Syncing contacts to the "cloud"

[VZWBB]

Has anyone tried the import/export feature to move thier "phone" contacts into "google" contacts? I am interested in doing this, but I am worried that I will lose things like notes/birthdays/anniversarys and such in the move. I found the following procedure over in the EVO forum:

You could try the Import/Export to SD card feature.

1. Open the People app.
2. Hit the menu button and choose "Import/Export".
3. Select "Export to SD card".
4. Choose the "Phone" account to export.
5. The Evo will then create a vCard file (.vcf format) of all your contacts in the "Phone" account and store it on the SD card.

Now for the tricky part. You'll need to get rid of all the contacts in the "Phone" account. Otherwise, when you import them back in from the SD card, you'll have duplicates that will automatically link to the Google contacts.

1. Hit the menu button and choose "View".
2. Uncheck everything except "Phone", then hit "Done". This will make the phone only show the contacts in the "Phone" account.
3. Hit menu, then choose "Delete".
4. Hit menu again, then choose "Select All".
5. Choose "Delete (x)" ...where (x) is the number of contacts you have in the "Phone" account.
6. Now change your view again so that it shows all your contact accounts: Menu|View... Re-check the appropriate accounts.

Now you will want to import the contacts into your Google account.

1. Hit menu and choose "Import/Export".
2. Choose "Import from SD card".
3. Choose "Google" for the account that the imported contacts will be created in.
4. The phone will search for the vCard file and import the contacts into your Google account. (Give this some time... It will take a while before the contacts sync to the cloud and show up on the phone.)

Hope this helps.

P.S. I don't know if there is an app out there that does this automatically, but in case there isn't, this should fix you up.

P.S.S. The next time you create a contact with your phone, be sure to choose "Google" as the account type. Then, from that point forward it should default to Google when you create subsequent contacts.

Now this procedure does look like what I want to do, however I am unsure about the birthdays/anniversarys as I said before, as well as how this will interact with verizons backup assistant and how this will interact with gmail contacts that i have the same name for already but currently only hold email address's.

Anyone try this or have a better idea?

 

[rugbyua9]

Has anyone tried the import/export feature to move thier "phone" contacts into "google" contacts? I am interested in doing this, but I am worried that I will lose things like notes/birthdays/anniversarys and such in the move. I found the following procedure over in the EVO forum:



Now this procedure does look like what I want to do, however I am unsure about the birthdays/anniversarys as I said before, as well as how this will interact with verizons backup assistant and how this will interact with gmail contacts that i have the same name for already but currently only hold email address's.

Anyone try this or have a better idea?

The way I manage my contacts is through the google cloud. I tried messing with exporting to SD card and all that jazz but it was more hassle than its worth.

Personally, i think the google cloud is the way to go. I find it is easier when at a desktop to edit the notes on my contacts that way and have it just sync with my phone. I've really disliked Verizons Backup Assistant in the past and have moved strictly to google cloud. Must faster and much more efficient to manage.

 

[raythepa]

when you say the "cloud", do you just mean to Google? Sorry seems like a simple question.

 

[rugbyua9]

Yeah. I manage my contacts in my primary account in gmail. You can edit your contacts there. You can set it up in the "people" app to only see contacts with phone numbers too so you won't see all your email addresses, just the people with phone numbers.

You've completely eliminated the need for Verizons backup assistant and will always have your contacts.

 

[VZWBB]

Yes, when I say cloud I mean google. If/when I do this, I am going to keep it that way. I just want to make sure I can do it this way without losing all the extra info, and if they will merge themselves with existing contacts or whatever.

I guess I could ask this: Has anyone just exported to sdcard, done a master reset and loaded all the info back by importing? Did the info stay the same or was the formatting all messed up?

Once they get to my gmail I will just remove all the backup assistant ones on verizons site. I just want to make sure I won't lose anything, because if I will then I need to write everything down first.

 

[raythepa]

that helps, I just did my second hard reset and this is the route I'm going. Almost a little skeptical of leaving all of this to the big "G", but it really has it's advantages.

 

[rugbyua9]

Yes, when I say cloud I mean google. If/when I do this, I am going to keep it that way. I just want to make sure I can do it this way without losing all the extra info, and if they will merge themselves with existing contacts or whatever.

I guess I could ask this: Has anyone just exported to sdcard, done a master reset and loaded all the info back by importing? Did the info stay the same or was the formatting all messed up?

Once they get to my gmail I will just remove all the backup assistant ones on verizons site. I just want to make sure I won't lose anything, because if I will then I need to write everything down first.

I did have problems with formatting when exporting to my SD card. Thats when I decided to give the google contacts a try. Been there ever since.

Basically just eliminating the middleman. I am rooted and do a lot of work on my SD card with ROM stuff so I also didnt want my contacts lost if I infact corrupted my SD card somehow.

 

[VZWBB]

Ok, thanks. I guess I'll have to go through each and every one and painstakely write down the info so that I am sure not to lose it.

 

[VZWBB]

Ok, so I jumped in with both feet today. I did an export to sd card of just my phone contacts. Then I did an import to google via the phone using that file. Low and behold it worked! Formatting was good, it keep birthday and anniversary dates and address's. There was one contact that for some reason it didn't move over though, but lucky for me it was my wifes, so it was easy to fix.

After I moved them, I switched the view back to just the phone, and deleted all the phone contacts. I then went into backup assistant on the web, and deleted all those contacts so it wouldn't resync them. I looked at the info BA stores and its pretty good...except the dates were all messed up for birthdays. Not sure why they didn't get messed up with every sync but whatever.

I did have one problem though. After I deleted all the phone contacts, my google contacts on the phone showed only half of what was there on the web. Before I did that delete it showed them all. So I ended up removing the google account from the phone, and re adding it back in. The only issue with that is you have to do a factory reset, and it messes up downloaded apps. Once I did it though, all my contacts showed back up.

I did have to go through and redownload and uninstall and then reinstall each app I had previously, so they wouldn't force close. But i had like 10 apps, so it was easy.

I wouldn't call it painless but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be and everything is back the way I had it before, except all my contacts are now in the cloud.