I emailed HTC on a few issues so I could get answers straight from them. I'll put them down point by answered point.
Q1. When syncing with your Google account, is it possible to sync with "My Contacts" without syncing with "All Contacts"?
A1. It is not possible to sync just 'My Contacts', it would always be 'Google Contacts, or 'All Contacts'.
(This I already found out from them as it syncs All Contacts first before syncing subgroups. And My Contacts is essentially a subgroup of All Contacts.)
Q2. Is there any way of saving contact vCard (that have been sent to you) to your synced (in my case Google) account? When you are sent a vCal, you have options of where to save it, but no options seem to appear for vCard contact files.
A2. vCards can only be saved as 'My Contacts', they cannit be moved over to 'Google Contacts'. I'm afraid it is not something there is an option for.
Q3. Is there any way of copying/moving a contact saved only on the phone to the set of contacts synced with your Google account? i.e similar to copying/moving from sim to phone, but copying/moving from only on the phone to phone and Google account.
A3. Like in point 2., I'm afraid you cannot change the type of contact once it has been saved, i.e, a Google Contact is always a Google contact, and can't be moved over to My contacts.
Q4. I have noticed that I if I change a birthday for a contact on the phone, the change is always reset to the information held online. Also, I've noticed that if I create a contact on the phone that contains birthday information, that contact will be deleted when the phone syncs. However changing a birthday online will sync to the phone just fine. Am I doing something wrong?
A4. The calender information held online has precedence over the information held on the phone. So if you create a contact with calender information contained within it, when it syncs, the calender information is reomved...as well as the contact information attached. But no, you're not doing anything wrong.
Q5. Regarding the calendar, I have noticed that the Desire will not receive vCal sent via SMS. I am using the same sim card as was in my previous device where I could receive vCal through SMS as well as MMS. Is this a feature of the phone, a setting that I have missed or is the ability to receive vCal via SMS not present?
A5. With regards to vCal, its the latter I'm afraid-vCal cannot be received via SMS, only MMS, Bluetooth or email.
------------------------------------
The only one's that bother me are points 2, 3 and 4. I think we definitely need a way to save contacts sent to us to our synced accounts.
But I don't really get the syncing issue. Maybe he didn't answer my question properly because if you create a contact on the phone without a birthday, it will sync just fine.
The birthday issue is relatively minor. The saving to synced contacts, not so minor.
not convinced by any of those answers whatsoever!
However, not got one at the moment to debunk them.
Mine should arrive tomorrow or the day after, and then i shall be back to prove these answers as wrong, or as a fault in the phone!
Are these really HTC Contact app limitation ... or Google Android limitation related to Google GMail Contacts?
What if we change the contact app to something else from the Market?
Cleargrey said:
I emailed HTC on a few issues so I could get answers straight from them. I'll put them down point by answered point.
Q1. When syncing with your Google account, is it possible to sync with "My Contacts" without syncing with "All Contacts"?
A1. It is not possible to sync just 'My Contacts', it would always be 'Google Contacts, or 'All Contacts'.
(This I already found out from them as it syncs All Contacts first before syncing subgroups. And My Contacts is essentially a subgroup of All Contacts.)
Q2. Is there any way of saving contact vCard (that have been sent to you) to your synced (in my case Google) account? When you are sent a vCal, you have options of where to save it, but no options seem to appear for vCard contact files.
A2. vCards can only be saved as 'My Contacts', they cannit be moved over to 'Google Contacts'. I'm afraid it is not something there is an option for.
Q3. Is there any way of copying/moving a contact saved only on the phone to the set of contacts synced with your Google account? i.e similar to copying/moving from sim to phone, but copying/moving from only on the phone to phone and Google account.
A3. Like in point 2., I'm afraid you cannot change the type of contact once it has been saved, i.e, a Google Contact is always a Google contact, and can't be moved over to My contacts.
Q4. I have noticed that I if I change a birthday for a contact on the phone, the change is always reset to the information held online. Also, I've noticed that if I create a contact on the phone that contains birthday information, that contact will be deleted when the phone syncs. However changing a birthday online will sync to the phone just fine. Am I doing something wrong?
A4. The calender information held online has precedence over the information held on the phone. So if you create a contact with calender information contained within it, when it syncs, the calender information is reomved...as well as the contact information attached. But no, you're not doing anything wrong.
Q5. Regarding the calendar, I have noticed that the Desire will not receive vCal sent via SMS. I am using the same sim card as was in my previous device where I could receive vCal through SMS as well as MMS. Is this a feature of the phone, a setting that I have missed or is the ability to receive vCal via SMS not present?
A5. With regards to vCal, its the latter I'm afraid-vCal cannot be received via SMS, only MMS, Bluetooth or email.
------------------------------------
The only one's that bother me are points 2, 3 and 4. I think we definitely need a way to save contacts sent to us to our synced accounts.
But I don't really get the syncing issue. Maybe he didn't answer my question properly because if you create a contact on the phone without a birthday, it will sync just fine.
The birthday issue is relatively minor. The saving to synced contacts, not so minor.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i have a question regarding point 4
does this mean the whole contact gets deleted or just the calendar entry ?
rhedgehog said:
not convinced by any of those answers whatsoever!
However, not got one at the moment to debunk them.
Mine should arrive tomorrow or the day after, and then i shall be back to prove these answers as wrong, or as a fault in the phone!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll be waiting! I could do chow down on some more info!
Thanks for the info!
