iPhone's iCal icon displays correct date, Mac OS X's still doesn't
While the iPhone signifies a massive leap ahead in mobile phone technology, it also has apparently leapt ahead of its big brother Mac OS X in a few key areas. Since iCal's debut in Apple's darling desktop OS, it has (to my knowledge) never displayed the correct date in the Dock; it's always been set on July 17th until you actually start iCal which causes it to reflect the proper date. The iPhone, on the other hand, must have received some spit and polish from the OS X engineers, because its iCal (or is it officially called Calendar?) displays the proper date every day, even if you don't start the app. In a way this makes sense, because virtually every mobile phone's home screen provides easy access to the time and date, so Apple had to get this right. Still, it would be nice if iCal in Mac OS X could catch up to its baby brother and do something as advanced as display the proper date in a Dock icon.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Jason said 10:36AM on 7-02-2007
Is that a block of dead pixels above the calendar icon?
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Adrian vG said 10:40AM on 7-02-2007
Well, since it doesn't seem that you ever quit an app, can't one make an asumption that iCal/Calendar is always on, and, therefore, always shows the correct date?
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mostman said 10:45AM on 7-02-2007
Yeah - its nice - but here is what would make the home screen even better:
Update the "Weather" and "Clock" apps to be accurate. In other words, have the weather not be 73 and sunny all the time - but reflect the weather in your first configured weather location. Have the clock reflect the current time. Also nice would be the ability to set a "home" in the maps app and have that icon show you your "home" instead of Infinite Loop.
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milosh said 10:48AM on 7-02-2007
> virtually every mobile phone's home screen provides easy access to the time and date, [...] it would be nice if iCal in Mac OS X could [...] display the proper date in a Dock icon.
I don't think so: a launch-icon is not a widget that should act on its own. On the contrary, the icon for a running program has the right to act, it is part of the program. If you want the date, the place you should be able to find it is the "date and time" thingy in the menu bar (even though it does not display by default).
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macxprt said 10:48AM on 7-02-2007
You could set iCal to be a Startup App in your login prefs. That way, whenever you log in, it would automatically update the date. If you do not want to see the calendar come up, check the "Hide" checkbox when adding iCal to your Startup Apps list.
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Eric M said 11:01AM on 7-02-2007
I just with the weather icon would update the same was. I know that the date doesnt require network access, but it would still be nice.
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Danny said 11:07AM on 7-02-2007
Dock icons can only be modified by their running process so this would require iCal (or an iCal proxy app) to be running at all times. Seeing how worked-up some people get over Dashboard being "always on" leads me to believe that solving the iCal problem would introduce the same irrational ire (and a MacOSXHints article on how to "disable" iCal).
macxprt's comment above is probably the most sane solution.
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The Jerk said 11:08AM on 7-02-2007
iPhone does use Leopard, though, so its definitely more advanced than what my MacBook is currently running. I bet it is reflected properly in the final build of Leopard.
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joeati said 11:09AM on 7-02-2007
As of now my iCal icon does display 2 July in OS X...
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artifex said 11:15AM on 7-02-2007
Hahaha. David, I thought I was the only person that hated the dock icon doing that.
macxprt, doesn't ical still hang around in memory or virtual memory, when you do that? Seems like a big load just to get an icon to switch. But I don't use the program much.
Jason, I think that's dust.
Speaking of weather, the generic weather widget switches from my city and state to another city with the same name, every time I launch it, giving me totally wrong readings. And yes, I make sure I specify my city and state, or zip code, which it then re-writes as just the wrong city, again, when I restart the widget. So I just use Meteo.
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Simon Iannelli said 11:19AM on 7-02-2007
Is there any place where we can see the iPhones calendar in action? I'd like to see the different views.
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Matt said 11:25AM on 7-02-2007
I am a "glass half full" kind of person and so the way I see it the dock icon does display the correct date...once a year :)
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Damien Guard said 11:38AM on 7-02-2007
All Apple need to do is generate a new icon on the filesystem whenever the date changes.
[)amien
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Dave Chartier said 11:39AM on 7-02-2007
#10: that means you or possibly another app has opened iCal in Mac OS X sometime after midnight last night. If you restart and *don't* have iCal set to run at startup, its Dock icon should default back to July 17th.
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Emory Dunn said 11:44AM on 7-02-2007
iCal displays the corect date if it is running, and if it is closed it does not.
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Krest said 12:09PM on 7-02-2007
Interestingly the "up to date" icons works in DragThing, iCal running or not. I dunno why it doesn't work in the Dock... kinda lame tough.
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SSteve said 12:18PM on 7-02-2007
Personally, I don't mind the July 17 icon. That's my wedding anniversary. :-) But I usually have iCal running so it's a moot point for me.
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Dustin Kniffen said 12:28PM on 7-02-2007
Here's another option kind of in the same vein as macxprt:
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20030214163614514
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jack said 12:28PM on 7-02-2007
Amen! I've always been bugged by iCal's icon not updating to the correct date, even when it's not running. If I recall, the similar calendar in the NeXT dock displayed the current date...
Mostman's idea is excellent; it'd be great if the main menu weather button also headlined the current weather in your default/main weather widget location.
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Chris said 12:44PM on 7-02-2007
I agree that it's preposterous that the iCal dock icon doesn't display the proper date. I should have to use some workaround for that. Hopefully it's fixed in Leopard.
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