Teach iCal to speak English

You don’t have to be Don Draper to get a great-looking assistant to hang on your every word. You can turn to Fantastical, which syncs with iCal, Outlook, Entourage, and -- through iCal -- BusyCal to make it easy to view and create appointments from anywhere on your Mac.
 
Fantastical displays a calendar above a scrollable, searchable list of your events. Mousing over or clicking shows more information -- when events occur, whether they’re all day or timed, which calendars they’re associated with, and more -- all with subtle animations that look great without distracting from your data. The flexible event list lets you view a range of upcoming appointments or upcoming days. While events can’t yet be revised or deleted in Fantastical 1.0.2 (the dev promises those features in a free update), double-clicking opens your default calendar app for editing.

Lots of info in a pretty, useful package.

But there’s more than just easy access to your calendars. Fantastical lets you quickly add detailed events to your schedule by typing naturally in plain English. Entering “Coffee with Steve at Starbucks Monday noon” creates a date for the following Monday, instantly filling in the time and location fields. Since Fantastical recognizes Address Book contacts as you type, you can invite guests by clicking their names. You can also specify exact dates and times, or ranges -- even assign events to a particular calendar. Optional alarms for each event you enter mean you’ll never miss a rendezvous -- something Don Draper himself would no doubt appreciate.

The bottom line. Sleeker than iCal and vastly more capable than its Dashboard widget, Fantastical is a great way to keep your schedule at hand while you work.