Sync With Outlook
With everything going online these days, Google has also entered the “get-yourself-organised” scene with Google Calendar. The advantage with Google Calendar is that since it is online, you do not need to be shackled to a single PC to keep tab on calendar events-you can get this information from almost any PC connected to the internet.
The problem here is that you can only access your calendar as long as you are online. To remedy this situation, there are some applications that help you synchronise Google Calendar with Outlook. RemoteCalendars is one such freeware utility. You can download it from http://remotecalendars.sourceforge.net. We will show you how you can synchronise your Google Calendar with Outlook 2003 or 2007 using RemoteCalendars.
Installing RemoteCalendars
RemoteCalendars is a bit tedious to install-first close Outlook if it is open. Install Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 (if you haven’t already) from this month’s CD. Extract the contents of RemoteCalendarsSetup-6.3ALL.zip to a folder of your choice. Inside the folder where you extracted files, you will find a Prerequisites folder, from which you must first unpack O2003PIA.EXE and install O2003PIA.MSI. Next, run vstor.exe, in the same folder. Finally, install RemoteCalendarsVSTOSetup.msi from the main RemoteCalendar folder. 
RemoteCalendars Options
Configuring RemoteCalendars
When you launch Outlook after this installation, the Remote Calendar Options window will open. Check the Automatic Update box if you want automatic updates. Click on Subscribe a RemoteCalendar button to add your Google Calendar to Outlook.
In Google Calendar, copy the iCal URL for your calendar’s Private Address on the Calendar Settings page-click on Manage Calendars on the left, and in the Calendar tab, click on the calendar name that you intend to work on. Near the bottom of the page, you can get the Private Address of this calendar in XML, iCal as well as HTML formats, select iCal and copy that URL. 
Copy iCal private URL
In RemoteCalendars, paste the iCal URL under “Remote calendar’s Url”, add the calendar name and check “It’s my Google Calendar and I want to sync both ways”. 
Subscribe to RemoteCalendar
You can categorise the events in your calendar (Business, Personal, Holiday, etc.); click on Add Categories to This Calendar to do so. Finally, enter the username and password for your Google Calendar when prompted. Items added to your Google Calendar will now appear in your Outlook Calendar.
Part II:
Sync With Your Smartphone
You can even carry your Google Calendar in your pocket. GCalSync is an open source application that allows you to synchronise Google Calendar with your mobile phone’s inbuilt calendar. You can also download calendar events to your phone and upload them to Google Calendar using this application.
Download And Install GCalSync
To download this Java application, visit www.gcalsync.com or better still, directly install it to your mobile phone from wap.gcalsync.com. You will find two versions of this application for smartphones-signed and unsigned, and one for the Blackberry. You should preferably install the signed version for your phone, because this won’t nag you for Internet access.
Configure GCalSync
Start GCalSync on your mobile-from amongst the different options you see, click Test to see whether your mobile and GCalSync are compatible. This tests the compatibility of your mobile calendar and also whether you have an adequate data connection-which is required for GCalSync to sync with Google Calendar online.
In the Options menu, you can set your user name (without the @gmail.com), your password and the calendar address (this is not necessary to be filled if you have filled your user name and password). You can also specify the period over which the calendar needs to be synchronised under Sync period. Finally, you can specify your time zone and decide whether you want one-way or two-way calendar synchronisation, and the direction of synchronisation (phone to Google or vice versa) in the Upload / Download options.
Select the Sync option to synchronise. If you want a complete resynchronisation of calendars, you should select Full resync.