I have run into a problem when syncing contact categories between Outlook and a BlackBerry 8700 TMO v4.1.0.284/2.0.0.120 with Desktop Manager v4.1. I decided to add categories to my contacts in Outlook (same contacts in the BlackBerry previously had no categories selected) and everything appeared to synchronize with the BlackBerry just fine. Howevery on the next synchronization, those contacts with more than one category selection were marked for change/update in Outlook even though nothing had changed on the BlackBerry. It appears that for some reason, that the BlackBerry merges the categories which Intelisync/Desktop Manager views as a revised new category. For example a contact in Outlook has category selections shown as "Business, Personal" which synchronizes fine with the BlackBerry. However on the next synchronization BlackBerry reports the categories as "Business,Personal" which causes all kinds of problems. It appears that the BlackBerry simply removes the whitespace after the comma and Intelisync/Desktop Manager really doesn't deal well with it. Has anyone seen this problem or know of a fix.

toddz

Toddz,

I have the same problem, and I've seen a half-dozen other folks with the same issue on the Cingular forum ... no solutions there either.

I don't see any other replies to your message. Have you solved this or seen any other posts with a solution?

Thanks.

KJM

If anyone's still reading this thread ... I found a work-around that at least works for me:

* When the BB wants to change the categories in Outlook, Intellisync presents the dialog box: "The following changes will be made to your Outlook Contacts ... 178 changes" (or whatever the number of contacts to be changed is...)

* That same dialog box has an option "Re-sync".

* I clicked "Re-sync" and after reading the data again, Intelli-Sync presented: "The following changes will be made to your handheld address book... 178 changes"

For whatever reason, the "Re-sync" process appears to then favor the Outlook version of the contact(s) categories data.

After the re-synch completed, all the dialog boxes just went away as usual, and the contacts in BB address book have the proper spacing ... i.e. "Personal, Suppliers" instead of "Personal,Suppliers".

Hope this helps, and if anyone discovers a less cumbersome work-around, or better yet a solution, please post!

KJM

i just spoke w/ rimm (wasting another hr + going first through verizon)....this synch problem of contacts w/ multiple categories is a problem known by rimm & there's no current fix...advise was to check their newsletter (under support) for news of a fix....the re-synch "fix" is not good, but it's what i use - you can't change a contact in your bb & have it updated in outlook. also, this process takes >20 minutes for ~1300 contacts.....rimm sucks - you'd think this is an easy problem to fix....wasn't an issue w/ older software version that i had for my 7100t (currently using 7130e, but it's a common problem for many blackberries)

Any update on this? Has anyone heard an ETA on when to expect a fix for the BB to Outlook sync with multiple categories per contact?

Any further developments?

Scott