Google Calendar Sync Questions... Help!!!

[r4614]

LOVE my new Droid... I'm a gal who never even learned to use the camera on any of my previous phones, just used them for phone calls, so this thing seems like MAGIC!

One thing will determine whether the Droid ends up being life-changing or just cool... I need to work out some calendar issues! Two calendar related questions:

1. Can anyone help me to resolve a sync problem? I'll try to explain my issue as clearly as I can... when I got my Droid, my Google calendar events magically showed up on the phone. Up until now, I only had a few personal things on my Google calendar. Since I'm now hoping to have only my work calendar on the phone, I went on my computer and deleted all events so I could start with a clean slate.

Calendar is now clear when checked on my computer and clear when checked on the browser on the Droid, but when I click on the calendar icon on the home screen of the Droid, all of the old calendar events are still there. To see if it just wasn't syncing, I tried adding an event on the Droid and on the computer, and both showed up. Just the old events won't go away. Anyone know what's up with that and how to resolve it?

2. I'm also interested to hear if Google calendar is buggy in general or has a lot of syncing issues. I'm using what my clients refer to as "the last Palm Pilot on earth" to schedule appointments and I live in fear of some horrible incident that would incapacitate both my Palm Pilot and the computer I sync it to (the girl's got issues, what can I say?). I got the Droid thinking that the solution to my problem would be using the calendar on the phone so it would back up to Google calendar and I'd have all my info safe and sound.

Now that I'm having an issue with the calendars not syncing properly, I'd worry that a scheduled or deleted event might not show up on the calendar, which would be a disaster in my line of work. Do any of you successfully use this calendar setup?

As you've probably determined, I am technologically challenged, so please dumb your answers down for me as much as possible!

Thanks!!

 

[Christine]

Have you tried deleting the calendar widget and then reinstalling it? If you don't know how to do that, tap and hold the calendar widget on your home screen. The apps banner now turns into a trash can. Drag the widget to the trash can to get rid of the widget. Now add the widget back to your home screen. This might be all it takes. I have found with google calendar that sometimes it's easier to add an event than it is to delete it; for instance, I have my facebook events synced to google calendar. I deleted several events from facebook but I can't for the life of me get them to disappear from my google calendar.

 

[ajm144k]

about your 1)... you can sync your calendar with specific calendars of yours, and other common calendars such as "us holidays". use the online google calendar from your desktop to set up which separate calendars you want to show up on your calendar.

to sync them to your droid, go to calendar > settings > more > my calendars and choose which ones you want your droid to sync with from online. if you have a separate work calendar with work events in there, make sure its selected and it will sync between your droid and online.

 

[r4614]

Thanks for the responses. I tried trashing the widget... it only disappeared from the home screen, but remained on the screen that pops up from the bottom of the home screen. I took it from there and put it back on the home screen... is that how I would delete and reinstall or did I do something wrong? The calendar still shows all of the deleted events...

This is driving me nuts!

 

[stevehoffman]

r4614, I hear ya! Like you, I've been a stalwart Palm pilot user up until getting the Droid a few days ago and am still getting the hang of the whole smartphone thing -- it's really leaving my comfort zone to stop using my Palm T/X !

And like you, I'm a helluva lot more concerned about things like syncing up my calendars (both personal & business stuff) than I am about a lot of bells & whistles and games and multimedia apps that seem to excite many people. To me the #1 point of a smartphone needs to be to organize, manage, and access my contacts and my calendars!

I cannot answer your question directly but I can tell you two things that might perhaps help:

One, I thought my Droid-to-PC syncing of Google calendar was buggy, but then I noticed that they WERE syncing up -- it just didn't always happen instantly. Have you tried entering/deleting calendar items on the Droid and/or your PC and then checking back, say, 10 minutes later? You might be pleasantly surprised.

Second, I found that one of the best places to get answers to questions re: Google Calendars is not necessarily on Android forums but on the Google Calendar help pages ( Google Calendar Help ), which tend to be written in pretty clear, NON-techy English -- and also on the Google Calendar user forum ( Calendar Help ) .

Hope this helps a wee bit!

 

[Christine]

r4614 - Sounds like you tried my suggestion and it didn't work. I wasn't sure about it but it was worth giving a shot, no? I will say that the deleted facebook events eventually got removed for me, it just took a few days. And I've never had the delay go the other way (I've never added something to the calendar and not had it show up immediately elsewhere).

