[wombat88]

Is there any way to sync your Blackberry calendar appointments to an online website such as Gmail without having Outlook installed? I don't want to purchase Outlook.

Mods: Sorry, I just realized this should have gone in the general discussion section. I forgot I was in the Curve section.

[icecold]

Wirelessly posted

Originally Posted by wombat88

Is there any way to sync your Blackberry calendar appointments to an online website such as Gmail without having Outlook installed? I don't want to purchase Outlook.

Mods: Sorry, I just realized this should have gone in the general discussion section. I forgot I was in the Curve section.

Google Sync™ is an app that synchronizes your BlackBerry calendar with your Google™ calendar wirelessly. It synchronizes both ways. Its one of the most useful apps that I have on my BB. You can download it at m.google.com.

[monkeypaw]

Yeah, over the air, automatic syncing of the BB calendar with Google Calendar is fantastic. When I get a plane reservation or car rental reservation in Gmail I go straight to Google Calendar, enter it there and it ends up on my phone automatically.

Yahoo Go! also supossedly allows syncing to Yahoo calendar, but the program used to cause problems for 8320 users. Not sure if that's been fixed.

Oh, just noticed. To be more precise, Google sync works through the data network so requires a data plan. If you're trying to sync via USB to Google calendar, I think there's a way, but it might not be a Google application. Its definitely not as easy as over the air.

[wombat88]

Thanks!!!! I will definitely download that then.

Does Google have anything similar for Contacts, or is there another option for doing that instead of using Outlook? I use Thunderbird for email, and managed to do a workaround to get my Address Book into my Blackberry though not all the fields mapped correctly so I had to do a lot to fix that manually. Now that they are all in there, though, I'm scared of losing them!

These are the times I do miss some features my Treo had, such as backups of everything onto an SD card, and very full-featured backup programs that actually get everything. I do wish that RIM would pay more attention to their Desktop Manager, or alternatively that some third-party software company would develop a program like BackupBuddy if RIM isn't interested in providing that.

[Dubdub]

Originally Posted by wombat88

Thanks!!!! I will definitely download that then.

Does Google have anything similar for Contacts, or is there another option for doing that instead of using Outlook? I use Thunderbird for email, and managed to do a workaround to get my Address Book into my Blackberry though not all the fields mapped correctly so I had to do a lot to fix that manually. Now that they are all in there, though, I'm scared of losing them!

These are the times I do miss some features my Treo had, such as backups of everything onto an SD card, and very full-featured backup programs that actually get everything. I do wish that RIM would pay more attention to their Desktop Manager, or alternatively that some third-party software company would develop a program like BackupBuddy if RIM isn't interested in providing that.

You can set up Desktop Manager/Intellisync to make backups at a regular basis when you connect. I have mine set to make a weekly backup on my laptop.

[wombat88]

But does the backup get all databases? I was under the impression that DM doesn't catch everything. I don't use Outlook so wasn't sure it would back up contacts for me.

[monkeypaw]

Originally Posted by wombat88

But does the backup get all databases? I was under the impression that DM doesn't catch everything. I don't use Outlook so wasn't sure it would back up contacts for me.

The backups are amazingly comprehensive. When my phone fried and I had to warranty exchange it, the restore of the backup was so good it was hard to tell it was a different phone.

If you want, sync your phone contacts over USB to a Yahoo account. It's an option in DM. Then you'll have a backup on your computer, and another backup at Yahoo.

[wombat88]

Originally Posted by icecold

Google Sync™ is an app that synchronizes your BlackBerry calendar with your Google™ calendar wirelessly. It synchronizes both ways. Its one of the most useful apps that I have on my BB. You can download it at m.google.com.

I downloaded the application, but it isn't syncing my calendar from the handheld to Google. I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. The appointments, birthdays, etc. are all there, but Google Calendar is showing nothing. I have three email addressses on my Curve, including Gmail. Most of my appointments are associated with a different email address than Gmail. Will Sync take all of them, or just the ones associated with Gmail? That said, birthdays/anniversaries are associated with all email addresses and those didn't sync either.

