Microsoft Outlook is less of an email client and more of a general PIM, which enables you to store your tasks, notes, diary information and your meetings. If someone emails you with a meeting request, you can accept and automatically add this information to your calendar. The reverse is true. Set up a meeting and send out invites to people in your address book. Most other email clients supply you with the facility to send and receive email, so when a calendar add-on appears for Thunderbird, it's worth installing on your system to see if it improves your productivity.

Mozilla Lightning 0.7 is the calendar add-on for Firefox. You can add your meetings, task information and track this from within Thunderbird, which makes a lot of sense when people are contacting you about forthcoming plans. Mozilla Sunbird is the standalone version of the same calendar.

31 Oct 2007