalDAV. so I put part of the blame on the Lightning
>
> developers.

This is a particularly crass statement. Remember, you get what you pay for. You, Peter, more than many here know how limited the resources are for Thunderbird and Lightning. Now might just be the time to be grateful that we users have the safety net of the connector to fall back on if CalDav access is removed. (btw, I too prefer CalDav access to my calendars over using the additional addon).

Whilst it's crazy that TB and Lightning aren't considered worthy of ore resources to make them more prominent as alternative email/calendaring clients, and it's good we have these forums to push the developers to improve things, I think a little respect is due for what we have so far.

Regards,

d

[Philipp Kewisch]

On 3/15/13 1:41 PM, cheekybuddha wrote:
> On Friday, March 15, 2013 9:19:12 AM UTC, Peter Lairo wrote:
>> One thing that needs mentioning is that if the Lightning developers had
>>
>> made it easier to set up lightning with a Google CalDAV calendar, then
>>
>> Google would have many more users and would thus have been much less
>>
>> likely to abandon CalDAV. so I put part of the blame on the Lightning
>>
>> developers.

Seriously? The fraction of the 1.2 Million average daily users that uses
Google CalDAV will really make a difference? Or even the remaining
amount that didn't succeed in setup? If this were an Email and
Calendaring client with a large portion of the market share that might
be a valid argument, but blaming me is just wrong. I'm sorry you don't
have your feature and I would love to see it too, but there are just
bigger problems to handle: getting rid of update problems by replacing
libical with a js implementation, fixing performance problems with many
events, improving test coverage and architecture to avoid regressions.
I've tried to encourage new contributors to work on this project, but
that didn't succeed yet.

Google is likely doing this because they need to manage their traffic in
a better way.

As I've said numerous times before, this will go out well. Lightning
will be able to handle this. Enough with the bashing today!

Philipp

[Peter Lairo]

On Fr. 15.03.2013 17:19, Philipp Kewisch wrote:
> On 3/15/13 1:41 PM, cheekybuddha wrote:
>> On Friday, March 15, 2013 9:19:12 AM UTC, Peter Lairo wrote:
>>> One thing that needs mentioning is that if the Lightning developers had
>>>
>>> made it easier to set up lightning with a Google CalDAV calendar, then
>>>
>>> Google would have many more users and would thus have been much less
>>>
>>> likely to abandon CalDAV. so I put part of the blame on the Lightning
>>>
>>> developers.
>
> Seriously?

Yes. Google's stated reason for ending CalDAV is:

"Everyone has a device, sometimes multiple devices."

and

"To make the most of these opportunities, we need to focus—otherwise we
spread ourselves too thin and lack impact."

So, if more "devices" used CalDAV, it would be a feature with more
"impact". And since Lightning doesn't support Google CalDAV in any
normal user friendly way, that "impact" is diminished. And that
reduction of impact is *partially* due to Lightning's deficiency in this
are.

My original observation still stands:

"I put *part* of the blame on the Lightning developers."

> The fraction of the 1.2 Million average daily users that uses
> Google CalDAV will really make a difference? Or even the remaining
> amount that didn't succeed in setup? If this were an Email and
> Calendaring client with a large portion of the market share that might
> be a valid argument, but blaming me is just wrong.

Are you saying there are a total of 1.2 M users of CalDAV, or there are
1.2 M users of Thunderbird? Or what?

I'm saying that if Lightning were integrated into Thunderbird by
default, and Lightning could more easily set up a Google calendar, then
*a huge increase in the percentage* of Thunderbird users would access
their Google calendar via CalDAV.

> I'm sorry you don't
> have your feature and I would love to see it too, but there are just
> bigger problems to handle: getting rid of update problems by replacing
> libical with a js implementation, fixing performance problems with many
> events, improving test coverage and architecture to avoid regressions.

Those certainly sound like important issues, but I disagree that those
are "bigger" (i.e. more important) problems.

> I've tried to encourage new contributors to work on this project, but
> that didn't succeed yet.

I've been racking my brain for years why there are not more programmers
who help out with Thunderbird and Lightning - both being awesome
programs and good causes. I just can't understand why. (NOT sarcasm!)

