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ICalendar (ics) and various calendar clients (Outlook, iCal, Lotus Notes) - what works and what doesn't?

I am working on a web application that allows users to create an event calendar and then upload these events to their selected calendar program (e.g. Outlook, Lotus Notes, iCal, Google Calendar, etc.).

The web application displays event data as an attachment in iCalendar (ics) format.

I face a lot of problems ...

  • If I use "VERSION: 1.0", Outlook 2003 will recognize and import the attachment. However, Apple iCal will not. If it is "VERSION: 2.0", iCal works, but Outlook 2003 will not.

  • If the attachment has more than one event (VEVENT), then Outlook 2003 imports only the first event if the user does not use the Outlook import function.

  • I do not have Lotus Notes or several versions of Outlook (2007, 2010), so I can not how they behave.

I do not mind to run a small dialog box that asks the user which calendar program they use, so I can configure the output accordingly. However, I do not know what each of the main programs supports or requires.

Has anyone found a resource that lists, according to a calendar program, what works and what doesn't? For example, does Outlook 2007 or 2010 support "VERSION: 1.0"? Is there a way to get Outlook 2003 to support "VERSION: 2.0" or handle multiple events? What does Lotus Notes support? What about yahoo and google?

I do not need to support EVERY program, but I would like to support as many core ones as possible.

Thank you very much in advance!

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For Lotus Notes, you can download a trial version of the Notes client software from the IBM website, and that may be all you really need to test your application. Notes can import records through the import menu or drag and drop the iCal file into the Notes client. (If you need to continue developing Notes, you can also download the free version of Domino Designer software from the IBM website - IBM makes Designer software available for use on a single computer without access to the server.)

There is a KBase article on the IBM site with some information about iCal support in the latest version of Notes (8.5) - http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/lotus/library/notes85-icalendar/index.html

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