Unrelated: If you like the life-simplifying side of the Droid, may I suggest the Cloudlist app? I downloaded all the free list-making apps to try them all out, and I thought this one was the best.

 

[r4614]

Ha! So I'm NOT the last Palm Pilot user on earth... good to know!

The syncing is definitely happening to some degree, since I did test events that showed up on both calendars. The only thing that didn't seem to respond to syncing is that the original events that I deleted from the calendar to clear it are all still there when I access the calendar from the icon on the Droid home screen... really weird.

Good tip about trying Google Calendar Help... thanks.


Christine - Yeah, I thought your original tip sounded like the perfect fix... just wondered if I was doing something wrong. Oh, well.

Glad to hear you haven't had problems with events not being added... that's my biggest concern.

I'm off to check out Cloudlist now... sounds great!

 

[PittCaleb]

I started a thread a few days ago now - I use Google Calendar and have multiple calendars (family) members shared and see them all in Google Calendar. I can NOT however add them on my Droid. Any thoughts?

Here's one thing, and I may have to play with this myself, all the calendars come from Google Apps / Domain accounts. I can see them from regular Gmail user account, but not on Droid. Any thoughts? Has anyone successfully 'seen' multiple calendars on their Droid? Perhaps my problem is it won't let me see other Apps/Domain calendars.

PittCaleb

 

[Babinyecz]

I hope this helps:

I had the same exact issue with Google calendar acting all goofy on me, it was driving me crazy, I too have the droid. They way I got it to finally sync correctly for me was to remove the calendar from the droid. If you are in the calendar, touch the menu button --> More --> My Calendars --> Touch menu again and select remove calendars. Once you have done this all events should be off the droid. Once this is done go to google and create a new calendar, export from one calendar and import it into the new calendar you created. Once that is done go back on your droid and add the new calendar. You can do it by doing the previous steps I just went through but you have to add calendar instead of remove calendar. This should bring up all your events. If you would like to revert to your original calendar you then have to remove the second calendar you created from the droid import the calendar back to the original and update. I know it is painful but I got it to work for me! I hope this helps.

 

[spectrrr]

I started a thread a few days ago now - I use Google Calendar and have multiple calendars (family) members shared and see them all in Google Calendar. I can NOT however add them on my Droid. Any thoughts?

Here's one thing, and I may have to play with this myself, all the calendars come from Google Apps / Domain accounts. I can see them from regular Gmail user account, but not on Droid. Any thoughts? Has anyone successfully 'seen' multiple calendars on their Droid? Perhaps my problem is it won't let me see other Apps/Domain calendars.

PittCaleb

I can see my multiple calendars just fine. HOWEVER I think they are all coming from one google account.

Come to think of it... I had a calendar showing the Patriots schedule that I added (clearly not mine) and it's NOT showing up... so I think you are correct about that..... hmmmmmm

 

[r4614]

Babinyecz - Thanks for posting the solution you found. I'll give it a try when I work up my nerve. I'm a chicken about this stuff... always afraid I'll hit the wrong button or something and really mess myself up!

 

[r4614]

Hey, it worked!!

Now if only I can figure out how to transfer my Palm Desktop info to Google calendar... I have it on a Mac, which seems to eliminate a lot of options. Ugh.

 

[stevehoffman]

r4614 -- As a fellow Palm user, I looked into ways to seamlessly transfer my Palm info -- calendar and contacts -- into Google Calendar and GMail so as to be able to sync everything with my Droid as smoothly as buttered velvet.

However, every method for transferring Palm stuff into Google stuff -- and I use the term "stuff" in its highly technical sense ;-) -- seemed fraught with complications to me. Kinda like asking how to change a lightbulb and being told, "first, go to main circuit board and rewire it" Not the answer I wanted to hear, as a non-techy ...

If you want, I can forward you the responses I found on other forums about the Palm-to-Google transfer .... I cut 'n' past them into emails so privately email me at goodnote.steve AT gmail.com and I'll forward the emails to you.

 

[PittCaleb]

I believe I have solved my calendar issues.

Problem: Google Apps for your Domain accounts, calendar's appear on my @gmail account, but not Droid, via sharing.

