synchronizer

No hassle backups

Nero's BackItUp and Burn makes the whole process of regular data backups easier for everyone. Using an intuitive tabbed interface and simple controls, just about anyone can pick up BackItUp and Burn and start a regular schedule for backups in only a few clicks. The software even offers the option of sending you an e-mail notification when automated backups are complete.

In addition to regular backups, BackItUp and Burn also includes full burning capabilities (as the name suggests) letting you burn your music, videos, data, and pictures to CD, DVD, or Blue-ray disks. Nero offers a free Gigabyte of … Read more

Apple update resolves iPhone DFU mode problem and Note Syncing

According to a report on spaziocellulare.com, Apple's recent Mac OS X 10.5.7 update brings two welcome changes for iPhone and iPod Touch users.

DFU Mode Fix

Last fall, our sister site, MacFixit, reported that Mac OS X 10.5.6 causes iPhone jailbreak/unlock problems by making it impossible to enter DFU mode, a deeper version of Recovery Mode activated by holding Power and Home for 10 seconds, then releasing Power while holding Home for 10 more seconds. This feature, which is helpful in jailbreaking an iPhone or an iPod Touch, is also important for troubleshooting … Read more

Scheduling glitch

SyncBackSE is another contender in the backup program category, but there's nothing here that you haven't already seen before, even in cheaper programs. We also found a few glitches with the program's scheduling feature.

The program uses a wizard-like approach to creating backup tasks. Using it, we were able to create a new backup task fairly easily. The program includes not only the ability to back up files, but also to synchronize, mirror, and group files together. A zip feature is available that allows you to backup your file into a ZIP file. All was well when … Read more

Sync files easily

Synchronizing files and folders can be an excruciating process for people who need to transfer many files from one place to another within their computers. Synchredible offers an alternative to spending countless minutes copying, clicking, and dragging files into new locations, and it has a great deal of success.

This free download look a little intimidating at first with its very sparse display, but it's easily mastered. Select two files or folders from the file tree drop-down and you are on your way. Synchredible keeps you on pace by telling you where you are in the seven-step process at … Read more

Syncing your Google and Outlook calendars

Last January, a Worker's Edge post described how to swap data between your Google Calendar and the calendar in Outlook 2003 or 2007, using the import/export functions of each product.

A few months later, Google released a free program that not only moves data between the two calendar apps, but it also syncs the calendar entries automatically at the interval of your choice.

Google Calendar Sync is so fast and simple to use that my calendars were synced before I knew it. When you install the program, you're asked where you want to place the utility's … Read more

Use freeware for local folder syncing

If you're looking to keep folders synchronized across different computers, Microsoft's FolderShare is a top-notch tool. But what about synchronizing local folders?

Microsoft's local sync tool, SyncToy, isn't bad. As part of the Windows XP PowerToys add-ons, it's convenient, uncomplicated, and stable. The five different types of synchronization might sound limiting, but they cover the gamut of sync combinations. Users can sync in one direction or bidirectionally. The other three sync types specify how the sync manages new, deleted, and updated files: updating only files in common that have changed, not deleting files from the … Read more

Featured Freeware: SyncToy

If you're looking for a convenient, uncomplicated, and stable synchronization tool, you could do much, much worse than Microsoft's SyncToy. Part of the Windows XP PowerToys add-ons, this tool makes it easy to keep folder contents identical on one machine or across a network.

The first time you run it, SyncToy will guide you through creating a pair of linked folders. Labeled as Left and Right, it will then ask you to choose from one of five synchronization methods. Echo works like a standard one-way sync, copying all files from Left to Right. Synchronize is bidirectional; Contribute works … Read more

Opera 9.6 focuses on neglected features

UPDATED: Corrected Opera's country of origin.

E-mail and RSS feed improvements top the list of changes for Opera 9.60, moved out of beta today for Windows and Mac. As noted when the 9.60 beta came out last month, this version of the free browser offers up a multifaceted ''low-bandwidth mode'' for Opera Mail and tweaks to the RSS reader.

The feed preview rolls into Opera's RSS management a standalone RSS app feature so that users can preview feeds before subscribing to them. The low bandwidth option for Opera Mail, also called M2, does different things for … Read more

Apple apologizes for its MobileMe "push" service (Update)

Apple is the master of hype. Normally, it lives up to that hype. But in its 3G iPhone launch and now with its MobileMe synchronization service, Apple has fallen down. Flat.

Billed as an upgrade to Apple's .Mac service (to which I have subscribed for years), MobileMe is anything but. In fact, as The Register reports, it's not even the push email service that it purports to be. It's IMAP, just as .Mac was.

Email is managed through IMAP, and strictly speaking is pulled by polling the IMAP servers every minute, though that gives a reasonable impression of being pushed....

[C]hanges made using the desktop application are not instantly or automatically reflected on the iPhone or within The Cloud. Such changes need to wait for a synchronisation process, a lag of up to 15 minutes, before they are propagated between the platforms. Not only that but anyone trying to use some of the more advanced IMAP capabilities, such as the APPEND command, will find the MobileMe service unaware that any changes have been made to their e-mail account, at least until a good-old SMTP delivery triggers notification.

Is it really that big of a deal? Perhaps not. But it's also false advertising on Apple's part, and an unworthy "upgrade" on a service that for years has only had one major benefit: The name ".mac." I don't want a lame ".me" email address, and I'm finding that I don't really benefit from the changes to the .Mac service.

Are you getting more mileage from MobileMe?

UPDATE: I just received this from Apple:… Read more