Well, one reason could be this:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=124096

> Google is likely doing this because they need to manage their traffic in
> a better way.

Could be. But I suspect that if more people used CalDAV (like IMAP), it
would be much harder for them to just drop it. I don't see them dropping
IMAP, and that is a much bigger "traffic" issue.

> As I've said numerous times before, this will go out well. Lightning
> will be able to handle this.

What will be the solution? Will you just stay with CalDAV within the
white-list? Will you add support for the "Google Calendar API" as Google
recommends? That sound like a good solution because the Google Calendar
API probably supports a lot of the extra features. Yeah, I know - not an
open standard. That's a reasonable objection.

> Enough with the bashing today!

If a polite and limited critique is considered "bashing", then there is
an additional danger of failure due the yes-man echo-chamber effect.
(Unless you meant the other respondents' bashing me: "totally
ridiculous", "Can't believe you're serious", "crass statement". Although
I don't consider any of that "bashing" either.)

Despite all of this discussion, and despite my original criticism, I am
VERY grateful to you Philipp for making and improving this awesome and
important calendar program! Thank you!

[Patrick Cloke]

On 3/15/2013 5:06 PM, Peter Lairo wrote:
> On Fr. 15.03.2013 17:19, Philipp Kewisch wrote:
>> As I've said numerous times before, this will go out well. Lightning
>> will be able to handle this.
>
> What will be the solution? Will you just stay with CalDAV within the
> white-list? Will you add support for the "Google Calendar API" as Google
> recommends? That sound like a good solution because the Google Calendar
> API probably supports a lot of the extra features. Yeah, I know - not an
> open standard. That's a reasonable objection.

As Philipp already said, the Provider for Google Calendar will continue
to work (let me be really explicit for you: it already uses the Google
Calendar API).

--Patrick

[Philipp Kewisch]

On 3/15/13 10:06 PM, Peter Lairo wrote:

> Are you saying there are a total of 1.2 M users of CalDAV, or there are
> 1.2 M users of Thunderbird? Or what?

Lightning has 1.2M average daily users in total.

>> I'm sorry you don't
>> have your feature and I would love to see it too, but there are just
>> bigger problems to handle: getting rid of update problems by replacing
>> libical with a js implementation, fixing performance problems with many
>> events, improving test coverage and architecture to avoid regressions.
>
> Those certainly sound like important issues, but I disagree that those
> are "bigger" (i.e. more important) problems.

Well ok, then lets concentrate on those new features and not care about
substantial things breaking. Syntax errors and not working caldav
provider in a release will just make a brighter day. Who cares if it
will make the calendar even slower so far that the UI will hang even
when just writing an email. Also, Lightning not working at all for some
users because of issues with the upgrade - pah. At least we have a new
feature.

> Despite all of this discussion, and despite my original criticism, I am
> VERY grateful to you Philipp for making and improving this awesome and
> important calendar program! Thank you!

Then act like it. Google announces something and you blame me. You have
no idea what Google's motivations are, it could be anything. Bad
codebase, revenue, traffic shaping and any other reason. Its kind of
like hearing about someone having a certain condition and then making
assumptions on what could be the cause without consulting a doctor.

These are the last words I will write on this topic.
Thank you for your help and understanding.
Philipp

[Stefan Sitter]

I wonder what will happen when Provider for Google Calendar switches to
Google Calendar API v3 and than hits the allowed number of queries.
Currently addons.mozilla.org lists 300.000 users of this extensions.

> https://developers.google.com/google-apps/calendar/pricing
> The Google Calendar API has a courtesy limit of 10,000 queries per
> day. If you need capacity beyond this courtesy limit, you can send a
> request from the Quotas pane of the Google APIs Console.

Unfortunately Google seems very restricted regarding information how
much money they will take to allow more.

Stefan

[Peter Lairo]

On So. 17.03.2013 13:02, Stefan Sitter wrote:
> I wonder what will happen when Provider for Google Calendar switches to
> Google Calendar API v3 and than hits the allowed number of queries.
> Currently addons.mozilla.org lists 300.000 users of this extensions.

In an earlier post, Phillip said: "Lightning has 1.2M average daily
users in total."