Using another @gmail account, not a Google Apps/Domain account, I entered some calendar info, shared it, saw it on my gmail account as a shared calendar - then checked on the Droid.

When I went into Add calendar, the newly shared @gmail calendar was there, I checked it and immediately the events were on my Droid Calendar.

I had edit access to this calendar, so I also successfully created an event that appeared then on the proper calendar for both the user and seen via share on my @gmail account.

So i believe the problem is Google Apps/Domain integration with traditional gmail. I will be migrating from using apps/domains to log in and read mail by forwarding all messages from that account to my gmail account and just using that one so my mail, calendars, apps, voice, etc are all in one place and all useable by the Droid.

Hope this problem solving helps others.

PittCaleb

 

[stevehoffman]

PittCaleb --

I think I get what you're saying, but can you explain one thing to those of us who are still in the "Android for Dummies" phase of the learning curve: what do you mean by a "Google Apps/Domain account" as opposed to a @gmail.com .....?

Thanks!
Steve H.

 

[PittCaleb]

what do you mean by a "Google Apps/Domain account" as opposed to a @gmail.com .....?

I own my own Internet domain (a few actually). Rather than deal with e-mail on my own, off my own servers, etc. Google has a way to allow mail going to your domain to be redirected to google's servers. That service used to be called "Google for your Domain" and is now simply called "Google Apps"

Unfortunately, Google Apps, although awesome, is not fully integrated and equal to a full/general/generic "gmail" account. My Google Apps account, has email (mail comes in and goes out as myname@mydomain.com, not @gmail.com), calendar and Docs (word processor, spreadsheet, etc.)

As most gmail users know, a general gmail account has mail, calendar & docs PLUS Google Voice, reader, picasa, web, news, etc. A lot more.

On the droid, under accounts/sync, I can sync my gmail calendar, contacts & gmail. For my Apps account, I can only sync my contacts & gmail, no calendar.

So what I had done was "share" my Apps calendar with my gmail account. I see said calendar over at gmail.com - it shows all my appointments, etc. But the Droid would not "see" those events, even though they were visible on the web gmail interface. That's why I posted the q's.

Earlier today I decided to share a calendar with a "generic" gmail user, and immediately I was able to see and edit events on that calendar. Thus, I believe the problem the entire time was that the Android Operating System is not "seeing" things from Google Apps and Google Apps accounts just aren't seen in the same light by Google as a "basic" or "generic" gmail account.

Long story short - if you're using Google Apps/Domain and having problems, try migrating your data to a traditional gmail account and see if you have the same problems. From my experience, I bet they'll go away.

Cheers & Good Luck,
PittCaleb

 

[ltcxprt]

love my new droid... I'm a gal who never even learned to use the camera on any of my previous phones, just used them for phone calls, so this thing seems like magic!

One thing will determine whether the droid ends up being life-changing or just cool... I need to work out some calendar issues! Two calendar related questions:

1. Can anyone help me to resolve a sync problem? I'll try to explain my issue as clearly as i can... When i got my droid, my google calendar events magically showed up on the phone. Up until now, i only had a few personal things on my google calendar. Since i'm now hoping to have only my work calendar on the phone, i went on my computer and deleted all events so i could start with a clean slate.

Calendar is now clear when checked on my computer and clear when checked on the browser on the droid, but when i click on the calendar icon on the home screen of the droid, all of the old calendar events are still there. To see if it just wasn't syncing, i tried adding an event on the droid and on the computer, and both showed up. Just the old events won't go away. Anyone know what's up with that and how to resolve it?

2. I'm also interested to hear if google calendar is buggy in general or has a lot of syncing issues. I'm using what my clients refer to as "the last palm pilot on earth" to schedule appointments and i live in fear of some horrible incident that would incapacitate both my palm pilot and the computer i sync it to (the girl's got issues, what can i say?). I got the droid thinking that the solution to my problem would be using the calendar on the phone so it would back up to google calendar and i'd have all my info safe and sound.

Now that i'm having an issue with the calendars not syncing properly, i'd worry that a scheduled or deleted event might not show up on the calendar, which would be a disaster in my line of work. Do any of you successfully use this calendar setup?

As you've probably determined, i am technologically challenged, so please dumb your answers down for me as much as possible!

Thanks!!

have the identical problem.. Have u gotten an answeryet? .it seems there should be one answerr not all these try this????