Scheduling software and personal information management (or PIM) tools can help anyone become more organized and lead a much more productive business and personal life.

Scheduling software and personal information management tools allow us to store personal records for the purposes of calendaring, contact management, email management, instant messaging, and other personal productivity tools. The latest generation of PIM applications provide for internet connectivity to allow users to synchronize with online calendaring and scheduling tools as well as other online personal information management utilities such as web mail. Individuals who have found PDA (personal digital assistants) useful will be please with the latest generation of net connected PDA aware applications that allow for transparent synchronization of cell phones, PDAs, as well as laptop and desktop computers.

Scheduling software has come a long way since the early days of Microsoft Outlook and Palm Desktop. There are now open source alternatives that are freely available and in many ways as powerful as and in some cases more powerful than their expensive proprietary competitors. Linux users have seen the growth of the Gnome-based calendaring and scheduling software Evolution while cross platform open source software enthusiasts have enjoyed the releases of Sunbird and Thunderbird from the Mozilla Foundations popular code base.

Developers have been paying attention to the Microsoft-dominated personal information management software realm. The software giant out of Redmond, Washington has recently released Outlook Live, which is available as a subscription service that is subscribed to on a yearly basis. The Outlook live service aims to provide a seamless and transparent user experience through the use of a reworked version of their award winning Outlook 2003 PIM client software that has the native ability to handle multiple calendars and built in connectivity and synchronization with the popular MSN websites feature set (such as the nearly ubiquitous MSN Hotmail services). If you find yourself needing access to your data 2 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year no matter where you are in the world (as long as you have access to an internet connected computer with a compatible web browser installed (Internet Explorer for those of you out there keeping score).