Help "My Contacts" vs "All Contacts" in GMail

[SDscorch]

ugh!! too many contacts!

its BOGGING down my phone!!



last night i went through and got rid of a TON of contacts - i went from ~2500 to inside of 1700

but.. when i checked on my phone how many contacts it was looking at (go to People, menu, view - it totalizes how many are in which category: Google, Phone, Exch Active Sync)



??

what happened with all my deleting?? didn't it take effect?? well, maybe by the morning it will be all synced up


nope! all 2600 there!!





so... i looked in my contacts in gmail - i have 1655 in "my contacts - and a LOT more in "all contacts"


now.. HOW do i get rid of all those extra contacts that i don't need??

also, there's no easy way to see what groups any given contact is a member of - you have to click on each one to look inside




i'm thnking i could do this... export (and save) everyone in "my contacts" - then DELETE "my contacts" --- whatever is left over is "all contacts"

then move those over to any particular group(s) that's appropriate - and delete the rest


in the end, re-import all of my contacts that i had originally taken out (my contacts)





can anyone else suggest a different way to do this??

 

[romeosidvicious]

ugh!! too many contacts!

its BOGGING down my phone!!



last night i went through and got rid of a TON of contacts - i went from ~2500 to inside of 1700

but.. when i checked on my phone how many contacts it was looking at (go to People, menu, view - it totalizes how many are in which category: Google, Phone, Exch Active Sync)



??

what happened with all my deleting?? didn't it take effect?? well, maybe by the morning it will be all synced up


nope! all 2600 there!!





so... i looked in my contacts in gmail - i have 1655 in "my contacts - and a LOT more in "all contacts"


now.. HOW do i get rid of all those extra contacts that i don't need??

also, there's no easy way to see what groups any given contact is a member of - you have to click on each one to look inside




i'm thnking i could do this... export (and save) everyone in "my contacts" - then DELETE "my contacts" --- whatever is left over is "all contacts"

then move those over to any particular group(s) that's appropriate - and delete the rest


in the end, re-import all of my contacts that i had originally taken out (my contacts)





can anyone else suggest a different way to do this??

Are you syncing only "My Contacts" because by default "All Contacts" is synced as well. You can choose to sync only specific groups of contacts and make some very small groups pretty easily.

Yes the groups interface sucks on the phone and in gmail but perhaps it will get better.

 

[romeosidvicious]

People -> Groups -> Menu -> Sync Groups will let you choose what groups to sync.

 

[SDscorch]

thankyou-thankyou-thankyou-thankyou!

i think that's just what i'm looking for!!

 

[t1jordan]

ugh!! too many contacts!

its BOGGING down my phone!!



last night i went through and got rid of a TON of contacts - i went from ~2500 to inside of 1700

but.. when i checked on my phone how many contacts it was looking at (go to People, menu, view - it totalizes how many are in which category: Google, Phone, Exch Active Sync)



??

what happened with all my deleting?? didn't it take effect?? well, maybe by the morning it will be all synced up


nope! all 2600 there!!





so... i looked in my contacts in gmail - i have 1655 in "my contacts - and a LOT more in "all contacts"


now.. HOW do i get rid of all those extra contacts that i don't need??

also, there's no easy way to see what groups any given contact is a member of - you have to click on each one to look inside




i'm thnking i could do this... export (and save) everyone in "my contacts" - then DELETE "my contacts" --- whatever is left over is "all contacts"

then move those over to any particular group(s) that's appropriate - and delete the rest


in the end, re-import all of my contacts that i had originally taken out (my contacts)





can anyone else suggest a different way to do this??

Im having a problem with too many contacts aswell. im not sure what to do about it. I am syncing with outlook. I think im going to stop syncing contacts with outlook.

 

[SDscorch]

Im having a problem with too many contacts aswell. im not sure what to do about it. I am syncing with outlook. I think im going to stop syncing contacts with outlook.

well.. number one, go through your contacts in Gmail and get rid of ones you don't need (note: export and save all of your Gmail contacts first! it only takes a second!!)



additionally, you can do what RSV just recommended...

People -> Groups -> Menu -> Sync Groups will let you choose what groups to sync.

that means, you've got ppl in your contacts separated into groups, his method above indicates a means to sync only certain groups to your phone



for me, these techniques work

 

[pdragon]

People -> Groups -> Menu -> Sync Groups will let you choose what groups to sync.

Thanks!

 

[abourne]

Okay, the heart of this issue hasn't been answered.

At Google's help forum here, it states the following:

All Contacts vs My Contacts on iPhone - Google Mobile Help

3) Google only syncs My Contacts because those are the contacts you've manually added to your contact list. If you look at your All Contacts, you'll see that some of those email addresses haven't been added to My Contacts.

-----------------------

I wish this was the case with my HTC Hero.

On my Android device, it's syncing All Contacts.

I only want it to sync My Contacts.

Please help. I want my Android phone to stop syncing All Contacts, and only sync My Contacts.

On the iPhone and iPod Touch, My Contacts, not All Contact, sync.

For some reason, the HTC Hero isn't doing this properly.

 

[brandiem09]

Go into Google Mail on your computer, remove all of the contacts that you don't want to sync with your phone from the "My Contacts" list.
Your phone will only sync "My Contacts"

In my Gmail, all of my contacts were in "My Contacts" for some odd reason.

I had the same issue, removed what I didn't want, no more problems.

 

[SDscorch]

I wish this was the case with my HTC Hero.

On my Android device, it's syncing All Contacts.

I only want it to sync My Contacts.

Please help. I want my Android phone to stop syncing All Contacts, and only sync My Contacts.

On the iPhone and iPod Touch, My Contacts, not All Contact, sync.

