Entourage is unlikely to be the best loved application on an Apple Mail fanboy’s blog.

But it does have one feature I like, the “My Day” widget that presents the day’s appointments and tasks in nice little interface. As I’ve said before, reluctantly, it’s a good idea.

Today is an app that does the same thing. It brings the day’s events and jobs together in a handy little interface that is also functional.

It copes well with CalDAV as well as “normal” iCal calendars, soups them up out of iCal and displays them nicely.

Moving the mouse over the items pops up a tool tip containing its notes.

Along the bottom of the interface, buttons allow you to add appointments and tasks directly from the app itself, perform other actions or print out the day’s activities in a handy hard copy.

The app’s preferences are fully-featured, and offer options for menubar display of the app, a global keyboard shortcut and whether or not to display it on top of other windows.

You can also stipulate which calendars to display.

A further pane provides the opportunity to set global alert styles for your appointments. So, for example, you could choose to get a fifteen minute email reminder on all your appointments, rather than hacking through iCal’s interface each time to set it individually. This looks like the most attractive time-saving option of the app to me.

An update (1.8) has just been released that promises improved performance and seamless compatibility with Snow Leopard (as it currently stands).

Today is shareware (USD 15) and is available from the developer’s web site .

All the gain of Entourage without the pain!