Quick Questions

[Strygun]

Hey folks,

My Incredible is on track for delivery this week, and I'm excited. This is my first android phone. I'm a big Google user, and have my Gmail account as my main email.

Here are a few questions I have:

1) I've read that when you first log in on an Android phone, it syncs your Google contacts (www.google.com/contacts) with the phone. How can I prevent it from doing that? I don't want it to, considering that Google Contacts currently sucks. It adds everyone I've ever emailed (or who has emailed me) to a giant contact list. Most of them are random and I don't even know who they are. Obviously, I don't want those created as contacts on my phone.

2) Can you have more than one Gmail account set up for emails? I use a personal Gmail account for my email, but my school uses a Google Apps account. Can I differentiate between the two, and have different icons/folders for them? I don't want all my emails from both accounts in one view.

 

[Adiliyo]

1. i believe you can turn off the contact sync, but i haven't check on it or tried it before, so not 100% sure

2. yes, you can have multiple gmail accounts and switch between them. there is no unified gmail inbox.

 

[Duvi]

1. You can choose not to sync the Contacts, Calendars and/or Mail.
2. Yes. I currently have my three Gmail accounts and my Google Apps email (for my business) set up.

 

[Strygun]

Thanks guys, here's another question.

I'm currently using a BB Curve 8330 on VZW. Unfortunately, VZW's BackupAssistant is not available for this phone, so I can't just upload all my contacts to VZW to ease the transition to my new Incredible.

I regularly backup my phone on my computer using the Desktop Manager. Unfortunately, that does not explicitly separate my contacts into a csv file (which I'm assuming I'll need to use.)

From what I've read, the best way to cleanly and efficiently transfer my contacts is to somehow get them into my Google Contacts so that when the phone syncs, it will sync correctly. So, ultimately, my question is this: how can I export a CSV list of my BB contacts so that I can then transfer them into Gmail?

Thanks!

 

[rion_j]

perhaps, you should clean up your contacts as well. i did this myself, as i merged mail awhile back from yahoo/hotmail into g-mail and it created a ton of contacts. so, now that it's all clean, i'm interested to see how the import goes with the gmail contacts

 

[Adiliyo]

you can use the google sync app (go to m.google.com on your BB browser) and it will upload all your contacts to gmail

if you really want a csv file, sync your blackberry with something like outlook and export a csv from there.

 

[Strygun]

perhaps, you should clean up your contacts as well. i did this myself, as i merged mail awhile back from yahoo/hotmail into g-mail and it created a ton of contacts. so, now that it's all clean, i'm interested to see how the import goes with the gmail contacts

Yeah, I'm kind of in a pickle. I cleaned up my Google Contacts last night in prep for the switch. There are about 130 contacts listed there, ALL of them just email addresses and names which have been automatically created by Gmail. I don't want to delete them from my contacts because I might want to email them in the future. HOWEVER, I do NOT want most of those to be synced to my phone, because they are just random people's emails, most of whom I do NOT have as Phone Contacts on my phone.

I'm trying to figure out the best way to get those synced up properly.

 

[Adiliyo]

there are groups in gmail's contacts.

you should be able to throw all those random emails into a specific group and tell the phone not to sync it (or tell it to only sync my contacts and clean it up that way)

i'm pretty sure there is an option to do that, but i don't have an android phone on me atm to confirm.

 

[mcaspe1]

Thanks guys, here's another question.

I'm currently using a BB Curve 8330 on VZW. Unfortunately, VZW's BackupAssistant is not available for this phone, so I can't just upload all my contacts to VZW to ease the transition to my new Incredible.

I regularly backup my phone on my computer using the Desktop Manager. Unfortunately, that does not explicitly separate my contacts into a csv file (which I'm assuming I'll need to use.)

From what I've read, the best way to cleanly and efficiently transfer my contacts is to somehow get them into my Google Contacts so that when the phone syncs, it will sync correctly. So, ultimately, my question is this: how can I export a CSV list of my BB contacts so that I can then transfer them into Gmail?



Thanks!

I found a couple of ways to do it. In Desktop Manager (DM) go to sync and sync with your outlook on your pc. From the outlook you can export them to a csv file then import them to google. Or, you can change the options to sync with Yahoo. Set it to go from handheld to yahoo. After the sync with yahoo, export the yahoo contacts to a csv then import that csv to google. Wallah. Worked perfectly for me.

