I claimed earlier, that Calendar synchronization between Google Calendar and Scheduleworld only works one way. But yesterday I read in \\Engtechs very nice guide to synchronization that it works two-ways, consequences were: I had to try again.
At first my results were the same as reported earlier, none of the appointments I had in Scheduleworld would appear in Google Calendar. This however changed when I made a completely new appointment in Scheduleworld which appeared in Google Calendar after a sync. The entire problem was solved by adding a hyphen to all my appointments – and suddenly they all appeared in Google Calendar.
This goes to show two points. First of all, that two-synchronization actually works between the two, making it possible to use Scheduleworld as a middleman for synchronization between Google Calendar and any SynML compatible device, like a cell phone. Second, that this service (in beta) has some weaknesses at the present, making it possible for some appointments to be left out.
After a failure earlier on, I tried syncing Scheduleworld and Google Calendar yesterday and it finally worked. I was hoping (naive - yes) that this could as a middleman providing Google Calendar with the needed Syncml compatibility. In reality I could only make this work one way, exporting from Google Calendar (why they needed my pasword and username I don’t know), and in order to make the synchronization start I had to log in to Scheduleworld and request it.
All in all progress but I don’t really know what to use the one way sync for - unless I’m migrating completely!
A week ago I discussed the possible ways one could sync the cell phone with an external calendar. Here I will show more specific how syncML can be used to synchronize a standard cell phone calendar with Outlook. The advantage by this is that that once it is up and running it is much easier (or at least on the phones I’ve tried) than using infrared or bluetooth, thus giving the user a calendar which is always close by, and backed up on a remote server if the phone should be lost, or your Dell laptop should explode.
In order to achieve this, a few thing are required:
A syncML compatible cell phone (most newer phones, and a lot of the older is)
A working WAP connection (GPRS, 3G or similar)
Outlook (this is possible with other applications too, but this guide is about Outlook).
From here on there are two ways to go, this can either be done for free but with a little more hassle in the setup. Or this can cost a bit of money and then have an easier setup.
The free solution
The only way I could make this work for free, is by using Funambols free syncML plugin for Outlook. Since this is the only free syncML plugin I could find. It seems that this plugin has some issues since I could only make it work with Scheduleworld.com. I would have preferred to use it with zyb.com, since I prefer them to scheduleworld, but I could not make the connection.
The first thing to be done is to make the synchronization between Scheduleworld and the cell phone work. In order to do that one need to start by going to Scheduleworlds website and set up an account. Then the phone needs to be set up (this is very different from phone to phone) with the following values, I can take some time to make it work.
Server url: http://sync.scheduleworld.com/sync4j/sync
User name: (this the costumer number which can be seen by logging in on the website and select preferences)
password: (the same password as selected for the website)
Application URI (often called a variety of things):
calendar:cal
contacs:card
When the synchronization is working between the phone and Scheduleworlds syncML server, it is time to focus on Outlook. The first thing which needs to be done is the installation of Funambols free syncML plugin for Outlook. The next time Outlook is started it will have on more menu called sync4j. In this menu configuration is selected and communications settings, synchronizations settings and Remote settings are set up as shown. With the “xxx..” in the username being the same user number as used when setting up the phone.
The problem with cyb.com’s server with Funambols plugin, was that the plugin crashed every time I tried to sync. If someone else can make that work I would like to know. The paid way
The first thing needed is to setup an account at cyb.com, and get the synchronization connection between the phone and the cyb server. This was actually easier done than said for me, all I had to do is go to zyb.com, and they helped me identify the phone and sent me the settings for the phone by text message.
The next thing to be done is to install and configure a plugin for Outlook. Since the funambol kept crashing, I’ve downloaded a 15 days trial version Nexthause’s Outlook plugin, the full version costs 29 dollars.
Like with cyb things a just a little smoother with this plugin. The first time Outlook is started after installing this plugin, a wizard is started.
At the dialog, shown above, the server is url is set. After that the password and username hs to be set.
In the third dialogue box I choose to test the server setting. When this is choosen the server found the remaining settings itself like shown below.
After pressing “Finish” Outlook starts normally with a synchronize icon appears in the toolbar.
No matter which of the paths has been chosen, at this point one can now get Outlook and the cell phone in sync very fast. Just remember that it is an ecternal server, meaning that if you have made some changes on the cell phone since you last used Outlook you have to start by syncing aswell as end by doing it, and vice versa so that the external server is always up to date.
I’ve been trying to get an overview of how it is possible to sync Google Calender. Here are the main ways I could find/think of. There are some solutions for mobile devices Ipod and Java compatible cell phones, and som solutions for desktop applications Ical and Outlook.
What Google offers is first of all import and export of cvs and ical files, but doing this manually is too much of a hassle. Secondly, they offer the chance to make the calendar available as a feed or a public ical file, but this is read only, which means no two-way syncronisation. Thirdly they offer some more specific services, texting in events via the cell phone, but this does not seem that attractiv to me and they don’t support my service provider.
Ipod users can sync one way with the getcals pc application.
As for the desktop solution by Scheduleworlds, which I mentioned earlier, this does not seem to work. Whenever I try to set it up I get a weird error message.
Since I wrote the post on syncing the cell phone calendars I’ve discovered a few more syncml servers, from reading up on other blogs. Gsmsync is a web based service (although still in beta), where one can sign up, and sync calendar and contacts with the server via syncml. Thereby using the server as interface for the calendar, and backup for contacts. The website looks and functions really well, most of the way, I never recieved the setup sms (until 30 minutes later), so I had to set the settings up by hand. In addition when looking in the documentation it is clear that they are in beta. In time they plan to make it a paid service, but as fare as I could see it is free right now.
ZYB is a service very similar to GSMsync, in the way that they offer a very similar product, calendar and contacts sync via syncml and a nice web interface, for adding appointments and contacts. Contrary to GSMsync their documentation is very good, and it is a free service, which they plan to keep it free, and make their money from selling additional services like outlook integration (I however have a hard time seeing how they will keep users from connecting with Outlook via Funambols free syncml plugin for Outlook).
Of the two ZYB gave the best impression, it worked right out of the box, and even helped the user identify the phone model during the signup, and sending the settings right to the phone. All in all ZYB is in my mind clearly the most consistent solution for syncing the cell phone calendar, making it an best choice for the non-experienced user.
