Despite the hour long server outage that millions of Google users (including myself) experienced yesterday, I took another step towards embracing cloud computing by setting up Google Sync. Up until this point I have been using Apple’s Address Book and iCal to run the Contacts and Calendar on my iPhone 3G. It was a pretty good experience, but I had some issues with it. Mainly, I expect this information, like my email, to be updated everywhere and accessible from anywhere.
So instead of paying money for MobileMe or SpanningSync, or taking the round about steps to getting something similar worked out, I entrusted Google again and setup Google Sync.
The biggest part of this whole process was to finally organize my contacts. Between my SIM card, my Address Book, and my Gmail account, I had a whole lot of duplicates, and outdated info. I figured I should clean things up before syncing.
Anyway, the Google Sync part of the process was relatively simple but somewhere along the line I lost my ‘Most Contacted’ list from my gmail account. I don’t know quite sure how it happened, but I have a feeling it was my fault and not Google’s. I needed to clean that list up anyway. Unfortunately, not having my ‘Most Contacted’ list, my Google Chat did not display the folks I normally chat with. Manually, I had to go through and invite them all again to chat. The one thing I learned is that when they say back up your contacts, you should back up ALL your contacts and not just the ones you want on your phone.
Of course, it should be interesting to see what all comes with the arrival of the iPhone OS 3.0. It could change everything again. Though for right now, just hours after adopting Google Sync, I am pretty happy.
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