Spanning Sync features
Everything Spanning Sync does, from calendar pairing to contact photos, and the details that matter when you rely on it every day.
Google sits in the middle. Your Mac syncs with Google, and Google passes the same data on to everything else you own.
Calendar sync: iCal ↔ Google Calendar
- True two-way sync. Add, edit or delete an event on either side and the other side follows.
- One pairing per calendar. Each iCal calendar is matched with a Google Calendar of your choice, so Work stays Work and Home stays Home.
- Merge, don't replace. Calendars that already have events on both sides are combined into a single, complete calendar.
- Recurring and all-day events keep their rules, and time zones are respected on both ends.
- Shared and public calendars. Holiday calendars, a coworker's shared calendar or a team schedule you can see in Google can appear in iCal too.
- Pick what syncs. Leave a calendar unchecked and it never leaves your Mac.
Contact sync: Address Book ↔ Google Contacts
- Complete cards. Names, companies, phone numbers, email addresses, street addresses, birthdays, URLs and notes stay matched.
- Photos travel too. Contact pictures added in Address Book show up in Google, and the other way round.
- Groups stay groups. Address Book groups map to Google contact groups, so your "Clients" group is the same list everywhere.
- Selective sync. Sync every contact, or only the groups you choose.
- Built for big address books. Thousands of contacts are handled without trouble.
Contact sync arrived in Spanning Sync 2.0 and was refined with group support and finer control in Spanning Sync 3.
Automatic and manual
Changes you make trigger a sync right away. A fallback schedule catches anything else, and the menu-bar item gives you Sync Now plus the time of the last successful sync.
Several Macs, one account
Sign in with the same Google account on each Mac and they all stay in agreement, even when one of them is asleep or offline. Family members and coworkers join in through Google's own calendar sharing.
Phones and devices
Any phone that syncs with Google, including iPhone, receives the same calendars and contacts. iPods and other Sync Services devices continue to sync through iTunes exactly as before.
Fast, careful and Mac-native
- Up to 10× faster. The version 3 engine moves only what changed and finishes large syncs in a fraction of the time earlier versions needed.
- Predictable conflict handling. When the same item was edited in two places, Spanning Sync resolves the difference in a consistent way instead of silently creating copies.
- Sync Services under the hood. Spanning Sync plugs into the same Mac OS X framework Apple built for its own sync, which is why it coexists with other sync tools.
- A preference pane, not an app. There is nothing to keep open. Settings live in System Preferences and sync runs in the background.
- Universal binary. Runs natively on Intel and PowerPC Macs.
- Clean uninstall. The download includes an uninstaller that removes the preference pane and its background components completely.
System requirements
| Current version | Spanning Sync 3.3 |
|---|---|
| Mac OS X | 10.5.8 or later |
| Processor | Intel or PowerPC (Universal binary) |
| Download size | 2.3 MB |
| Account | A free Google account (Gmail or Google Apps) |
| Language | English |
| License | 15-day free trial, then $25 per year or $65 one-time |