Any ideas?

[wombat88]

I did a search at the Google forums and apparently I'm not the only one experiencing issues with syncing the calendar from the Curve to Gmail Calendar. Most people report being unable to sync from the Bb to Gmail Calendar. There were various suggestions, but none of them worked, and people continue to report the same problem but no solutions are posted. Some report that syncing used to work, but does no longer, at least from the Blackberry calendar to Gmail.

What I ended up doing was to set up all of my appointments in Gmail calendar manually. After doing that, I synced and it worked, though I had to go back and delete all the duplicates which was also a pain. I was able to get a test appointment from my Blackberry to Gmail Calendar, but it was a new one. Any appointments I had on my Blackberry already, old or future, would not sync even though I had the setting to 24 weeks. It appears there is an issue with existing appointments, so that even if you update them they won't sync.

I'm hoping it really syncs both ways now, but we'll have to see.

[wombat88]

Originally Posted by monkeypaw

The backups are amazingly comprehensive. When my phone fried and I had to warranty exchange it, the restore of the backup was so good it was hard to tell it was a different phone.

That is good to hear. I'd read at another forum about people losing contacts or appointments when they did backups, but maybe they didn't have things set up correctly.

One thing I did like about the Treo was that my backup program always gave a detailed log, so I could see what was being backed up exactly. It always gave me confidence that a restore would replicate things, though the on-the-fly SD backups were even better since sometimes crashes happened when I didn't have access to my computer backups.

Oh well, new phone, different system. I guess I'll get used to it.

[monkeypaw]

Originally Posted by wombat88

I did a search at the Google forums and apparently I'm not the only one experiencing issues with syncing the calendar from the Curve to Gmail Calendar. Most people report being unable to sync from the Bb to Gmail Calendar. There were various suggestions, but none of them worked, and people continue to report the same problem but no solutions are posted. Some report that syncing used to work, but does no longer, at least from the Blackberry calendar to Gmail.

What I ended up doing was to set up all of my appointments in Gmail calendar manually. After doing that, I synced and it worked, though I had to go back and delete all the duplicates which was also a pain. I was able to get a test appointment from my Blackberry to Gmail Calendar, but it was a new one. Any appointments I had on my Blackberry already, old or future, would not sync even though I had the setting to 24 weeks. It appears there is an issue with existing appointments, so that even if you update them they won't sync.

I'm hoping it really syncs both ways now, but we'll have to see.

Oh yeah, I forgot about that. I'm long past the period when the old ones mattered. It works for new appointments fairly well, but not so well for old ones. Recurring ones may take re-entering.

[wombat88]

Thanks, monkeypaw. I have it set up now so hopefully maintenance from here on out will be not too bad. I do feel better now there's a backup solution of sorts. Thanks again for the tip!

[K McMean]

I am getting a 'login failed' message when trying to sign in and telling me to check my network settings, anyone had this before?

[misthos]

Wirelessly posted

Started getting the login failed as soon as I went to 4.5. I've tried reloading google sync (making sure I set all permissions to allow) but have been unable to find a fix. Maybe an OS 4.5 issue?

[takeshi]

Originally Posted by wombat88

I do wish that RIM would pay more attention to their Desktop Manager, or alternatively that some third-party software company would develop a program like BackupBuddy if RIM isn't interested in providing that.

I have a feeling that they're going to keep DM and BIS in check t avoid competing with BES. One very nice thing about BES is the ability to have wireless backups. A utility to backup to the media card would be very cool though.

Originally Posted by wombat88

But does the backup get all databases? I was under the impression that DM doesn't catch everything. I don't use Outlook so wasn't sure it would back up contacts for me.

If you want to see what the backup utility covers then run it in advanced mode. You can look at each database.