I have had an issue for a while - how to share calendars with Meenakshi and the rest of the family in an easy way. Right now my primary calendar is in Exchange at work, and that is fine for work related items, but tracking and sharing personal items was not possible. Right now, I mark them as Private in Exchange so my colleagues can see that I am busy then, but cannot see the details. And the personal events when added, Meenakshi gets an invite, but if she wants to send me an invite (or look at when I am busy or free), then that is not possible. We exchange a number of emails or IM’s before finding out what a suitable time is. This gets more interesting, when other friends and family want to know when are we free or busy for say a theater show or dinner.
With Google Calendar , I can solve these issues. Not only do I have my personal calendar (which is exported from Exchange), that Meenakshi has access to view in a secure manner, we also have a public calendar which is open to the world - so friends and family can look at that and see when we might be available. Yes, the public calendar is a subset of the complete calendar, but it certainly helps a lot. More these days, since we moved to London from San Francisco - seems like its easier to get to London from most places and we are getting quite popular with people wanting to come and spend time with us (hey who would have thought I was popular) ;). Now they can look at which weekends we are free and they can plan accordingly.
If you are interested in this public calendar, the ICal version can be found here (which you can import in Outlook or another program). If you prefer, you can get the XML version here .