Syncing the macs

August 13, 2008 10:10 AM

I am looking for a way to sync an ibook with an imac. I'd like to make sure all my working documents, ical, adresses, firefox bookmarks and zotero files are updated when I come home.

I am spending a lot of time on the ibook (Os 10.3), working on various word documents, saving pdf files from the web and updating infos in iCal and the address book. When I get home, would there be any way to make sure these are updated on the imac (10.5) through the home wifi network?
Things I'd like to keep in sync:
-A specific folder containing word documents and pdf files
-iCal calendars
-adresses (in the Address book)
-Firefox bookmarks
-Zotero documents

I'd like to hear other's tricks concerning the syncing of these various applications.

posted by ddaavviidd to computers & internet (7 comments total)

Look into:

MobileMe
DropBox
Foxmarks
posted by sharkfu at 10:17 AM on August 13, 2008

MobileMe is designed for this, if they get it stable and working.
posted by griffey at 10:36 AM on August 13, 2008

MobileMe does not sync Firefox, just Safari.

It does allow you to save to an iDisk (it mounts in Finder just like a local drive or share), Address Book, and iCal. These apps stay synchronized as long as they are on and connected to the web (or will sync when you reconnect them). They don't have to be on the same network. You can also access your calendar and contacts via a webpage.

The other cool feature is the BackToMyMac (both clients need to be Leopard though) where you can access the desktop/shares on your home Mac from anywhere else connected through the internet (provided you have NAT/UPnP enabled, etc).

It also lets you sync your keychains, Dock items and a few other things between your Macs. It it is great that if I add a bookmark on my MacBookPro that my home system's Safari has it on there when I get home. Same with the address book and calendar.

MobileMe is $99 a year and also includes an email account web galleries and other crap I don't use. You can get it cheaper from Amazon and even from Apple stores sometimes. If you have an iPhone it will keep your phones contacts and calendar in sync with your Macs over the air.

Although it had some well publicized issues when it launched/changed from being called dotmac, that is been pretty much fixed and is working well now. I've been using it for years to keep my two Macs in sync and since Leopard came out like the BackToMyMac feature.

There are free-er ways to do this but takes some work. Search for free .mac replacement (or now I guess free mobile me replacement... but a big selling point of MobileMe now is the push to iPhone features which you probably don't need so that might lead to some false hits).
posted by birdherder at 10:56 AM on August 13, 2008

You could use FolderShare to keep your documents folder synced between two machines. It's free, and works with both PCs and Macs.
posted by dcjd at 11:19 AM on August 13, 2008

For Firefox bookmarks, try Mozilla Weave when it is a little more stable.
posted by qvtqht at 12:54 PM on August 13, 2008

other more geeky solutions for file synchronization are Chronosync or rsync.

If you use Google Calendar, iCal will now sync (in both directions) to it.
posted by kenliu at 2:32 PM on August 13, 2008

All best answers! Thanks for the infos, there's a couple things I'll look into. I knew about MobileMe, I just don't feel like paying 100$ a year just to sync my calendar... chronosync looks great and I just realised that google calendar could bcomee my friend.
posted by ddaavviidd at 5:22 AM on August 14, 2008