About 20 companies including Netscape Communication Corp, Lotus Development Corp and Hewlett-Packard Corp met in Moutain View, California, yesterday to hammer out a standard for Internet calendaring and scheduling protocols. Microsoft Corp was absent, continuing its trend of not appearing at Netscape-ensemble announcements and vice versa. There are at least three different technical drafts up for consideration by the group, including the Versit Consortium’s vCalendar specification. Lotus and Clear Blue Network Systems Inc are promoting their co-authored Internet Calendar Access Protocol (ICAP), which is available from Lotus’ Web site. Netscape says it will ship enterprise scheduling products that adhere to the future standard by year-end. Microsoft did not return phone calls by press time yesterday.