 

[rhippler]

If you look at your contacts in gmail you will see an 'all contacts' and a 'My contacts'. all is where it dumps all the acquired contacts but I am pretty sure it only syncs the my contacts list with the phone. This is the way it is working on my blackberry.

 

[Strygun]

there are groups in gmail's contacts.

you should be able to throw all those random emails into a specific group and tell the phone not to sync it (or tell it to only sync my contacts and clean it up that way)

i'm pretty sure there is an option to do that, but i don't have an android phone on me atm to confirm.

If you could check on that, that would be great. That would be an easy solution to the problem.

If you look at your contacts in gmail you will see an 'all contacts' and a 'My contacts'. all is where it dumps all the acquired contacts but I am pretty sure it only syncs the my contacts list with the phone. This is the way it is working on my blackberry.

Can I specify on Android that I DON'T want it to sync "My Contacts"? If I manage to get all my BB contacts uploaded to Google Contacts, I will put them in a specific "Phone Contacts" group and then have it sync just that group.

 

[Adiliyo]

open People/contacts
go to Groups tab, and press menu shows the option "Sync Groups".
press that and it gives the options:
- Sync all contacts
- My Contacts

So, untick 'Sync all', hit save

that sounds about right (i found it on google's support groups and edited it for clarity)

it's for the hero/eris, but the principle should be the same (some names may change however, but it should at least get you started)



it seems like it's either you sync everything, or you sync my contacts though.

 

[Tagged]

If you just want your current phone contacts you can great a new gmail account and sync to that account from your BB. Then first link to that gmail account on your DI and poof, you only have your old BB contacts.

Then turn off auto sync and switch over to your mail gmail account.

Also, I do not have a DI yet but nomally the google sync app only syncs with your "my contacts" not "all contacts" as someone said earlier. It is also a great time to sort thru your contacts on gmail!

 

[Strygun]

open People/contacts
go to Groups tab, and press menu shows the option "Sync Groups".
press that and it gives the options:
- Sync all contacts
- My Contacts

So, untick 'Sync all', hit save

it seems like it's either you sync everything, or you sync my contacts though.

Yeah, I saw this on the Google support as well. I'm wondering if it really is restricted to just sync all or my contacts or other groups that I make. If you could select specific groups, that would be GREAT. Can anyone with groups check this?

 

[Strygun]

If you just want your current phone contacts you can great a new gmail account and sync to that account from your BB. Then first link to that gmail account on your DI and poof, you only have your old BB contacts.

Then turn off auto sync and switch over to your mail gmail account.

Also, I do not have a DI yet but nomally the google sync app only syncs with your "my contacts" not "all contacts" as someone said earlier. It is also a great time to sort thru your contacts on gmail!

I think I'm going to go with a modified version of this idea. I created a dummy gmail account and I'm syncing my BB with that dummy version, which has 0 contacts to start with. Then, I'll export/download those contacts as a Google CSV and then import/upload that file to my normal gmail account contacts. From there, I should be able to dump them all in a separate "group," and then hopefully the Incredible will let me choose which "group" of contacts I'd like to sync. If not, well, I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

 

[Adiliyo]

personally, i do find sorting through things to be very therapeutic.

on slow days, i like to make sure my music and video libraries are all clean and organized, and doing my contacts is in the same boat.

but i think i'm weird like that

 

[asuwookie]

I also am upgrading from a curve. I used the google sync on the curve and exported to my gmail and they already went into a seperate folder called my contacts. I was able to go into Gmail and clean up both my contacts and all contacts a bit - associating phone numbers with emails, adding pictures, etc. now I have my contacts which is my phone list and "all contacts" which is that other group of people that have sent me one email through out the several years I have had gmail. I hope that helps some. Not sure I see the need to set up a new gmail hoping that it will just upload my contacts instead of all contacts.

 

[Duvi]

personally, i do find sorting through things to be very therapeutic.

on slow days, i like to make sure my music and video libraries are all clean and organized, and doing my contacts is in the same boat.

but i think i'm weird like that

I have way too much music to have to organize... I'll pay you to organize mine

 

[wavechaser]

How do I get my current contacts on my POS LG Envy into google contacts, so that I can get them synced to my Incredible when it arrives?

 

[Strygun]

How do I get my current contacts on my POS LG Envy into google contacts, so that I can get them synced to my Incredible when it arrives?

The enV can use VZW's BackupAssistant and then export those contacts as a CSV into Google Contacts. See this link: How to Use Guide: Backup Assistant