Help Best way to re-enter entire contact list?

[jjwinc]

I think there's an app in the market for that..I forget the name at the moment..something called groupsrus or something like that..the claim is to be able to assign a ringtone to a gmail contact

It's called Contacts GroupU

Contacts GroupU (Free) - Android app on AppBrain

 

[sremick]

It's called Contacts GroupU

Contacts GroupU (Free) - Android app on AppBrain

Mentioned in the Captivate FAQ already.

Contacts - CapFAQ

Always worth checking there first.

 

[timbuk2]

Ok, if I'm following this right.... I've manually set up contacts in my captivate but do not have all their email address. I've spruced up my Gmail account Address Book that includes all the email addresses. If I sync these two (my phone w/ Gmail) I will see the duplicates, but one set will not contain the email addresses, so I will have to manually delete each one, right?

 

[BookLover]

Ok, if I'm following this right.... I've manually set up contacts in my captivate but do not have all their email address. I've spruced up my Gmail account Address Book that includes all the email addresses. If I sync these two (my phone w/ Gmail) I will see the duplicates, but one set will not contain the email addresses, so I will have to manually delete each one, right?

Umm...not quite, unfortunately.

Gmail is one database.

Your phone contacts (the ones you entered as "phone" in that are NOT in gmail) are in another database.

What Android does is link the two databases together via something common, most likely by name...but each database does NOT *sync* with the other; they remain separate databases...So if you DELETE the phone contact, it goes poof! - no more phone numbers. If you delete the GMAIL contact, it goes poof! - no more emails.

If you want ALL the data resident in ONE database (phone numbers, email, addresses, etc.) -- your best bet is to enter them into GMAIL online. Then instead of deleting the phone contact, you can actually just hide or "not show" phone contacts on your phone, so that all the contacts you "see" on your phone come from gmail.

I had to do this myself. Not fun, but not that bad if you're doing it on the computer. On the phone, it's slow going.

EDIT: One thing you might consider is to EXPORT your PHONE list into VCF and then IMPORT into GMAIL. Then in GMAIL, you can "merge" records. But I can't exactly remember if I did this in Google Voice or GMAIL...but in one of those two Google clouds, I merged the duplicate records into one, as needed.

 

[timbuk2]

Before I read your message, and started to attempt to sync my gmail online with my phone contacts, I noticed that all the names appeared on my phone now (somehow) but many do not have the email addresses that I entered in Gmail. Hmmm. I guess I'll try your last suggestion. I had read to export from Gmail in ldif and import into phone.

 

[timbuk2]

Well, I thought it would be much simpler than this. Everyone I know lives on their iPhones and have all their contacts there with all info. None of them, that I'm familiar with, mounted their phone in any way to get them. I guess I'm really not into all this enough to have all that info anyway. I suppose I should just yield to texting folks, unless they don't have a data plan, then I need to enter their email address on my contacts list so I can email them from the phone if needed. I guess I'm not a smart phone geek yet enough to need it all there. ;-)

 

[sremick]

Or you can export from your phone to vCard, import into Gmail, then delete all your phone contacts and only use Gmail contacts.

 

[reinbeau]

Or you can export from your phone to vCard, import into Gmail, then delete all your phone contacts and only use Gmail contacts.

The problem with that is you lose lots of customization possibilities. It amazes me that Google can't add those features in considering it's all their systems (gmail contacts and Android).

 

[timbuk2]

The problem with that is you lose lots of customization possibilities. It amazes me that Google can't add those features in considering it's all their systems (gmail contacts and Android).

I guess that's what I was thinking... I thought it'd be great to just sync and have all my mutual contacts email addresses and info on my phone... guess I can't without a LOT of time invested. I'll just manually add the email addresses to my phone's contacts that can't receive texts.

Tim

 

[BookLover]

I guess that's what I was thinking... I thought it'd be great to just sync and have all my mutual contacts email addresses and info on my phone... guess I can't without a LOT of time invested. I'll just manually add the email addresses to my phone's contacts that can't receive texts.

Tim

It is a lot of work. But once you do it once, it's done forever, and the sync'ing between phone and gmail *will* work flawlessly...and you have an automatic backup in the cloud of all contact info.

You could just do like 10 a day. Then maybe it won't seem like so much work.

It's worth it in the end

 

[timbuk2]

So the changes I'm making in my online Gmail account will not change on my phone. I have to manually export it then import into my phone correct? I think I'm gonna have to go back and read some stuff all over again. ;-(

 

[sremick]

So the changes I'm making in my online Gmail account will not change on my phone. I have to manually export it then import into my phone correct?

Incorrect. Gmail contacts that originated as Gmail contacts and are syncing to the phone will also sync any changes you make to them, either at the phone end or the Gmail website end.

Phone contacts reside only on the phone, and changes made to them will not affect Gmail, even if the phone contact is being "linked" to the matching Gmail contact.

What you need to be reading is the Captivate FAQ:
Contacts - CapFAQ

 

[timbuk2]

What you need to be reading is the Captivate FAQ:
Contacts - CapFAQ

Yes, I've read it several times and still trying to compare it with what is really happening. When I open Contacts App on phone, some of my contacts were missing and some were missing the linking I had performed to include their email addresses. From the tabs at the top, I choose GROUPS and there is 97 in the unassigned group, no Google, (as mentioned in the FAQ) but seem to have all the updated info I entered into Gmail Online. I also can find contacts in the HISTORY tab that are NOT in my contacts list, although they were. It's becoming more and more confusing all the time, so I'm gonna take a break, come back and read the FAQ once again and see if that helps. Looks like I need to set NOT ASSIGNED group as my default since all that data is correct, but I see no option to do that.

 

[timbuk2]

I've devoted 24 hours to this project, thought I had all my gmail contacts online set up right, with pics and everything, then synced with phone, after a few adjustments, linking etc thought I had it all done. So, I decided I should back up to my SD card and when I did, my entire contact list is screwed. Lots of duplicates again, numbers I had deleted came back etc etc. I'm starting not to like this. Now I have over 500 duplicate NOT ASSIGNED contacts and see no way to delete them except one at a time. This should be easier.

Tim

 

[timbuk2]

I just also noticed that many of my contacts that had NO links but had all the correct information, have about 4 or 5 links each with duplicate info. Not working on this any more until I'm convinced I know how to stop it from changing.

 

[saintdanbert]

But...have they solved the problem yet of Gmail automatically adding every goshforsaken person you ever e-mailed or received an e-mail from into your contacts?
...

In GMAIL, there is a setting that governs automatic adding of email targets to the contact list. In general, it captures any TO: or CC: address as a contact when the setting is on.

Bonne chance,
~~~ 0;-Dan