Lightning: a project to integrate calendar into Thunderbird

[Mike Shaver]

As I should have done a month ago, I've created some initial documents
on the wiki about a project we're calling "Lightning".

You can read more about it at
http://wiki.mozilla.org/index.php/Calendar:Lightning
and pages linked from there. More will be coming in the near future,
but comments are welcome in this newsgroup or on the "discussion" pages
on the Wiki (look for the "discussion" tab at the top of the page you
want to comment on).

Mike

[Dhoughal Walker]

Great to hear that there will be several Calendar projects for Mozilla!

What I would like to see for a Mozilla calendaring application:

A memo function combined with Palm HotSync support, so that all basic
functions of Palm Desktop (dates, tasks, memos) would be offered by Mozilla.

D.

[Alexander N. Treyner]

I want to add, that in my opinion - basic lack Mozilla Calendar Project
is a work only with a format iCal. I would like to see in a calendar -
the interface of higher level which can be realized for work with iCal
and for work with some web-service.
If development will go on this way, I would join the project.

[Rod Whiteley]

Alexander N. Treyner wrote:
> If development will go on this way, I would join the project.

Join the project! From what I have read here, development went that way
some time ago.

--
Rod Whiteley

[Alexander N. Treyner]

How can I do it? Where project is hosted?

Alex.

[Rod Whiteley]

Alexander N. Treyner wrote:
> How can I do it? Where project is hosted?

http://www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar/

--
Rod Whiteley

[Michael McCallister]

Greetings,

Since it appears that Thunderbird + Firebird now wants to compete more
with Outlook, I'd like to propose an approach that may make this
possible. Microsoft's comments here:

http://news.com.com/Mozillas+Lightning+to+strike+Outlook/2100-7344_3-5501618.html

Are valid to a certain extent. People have come to demand more from
"PIM" applications. Assuming Thunderbird and Sunbird were successfully
integrated, that alone is not enough to compete with Outlook + Exchange.
People want their data seemlessly synced up to all interfaces in which
they access it. Exchange provides this currently. If I run Exchange
and I can access my email, calendar, and contacts from Outlook, Outlook
Web Access, and portable devices (i.e. phones and pdas) that offer
Exchange plugins (i.e. http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmobile/) and
everything "just works" seemlessly.

I believe the same can be said for Thunderbird + Sunbird without too
much effort. Obviously, Thunderbird + Sunbird is just part of the
solution in my above example and I am not proposing that the Mozilla
foundation tries to build all the software for the whole solution. I am
proposing that we come up with a viable solution to integrate all
interfaces in which people access email, calendar data, contact data,
todo lists, etc. on their primary PIM app, web based PIM interfaces, and
mobile devices.

First lets take a look at what we have today: IMAP4 basically takes care
of email for us, LDAP to a certain extent handles contacts, and ICAL
over WebDAV handles calendar and todo list issues. I am not proposing
that these interfaces are abandoned (especially IMAP) - but I would like
to propose an alternative that may offer an easier way to reach our end
goal of complete PIM data integration. I'm not saying that LDAP and and
ICAL over WebDAV are bad - I just don't think they are going to offer a
solution that can compete with Outlook + Exchange.

I think SyncML (http://www.openmobilealliance.org/syncml) offers a
viable alternative that could relatively easily be bolted on to
Thunderbird + Sunbird. SyncML offers the following benefits from my
viewpoint:

* Open standard that already has a lot of traction. For example, it
is part of the WAP 2.0 standard so 90% of the cell phones you can
buy today already support synchronizing contacts, calendars, todo
lists over HTTP/SyncML. Also, many cell phones are now offering
email clients with IMAP support.
* To really compete with Outlook + Exchange, Thunderbird + Sunbird
will need to support Exchange. This is possible over SyncML and
this open source project: http://sync4j.funambol.com/.
* SyncML support should be there soon for the two most popular open
source web mail clients: IMP (http://www.horde.org/imp/) and
Squirrelmail (http://squirrelmail.org/). For example, IMP is
working on this already: http://www.horde.org/sync and a
Squirrelmail plugin to support SyncML should be easy enough to
write assuming Squirrelmail rolls out support for decent Calendar
and Contacts (already in CVS for both)

Furthermore, the Mozilla Foundation could host documentation for sys
admins on how to setup Exchange integration over SyncML etc. A
comprehensive HowTo would almost be a requirement since we are tying
multiple software projects together in order to offer rich PIM client +
Webmail + Mobile device integration.

Anyways, I am just brain-storming here and thought I would share this
idea since this appears to be a topic of focus recently. It would
appear to me that this would be the path of least resistance to offer a
solution that can compete with Outlook + Exchange.

Mike

[Alexander N. Treyner]

Rod Whiteley wrote:
> Alexander N. Treyner wrote:
>
>> How can I do it? Where project is hosted?
>
>
> http://www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar/
>

There is no mention of word "Lighting".

[Simon Paquet]

And on the seventh day Alexander N. Treyner spoke:

>>> How can I do it? Where project is hosted?
>>
>> http://www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar/
>>
>There is no mention of word "Lighting".

Take a look at the news section on the page.

Simon
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