For some reason, the HTC Hero isn't doing this properly.

so wait.. you're saying...

People -> Groups -> Menu -> Sync Groups

...doesn't work??





because it does for me

i see all my groups, and a check mark next to each one


additionally, i see one of my choices that says.... "sync all contacts"

(psst! its the TOP one!)



and guess what - i UNchecked that one

and guess what else - ALL of my contacts don't get synced


just the ones that i want synced




??

 

[abourne]

Go into Google Mail on your computer, remove all of the contacts that you don't want to sync with your phone from the "My Contacts" list.

Yes, I do that. I do a manual clean-up from time to time. This is both tedious and cumbersome.

However, the problem remains that every time I send or receive from a new email address, or one that's not currently in my contacts, it keeps getting added to "All Contacts", and the problem re-occurs.

Your phone will only sync "My Contacts"

This is not true. My phone, HTC Hero, still syncs with "All Contacts". The cleanup we've discussed above does not change the sync path from "All Contacts" to "My Contacts".

In my Gmail, all of my contacts were in "My Contacts" for some odd reason.

Probably because it's not picking up new ones.

I had the same issue, removed what I didn't want, no more problems.

Yes, again, I remove them. But as I use Gmail frequently, these annoying email addresses keep popping into "All Contacts", and hence, creeping into my HTC Hero contact list.

I'm still looking for a way to make this stop.

.

 

[abourne]

People -> Groups -> Menu -> Sync Groups

Now I think I've got it!

"People" - I see you mean the picture of the people.

"Groups" - Yes, I see it says "Groups" at the top of the screen.

"Menu" - Yes, now when in this screen, I click on the "Menu" button.

"Sync Groups" - Yes, now I click on the "Sync Groups" button.

All list appears as follows:

1) Sync All contacts
2) My Contacts
3) Group Name #1
4) Group Name #2
5) Group Name #3
etc.

Because "Sync All contacts" was checked, all below were checked.

I de-selected "Sync All contacts"

I selected "My Contacts" as the only one to be checked.

Since "My contacts" has all the contacts I want to be sync'd, I left this one as the only one to be checked.

I think the problem is now resolved.

Mission Accomplished.

Thank you SDscorch!

 

[abourne]

Now that we've reached clarification on this matter, who here finds the "All Contacts" feature in Gmail annoying when they automatically add email addresses as you send/receive email with new email addresses and they automatically put them into "All Contacts".

Personally, I wish there was an option to opt-out of this.

 

[MrBazar]

My Hero (Sprint) only displays two options under the menu in the groups section. Add or delete group...

 

[abourne]

I have three:

Add group | Delete Groups | Sync Groups

 

[SDscorch]

abourne.. i think yeah, you might have a bug of some kind

but its probably inside gmail - i would bring this up in the gmail area (look for "report gmail bug" in the upper right hand corner when you're in gmail)

if you're doing all that and you still get all of your contacts (or, like it sounds like you're saying, as you email to contacts they get migrated into "My Contacts").. that's definitely a problem and somethings not working the way its supposed to

!

 

[abourne]

SDscorch, not a problem. The All contacts are not automatically transferring to My contacts in Gmail. Now that I've set the sync settings on my HTC, everything is good to go.

My preference would be for an opt-out or way to prevent email addresses from automatically being added to All contacts.

It would be nice if there was a way to list contacts in All contacts that are not in My contacts as a quick and easy way to delete them.

 

[SDscorch]

It would be nice if there was a way to list contacts in All contacts that are not in My contacts as a quick and easy way to delete them.

yes! good point!!

at one time - when they first came out with this, there was a way to see those "other" contacts that just automatically got saved

you could look at that list and pick and choose (and also delete) from the list and move them to "My Contacts"

not any more



here's an idea... Google has a "product ideas" web page - i'm going to add it to the list - other ppl will vote on it

i think its a good idea!




direct link to Call Management / Contact Management area...

Google Product Ideas

 

[abourne]

Yes, I've started a discussion about in the Google Support Forum here:

Is there any way to opt-out, or prevent the automatically adding of email addresses into "All Contacts"? - Gmail Help

 

[sdague]

Thank you so much for sorting this out. The All Contacts sync thing was driving me nuts, now life is good.

 

[abourne]

Yes, I've posted a summary here:

http://androidforums.com/htc-hero/13892-my-contacts-vs-all-contacts-how-not-sync-all-contacts.html

Or the "Mission Accomplished" post here:

http://androidforums.com/82161-post3.html

It's actually the HTC Hero that has the "All Contacts" sync set as the default. Perhaps we should tell HTC to change the default to "My Contacts".

.

 

[n8man1068]

Now that we've reached clarification on this matter, who here finds the "All Contacts" feature in Gmail annoying when they automatically add email addresses as you send/receive email with new email addresses and they automatically put them into "All Contacts".

Personally, I wish there was an option to opt-out of this.

annoying. Especially when you have several years of various contacts. I had 4+ contact entries from some people on my phone. Came here/joined to figure out how to better my 'Google Experience'. haha

 

[klugg]

My Hero (Sprint) only displays two options under the menu in the groups section. Add or delete group...

The same on my Samsung Galaxy S. Any sollution for us on this annoying issue?

 

[whitesoxxx]

My Hero (Sprint) only displays two options under the menu in the groups section. Add or delete group...

this is the same on the EVO or any phone with HTC Sense UI I believe.

I flashed my phone earlier and forgot how I got to the setting and stumbled upon this thread with no apparent solution.... but I figured it out

Open People > Menu > View > Only contacts with phone numbers

This will remove the erroneous email addresses that were previously synced to your phone. Doubt anyone in this thread cares anymore but I thought it would be best to give a solution for future google searchers