I've recently adopted http://www.timetomeet.info, which is a web app, to arrange my apointments. It synchronises with Google calendar or any ical calendar, highlighting bookings already in your calendar.

From within timetomeet, you visually select on a calendar the times/dates you wish to offer others for a specific meeting. It supports multiple attendees and multiple time zone conversions. You select whether to send the invitees an email with a link from timetomeet or generates a link for you to embed in your own email.

The link takes the invitee to the calendar where they can see the times you've offered and they can select the times they prefer or add their own times. Thereafter timetomeet identifies mutually agreeable times for you to select (or add more times).

I've found this preferable to publishing my calendar for all to see for several reasons
- Most importantly, I will often wish to control the slots people can take so that my meetings are clustered together in time and location.
- Some meetings I have are confidential and I don't necessarily wish to impart who I am meeting. At the very least it's discourteous to your invitee as well.

Sadly my own online calendar app (www.airset.com), which is excellent in most respects, can't be configured to disclose whether slots are simply free/busy in a public calendar. I think that google calendar has the same problem.

I've found timetomeet invaluable in saving time arranging meetings, particularly involving more than one other person. Furthermore, its FREE and your invitees are not required to sign up as users (a practice I detest in other apps).

A similar app, albeit in private beta, is http://www.timebridge.com

I blogged on it here http://greatapps.blogspot.com/2006/12/easier-way-…