Google Calendar Sync with Outlook

Google is WICKED smart.

They have released a little widget that will sync your Outlook and Google Calendars.  You can sync one way or both, which I find particularly fantastic.  That is, I can push my Outlook information up to my Google Calendar, but I don’t have it sync the other way too.

Direct from Google, here is the how-to:

To set up Google Calendar Sync:

1. Make sure you’re using a supported operating system and Outlook version.
2. Download Google Calendar Sync (version 0.9.3.3) at http://dl.google.com/googlecalendarsync/GoogleCalendarSync_Installer.exe
3. Once a dialog box appears, click Save File. The downloaded file should open automatically. If it doesn’t, manually open it from your browser’s download window.
4. Click OK to confirm that you’re aware this is an executable file.
5. Read through the Google Calendar Sync Terms of Service, and click I Agree.
6. Follow through the Installation Options and click Install to finish the set-up process.

Once Google Calendar Sync is installed on your computer, the Google Calendar Sync Settings window will appear:

In the Settings window, enter your email address and password and select the Sync Option you prefer. Read about each Sync Option.

You’ll also be able to set the time interval for syncing to occur. Please keep in mind that 10 minutes is the minimum time interval allowed.

After the initial set-up, you can access the Google Calendar Sync Settings window again by double-clicking the calendar icon in your Windows System Tray.

Icon Status

To access the Google Calendar Sync Settings window, just right-click the calendar icon in your Windows System Tray and select Options.

When your events are actively syncing between Google Calendar and Microsoft Outlook Calendar, you’ll see arrows in the Google Calendar Sync icon:

When events aren’t actively syncing, your calendar icon will look like this:

Why did I copy and paste the whole thing in there instead of writing my own how-to or just linking?

1. Google wrote good, clear instructions.  No need to re-invent the wheel here.
2. The people who call me up and say their computer is broken (but it’s not plugged in), the internet is broken (but their cable is unplugged), their computer “ate” a recent file (they don’t know where they saved it): these people will not click the link.  They like things nice and spoon-fed.  (Or me, coming to their house to fix it for them.)

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