Holy Crap! How did GMail get my contacts?!

[JetJock79]

Hello again everyone,

After asking some questions on here about the Droid X that I want to get,...someone had advised to start a GMail account so I can get things ready to sync my contacts and calendar once I got the phone. I decided to do so last night, and after setting up a new account, and linking it to my BB......I pulled up the contact list and BAM! All my contacts were on GMail!

My question is.....where the hell did GMail pull my contacts from? Did it get them off my phone once I set up a new e-mail account from my phone? Does Google know more about me than they'd like to say? Sorry if this question sounds dumb....but I'm fairly new to Android and Google services. Thanks!

 

[Skatedawg]

Welcome

JetJock79,

Welcome to the world of Android. So im going to assume that you had your contacts transferred onto your phone at the store or whatever. When you make your G-mail account for the first time, it will begin to sync automatically. It all works in the background for you to back up your contacts, calendar, and gmail emails. This is a great community, so feel free to ask questions.

 

[JetJock79]

I don't have the phone yet. I just opened a new GMail account last night, and then set that account up with my BlackBerry (now have both my hotmail and gmal accounts on that phone). Once I set up the gmail account,, and then went on my phone to set it up there so I could get push e-mail......I logged back on to my gmail account after a couple of test e-mails (was checking speed of delivery). I hopped onto the contact list just to start exploring.....and BAM....all my contacts from my phone where on there. I just want to know where Gmail pulled them from because I didn't authorize anything. I'm not upset, just curious. Did they come from my phone, or did Gmail pull from my Outlook?

 

[davidnc]

I also set up my gmail account before I got my android phone . I had a blackberry , I did not set up from my phone tho .

While I dont know what the entire process you used I would guess that at somepoint you allowed gmail access to your contacts since as you said you was setting it up from your blackberry.

So having said that it got your contacts from your phone not outlook would be my "guess"

 

[.46caliber]

I don't have the phone yet. I just opened a new GMail account last night, and then set that account up with my BlackBerry (now have both my hotmail and gmal accounts on that phone). Once I set up the gmail account,, and then went on my phone to set it up there so I could get push e-mail......I logged back on to my gmail account after a couple of test e-mails (was checking speed of delivery). I hopped onto the contact list just to start exploring.....and BAM....all my contacts from my phone where on there. I just want to know where Gmail pulled them from because I didn't authorize anything. I'm not upset, just curious. Did they come from my phone, or did Gmail pull from my Outlook?

I don't know for sure, cause I've never used a BB, but I would imagine that as you were setting up with Gmail on the BB is when the contacts were pulled from the phone. That would be the only place they could come from.

When you synced your BB to Gmail, you weren't just syncing the email address and emails to the phone. Gmail synced everything. It shares the emails on Gmail with the phone, it shares contacts, calendars everything. It just does it. Welcome to free email that does what you want it to do without you having to work hard for it.

 

[davidnc]

Yeah , most like that is what happen , I did download the google app for gmail onto my blackberry to sync my numbers to my gmail account in preparing for my android device.

That sounds like what the OP did .

When I did that and logged back into my gmail afterwards all my contacts where there and did not have my android phone then either at that time.

 

[Topweasel]

Yeah it has to be using the BB Gmail program, I had BIS getting all of my email and it never did that.

 

[Skatedawg]

I had a Blackberry for a while before i had an Android phone. This is more than likely happening because when you set it up on your BB the Gmail enhanced plugin did its job in syncing your contacts. Im not 100% on this but im pretty sure thats the case. Regardless, You have your contacts backed up on google and more than likely you have it on your blackberry desktop manager as well for "Just in case" purposes. If you have any more questions feel free to PM me or reply.

 

[JetJock79]

I just thought I'd update this for anyone else searching this same subject in the future;

Two hours ago, I added a contact to my phone. I just got home a little while ago, and logged onto Gmail so I could write an e-mail to that person. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw the person already in my contacts!! I guess my phone will update the contact list automatically OTA!! This is incredible to me because I've been dealing with services where you had to update things manually! Android and Google is something else!! I can see a long and happy future for me with them!

 

[alpha752]

most likley there is an app running on your BB, like Google Sync that sits in the background and syncs your contacts, calender, and email. When I switched from BB to Android thats how I did it. I ran Google Sync on the BB to connect it to my gmail, and that was that.

 

[JetJock79]

I haven't installed google sync....and unless it came wrapped up in the hybrid I'm running on it now,.....then it's not. I linked my BB to my Gmail account via the e-mail settings page on the phone.

(just checked the apps on the phone that are hidden, and no google sync)

 

[carlos31820]

I haven't installed google sync....and unless it came wrapped up in the hybrid I'm running on it now,.....then it's not. I linked my BB to my Gmail account via the e-mail settings page on the phone.

(just checked the apps on the phone that are hidden, and no google sync)

Blackberry Internet Service (BIS) had supported Gmail contact sync for a while now. However, it used to be turned off by default. Log into your BIS account and look at the settings for your newly added Gmail account. At the bottom of the screen there should be a check box for contact sync.



Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk

 

[dgs2000]

I haven't installed google sync....and unless it came wrapped up in the hybrid I'm running on it now,.....then it's not. I linked my BB to my Gmail account via the e-mail settings page on the phone.

(just checked the apps on the phone that are hidden, and no google sync)

I believe google/gmail contact (and calendar) sync has been added to blackberry internet service (aka BIS), so out no longer requires the dedicated google sync app. You should see am option for this on your carrier's bis portal or on the email settings app on your bb.

Btw, while it sounds like bb is improving their google sync capability, this has always worked PERFECTLY on Android our of the box, so things will be just fine on your Dx. Just saved youself a step

 

[JetJock79]

Thanks as usual! This is going to make my switch over to Android easier and excting. At the end of the month when my early upgrade comes into play.....I'm going to quickly switch over to the Droid X.......thanks again!