It’s finally summer in Seattle, and baseball games when the roof on Safeco Field is open are the best. With Windows Live Calendar and subscriptions to a couple of online calendars, I can figure out when the Seattle Mariners are playing at home and what the weather forecast is. Then I’ll know when I should try to score some tickets.

Why subscribe instead of import calendars?

Well, there are a few differences between subscribing and importing:

• If you subscribe to an online calendar, whenever the third-party calendar is updated, your calendar is updated as well. This is great for calendars on the web, like sports schedules. To subscribe to an online calendar, all you need to know is the URL for the calendar and then paste it into Windows Live Calendar.
• If you import an online calendar, you don’t get calendar updates, you get a copy or “snapshot” of the calendar. This is great for uploading calendars from a computer, like migrating from an old calendar to Windows Live Calendar. To import a calendar, you need to save the .ics file to your computer and then import it into Windows Live Calendar.

After a little web searching on Bing, I found the two calendars that I need: the Mariner’s home game schedule for 2009, and the weekly Seattle weather forecast.

To subscribe to an online calendar:

1. Go to Windows Live Calendar and sign in with your Windows Live ID.
2. Click Subscribe at the top of the web page.
3. In the Calendar URL box, paste the URL for the online calendar, name the calendar, change the color (if you want), and click Subscribe to calendar.

Subscribing to the Mariner’s home game schedule

Windows Live Calendar lets you know that your subscription was added. Just click Done to see your calendars. And if the events don't show up on your calendar right away, check back because it will be updated shortly.

And now, just repeat for the Seattle weather calendar.

Voila, the Seattle weather forecast is there, too

Darn, no home games this week. I guess I’ll just have to keep checking my Windows Live Calendar.

Dawn Hollingsworth, CrackerJack fan
- Windows Live team

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