Side Project 2: Alarm synchronized with Google Calendar

I actually started on this earlier last year when I got back to school in September.  I was finding myself re-setting my alarm clock every night to a different time (due to classes each morning starting at a different time).  I got quite frustrated myself when I forgot to set the alarm or setting it to the wrong time.

I realized that all my classes were in my Google Calendar, so if I could write an alarm app that could read my Google Calendar and automatically wake me up before that (maybe 1.5-2 hours ahead, since it takes about 1 hour to commute to school).

I started in mid-September and then schoolwork hit me and I never got it to a working state.

Now that I have time (although I don’t really have a reason to set alarms these few months), I finished it off to a working state.  It’s written in Java using Google Calendar libraries to hook it up to the web service.

I’ve uploaded the Java code to my Github account.  The code is quite rough right now, probably has a few bugs.  It’s a command line Java application, as it was meant to work on a headless system.  Eventually I’ll probably add a better readme, better documentation on how to use it, and maybe even a GUI.  This project hasn’t really been a priority for me right now since I don’t have to set any alarms these few months 🙂

Google Calendar and Google Earth

Another beautiful [beta] Web 2.0 application brought to you by Google. Multiple views, multiple calendars, sharing calendars, super-cool interface (even cooler than Gmail). Of course it doesn’t match with the flying abilities of Google Earth, but it does set the standard for calendar applications on the browser.

Go to Google Calendar.

google-calendar-events

Oh I might as well mention, you can configure Google Earth to be a flight-simulator type program, and fly around anywhere in the world. You really get the feeling that you’re really in the cockpit if you try flying low in 3D-ized areas (such as the North Shore Mountains and Howe Sound).

Flying in Google Earth
Flying around Vancouver in Google Earth