Tech Tip: Contacts automatically merging on Android phones

Posted on January 13, 2010 by Rushang

Some users report that not all PC contacts sync to their Android device. Or, contacts with similar names are not synchronizing at all.

Here’s what one user reported:

For instance, in Outlook contacts, I have a Jon Lewis, a Jonathan Lewis, and a John Lewis — all with different organizations and different contact info. But CompanionLink only sends the “Jonathan Lewis” info to my Droid.

This might be due to one of the “features” of Android. The device automatically merges similar contacts with the goal of merging potential duplicates.

Here’s how to fix for contacts you feel are missing or automatically merged by Android:

1. Go to the contact in question on the device.
2. Select the “Menu” option.
3. Select the “Separate contacts” option.

This will separate each contact as its own entity. In the John Lewis example above, you will now have three contacts: 1) Jon Lewis, 2) Jonathan Lewis, and 3) John Lewis.

Sort order for names on Android phones

Posted on January 8, 2010 by Rushang

Name sort options for Google and Android phones

Google combines the the first and last names into one “Name” field. For example, if you had a contact record with a first name of “Bob” and last name of “Smith”, Google will combine that into Bob Smith.

Android phones (like Droid, Nexus One, CLIQ, etc.) also do this. But what if you need to sort by “last name, first name” format?

CompanionLink has a new Name Order feature that addresses this with Google and Android-based phones. Users can choose which format they’d like contacts to appear on their Android phone.

Droid user tip to show all contacts

Posted on December 28, 2009 by Rushang

Droid 2.0 users who use CompanionLink USB to sync data may notice that some, or perhaps all, of their contacts do not display on the device after synchronizing. The problem is that the display options on the Droid will typically hide the user’s contacts based on group/category membership. Here is how to fix this problem:

1. On the Droid, open Contacts, then go to Menu -> Display Options.
2. Tap the name of the primary contacts account. This will cause the account group list to display.

– To display categorized contacts, select “System group: My Contacts”.

– To display uncategorized contacts, select “All other contacts”.

NOTE: To filter the display so that it only show certain groups (categories), uncheck “System group: My Contacts”, then check the name(s) of the specific groups you want to display.

How to back up your online Google data

Posted on October 26, 2009 by Rushang

It seems 2009 is the year of online outages. All the major web-based email and collaboration providers have had some glitch or another with their systems. That includes Google, Yahoo (today!), and Hotmail.

The fiasco with the Danger (T-Mobile Sidekick) units is another example of how people nearly lost all their important data.

It never hurts to have a backup of your data on a file on your computer. Never. And doing it takes less than 5 minutes. In fact, you don’t even need to purchase a full version of CompanionLink to do it!

If you use Google, you can just download a 14-day CompanionLink evaluation version from our website and use it to back up your data to desktop software like Outlook, Lotus Notes or Palm Desktop. You can also export it from there to a CSV file or other data format that you can save somewhere safe.

Follow up to Mav 2010 tradeshow (Scottsdale, AZ)

Posted on October 12, 2009 by Rushang

[slideshare id=2202113&doc=mav-slideshare-091012163809-phpapp01]

Take-aways from the tradeshow in Scottsdale:

1. CompanionLink has at least one way to sync ACT! data to all the top smartphones
2. Most smartphones have more than one way to sync with ACT!
3. CompanionLink offers 3 tiers of support

Syncing tasks with Google, Gmail or Google Apps

Posted on August 21, 2009 by Rushang

While Google still hasn’t given us access to their Tasks API (so we can sync Tasks), we’ve created a workaround for the time being. CompanionLink will sync your Tasks in Outlook, Palm Desktop, and other desktop software to your Google calendar as untimed events.

If you have a phone that syncs with your Google account, you can complete the task on your phone by inserting (complete) at the end of the subject of the task.

Original Task:
Task: Send email updates on the new product line

Completed Task:
Task: Send email updates on the new product line (complete)

Keeping private Outlook data out of ACT!

Posted on August 19, 2009 by Rushang

There are two ways that you can keep your private Outlook contacts from synching to ACT!:

1. Keep your private contacts in a separate Outlook folder from your corporate contacts, then configure DoubleLook to sync only with the Outlook folder containing your corporate contacts. You can find this setting under the Outlook Folders tab in the DoubleLook configuration.

– or –

2. In Outlook, categorize your private contacts as “Personal”, then configure DoubleLook to ignore records in the Personal category. You can find this setting under the Personal Category tab in the DoubleLook configuration.

There are two ways that you can prevent your private Outlook contacts from syncing to ACT!:

1. Keep your private contacts in a separate Outlook folder from your corporate contacts. Then configure your CompanionLink product to sync only with the Outlook folder containing your corporate contacts. You can find this setting under the Outlook Folders tab in the software’s configuration.