Does that mean that addons.mozilla.org only tracks the number of
downloaded copies (per month?) and that four times more than that are
using Lightning? It seems that one of those two methods for counting
"users" is very inaccurate.

> > https://developers.google.com/google-apps/calendar/pricing
> > The Google Calendar API has a courtesy limit of 10,000 queries per
> > day. If you need capacity beyond this courtesy limit, you can send a
> > request from the Quotas pane of the Google APIs Console.

Is that 10,000 queries per day *per user* or 10,000 queries per day *per
app*? If it's per user, how close to 10,000 queries per day does a
typical user get?

> Unfortunately Google seems very restricted regarding information how
> much money they will take to allow more.

Who would pay for this? Each user or the app owner?

I have a bad feeling about this current situation with Google.

[Stefan Sitter]

On 17.03.2013 14:36, Peter Lairo wrote:
> In an earlier post, Phillip said: "Lightning has 1.2M average daily
> users in total."

We are speaking about different extensions.

Lightning: about 1.200.000 daily users
Provider for Google Calendar: about 300.000 daily users

> Does that mean that addons.mozilla.org only tracks the number of
> downloaded copies (per month?) and that four times more than that are
> using Lightning? It seems that one of those two methods for counting
> "users" is very inaccurate.

No, not downloads. Average download for Lightning is about 6000 per day.
To quote from addons.mozilla.org:

> What are daily users? Add-ons downloaded from this site check for
> updates once per day. The total number of these update pings is known
> as Active Daily Users.

You have to add the user count that did not install Lightning via
addons.mozilla.org, e.g. the many users that installed Lightning from
its operating system repositories like Ubuntu.

For Lightning the statistics are public available:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/lightning/statistics/

>>> https://developers.google.com/google-apps/calendar/pricing The
>>> Google Calendar API has a courtesy limit of 10,000 queries per
>>> day. If you need capacity beyond this courtesy limit, you can
>>> send a request from the Quotas pane of the Google APIs Console.
>
> Is that 10,000 queries per day *per user* or 10,000 queries per day
> *per app*? If it's per user, how close to 10,000 queries per day does
> a typical user get?
>
>> Unfortunately Google seems very restricted regarding information
>> how much money they will take to allow more.
>
> Who would pay for this? Each user or the app owner?
>
> I have a bad feeling about this current situation with Google.

I have got similar questions and feelings.

Stefan

[Philipp Kewisch]

On 3/17/13 1:02 PM, Stefan Sitter wrote:
> I wonder what will happen when Provider for Google Calendar switches to
> Google Calendar API v3 and than hits the allowed number of queries.
> Currently addons.mozilla.org lists 300.000 users of this extensions.
>
> > https://developers.google.com/google-apps/calendar/pricing
> > The Google Calendar API has a courtesy limit of 10,000 queries per
> > day. If you need capacity beyond this courtesy limit, you can send a
> > request from the Quotas pane of the Google APIs Console.
>
> Unfortunately Google seems very restricted regarding information how
> much money they will take to allow more.

Don't worry, I have a limit of 5M queries for the provider with v3 API
and will request more if needed.

In the meanwhile, feel free to test the v3 API extension:
https://bitly.com/Udr3mR

Philipp

[Stefan Sitter]

On 14.03.2013 18:59, Philipp Kewisch wrote:

> I have already applied for access. From what I've heard, it will
> still be possible to access Google via CalDAV afterwards with a few
> changes to Lightning itself.

Did you get any response from Google regarding this topic?

I noticed the update on
http://googleblog.blogspot.de/2013/03/a-second-spring-of-cleaning.html:
> We worked with the developers who provide 98 percent of our current
> CalDAV traffic to assure access to the CalDAV API, which means many
> popular products will not be impacted. We remain committed to
> supporting open protocols like CalDAV.

Does this include Lightning?

Stefan

[Philipp Kewisch]

Yes, Lightning is included. I have a fix coming soon, just a few issues
to take care of.

Philipp

[acrow...@integrafin.co.uk]

Hi,

Does the v3 API addon finally solve the re-invite/reminder spamming issue?

Thanks

Alex