Ever open an email on your iPhone and only see a calendar icon, but when you click on it you can't read anything? This site is designed to mitigate that problem until Apple decides to fix ICS file parsing.
It's pretty simple - just forward any message containing an ics file to beta@icsparse.appspotmail.com. The service will parse your message and will e-mail you back the details in a fairly human-readable format. Make sure to include the original attachment in the forwarded mail - the iPhone sometimes takes longer to download this and send it. You can verify the file is attached by viewing the icon at the bottom of the email message.
It's free! Please feel free to use the service as needed, but try not to overload it.
This is an issue with the way a lot of clients handle the timezone representation within the ICS files. The iCalendar spec allows for timezone / offsets to be put in the date but some clients do not do this (Outlook especially.) Usually, the easiest thing is to look in the Description section for the actual time / date of the meeting, otherwise we present it as listed in the file. Typically, this is set for GMT. We have some ideas on handling it in the future, but for now just be careful.
We're working on that for devices running the 4.0+ iOS (iPhone / iPod Touch)! Still some kinks to work out but we hope to have a release soon.
Make sure you sent it to beta@icsparse.appspotmail.com - currently any other address is set to automatically reject email requests.
We've got one for users with iOS4 or later! ICS Reader is now available on the App Store for free! More information also available at http://icsreader.com.
Yes and no - if you're using something like Dropbox or another app that supports the a document selection viewer, then yes, it will work well. If you're wanting to open it from e-mail (95% of you out there) then there's still a minor workaround required but it does work.
In most cases, you shouldn't need this as the mail clients can parse it (Note: the iPhone Mail.app knows how to handle ICS files - the problem is it just doesn't try when you're connected to an IMAP or POP3 service, only Exchange or MobileMe.) The service should work with any given e-mail client so if you've got something that can't parse the file but can read text or html, it should work for you.
We're looking into this - it's definitely possible to do, it's mostly a matter of sending back the proper type of ICS file in response which can be a bit tricky. Please let us know if this is something you need.
We have no intention of using your data unless there's an error / problem / etc. That said, we cannot and do not promise the security of any information sent to this service. If you're concerned in any way about this, DO NOT USE THIS SERVICE. In addition, we make no guarantees as to the availability of the service nor it's effectiveness. It works fine for us (make sure to read about the timezone piece above) but it may not work for you. When in doubt, just open your laptop and verify the settings that way. Again, if any of this concerns you, DO NOT USE THIS SERVICE.
This service is built using python running on top of Google AppEngine. We specifically use the great VObject library to handle parsing of the ics files. Everything else is built into AppEngine, mostly just code to attempt to intelligently handle the mutilation of attachments received from various e-mail clients. For the coming iOS app, we've had to change things somewhat - details to follow.
First, check to make sure the ics file is actually attached - if the service does not detect an attachment it will not send any response. If you sent a file with an attachment, you should receive a response even if it states it couldn't parse the attachment. In these cases, if you're comfortable doing so, please forward us a copy of the e-mail with the attachment and we'll look into it. Our e-mail address is icsparse@flexiblecreations.com.
Note that we may also have the site in various states of development at any given time so the service may not be active.
It's also come to our attention that in certain circumstances, the iPhone likes to hold onto the e-mail address that replies to you, meaning icsparse@flexiblecreations.com. This is a side-effect of using Google AppEngine and we have a fix in development. In the mean time, just make sure you're using the beta@icsparse.appspotmail.com address. Don't worry if it happens accidentally, we don't mind - we just want to make sure the service is working well for you and we can't always reply immediately if it gets sent to the wrong address.
We welcome feedback and questions about the service - this is largely an experiment and to solve a couple pain points we experience. Feel free to contact us at the address listed above.