The thing I don't get is this:
A1. It is not possible to sync just 'My Contacts', it would always be 'Google Contacts, or 'All Contacts'.
How can that not be a MAJOR problem?! I got hundreds of mail addresses in there of people I ever wrote to. If they would show up on my phone, that would make the whole sync feature useless.
Or am I missing something?
no entropy, you're not missing anything, it's a major issue to me!
I really hate to have ALL the contacts I wrote to or received a mail from, even for just one time only.
A little work-around is to check the contact option which says something like "only show contacts with telephone number", but it works in Phone contacts only: if you, from the menu, click on search contacts and look for something it will show up with EVERY contact you got in touch on gmail.
It really pisses me off
I am only importing My Contacts on my phone. I don't know how I did it, but I have My Contacts with a few groups,(about 60 contacts) and then I have All Contacts, with over 200 people. None of these show up on my phone...
zonkkk said:
I am only importing My Contacts on my phone. I don't know how I did it, but I have My Contacts with a few groups,(about 60 contacts) and then I have All Contacts, with over 200 people. None of these show up on my phone...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That would be interesting to know!
Are you sure they are not showing just because, maybe, you checked "only show contacts with telephone number"?
Will you test ti by going on the main menu, and click "search contacts" and see you EVERY contact (mail only ones too I mean) shows up?
Thnx
zonkkk said:
I am only importing My Contacts on my phone. I don't know how I did it, but I have My Contacts with a few groups,(about 60 contacts) and then I have All Contacts, with over 200 people. None of these show up on my phone...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
JapanLover said:
That would be interesting to know!
Are you sure they are not showing just because, maybe, you checked "only show contacts with telephone number"?
Will you test ti by going on the main menu, and click "search contacts" and see you EVERY contact (mail only ones too I mean) shows up?
Thnx
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've been a bit troubled by contacts over the past couple of days and been spending a lot of time getting them sorted. All working pretty peachy now but it was a trial.
If may help to read my posts here and here.
goin' home, but will DEFINITELY check your posts!!!
Oh: since you look experienced on GContacts... any clues on progs to sync Outlook other than the good Go Contacts Sync? it works well, but it doesn't updates pics
Haha! Mine arrived this morning while i was at work so took the opportunity to pick it up from home on my lunch break!!
right here we go.
1) bollocks....kinda. It will sync those auto contacts, but you can hide them.
In people, press menu, view.
untick the box next to 'show google auto contacts'
2) bollocks. When you select to import from the SD card, it asks you which account you want to create the contacts under. just select google.
3) bollocks. See answer 2. Export contacts from phone to SD card. Delete copies on phone, import from sd card to google account.
4) i'm still looking at this but i suspect it is linked to facebook. I think it only downloads from facebook and so that overwrites what you put in. if you log out of facebook for HHTC Sense, i suspect the value you put in would appear.
5) this appears to be correct.
However, i happen to know from sources that they didn't have any desire handsets until recently, so don't be too hard on them.
thought, probably just removing the link from a contact to facebook might prove the birthday thing....trying now
Yup, that seems to be it.
When a contact is linked to facebook, you'll see a facebook logo next to their birthday in the contact view (assuming they have put their birthday in)when you actually edit that contact, no birthday is actually saved in the contact.
So it seems that data synced from facebook takes precedence over the local data.
I'll give them bollocks on number 4 because nothing is being deleted at all, and the calendar data seems to be getting synched to google, it's just that the phone will display the facebook data and not the local data.
so that appears to be 4 bollocks out of 5.
And a MAJOR annoyance for me is people tthat have their phone numbers on facebook as just 44xxxxxxx rather than +44xxxxxx or 07xxxxxx meaning you cant send them a text as it fails without the initial + and you can't edit the number as its pulled from facebook.
I have had to unlink several contacts for this reason to get my correct 'local' data to be used insted.
rhedgehog said:
Yup, that seems to be it.
When a contact is linked to facebook, you'll see a facebook logo next to their birthday in the contact view (assuming they have put their birthday in)when you actually edit that contact, no birthday is actually saved in the contact.
So it seems that data synced from facebook takes precedence over the local data.
I'll give them bollocks on number 4 because nothing is being deleted at all, and the calendar data seems to be getting synched to google, it's just that the phone will display the facebook data and not the local data.
so that appears to be 4 bollocks out of 5.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
lol Thanks for that. Firstly, glad you finally have you Desire! The SD card route will have to do for the contacts.
As for the facebook thing, well, I haven't signed in to any facebook account yet as experience has told me to get one set of contacts in working order, and back it up before trying to sync it with another account/system. And still, when I update a birthday on my phone, it won't sync to my Google account. It's not a major thing but it is a minor irritation.
I just did another test of inputting a new test contact into my phone with a birthday (01/02/70) and the contact was deleted on syncing with my Google account. Go figure.
Oh, and it wasn't all bolx! They were half right that you can't directly save a vCard to your Google account. At least give them a one testicle redemption!
ok just to get this straight. it deletes contacts if they have calendar info in them ?
so how do you add new contacts ? first without calendar info, then sync and then go to your google account and change calendar ?
thats just strange and bad
does this only occur for contacts with calendar info in them , or are there other places where this occurs ?
TulpiX said:
ok just to get this straight. it deletes contacts if they have calendar info in them ?
so how do you add new contacts ? first without calendar info, then sync and then go to your google account and change calendar ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For me, yes. Try it, let me know what happens when you sync up a new contact with a birthday from your phone to your Google account. Or change the birthday of a contact already synced on your phone and let us know if it changes it in your Google account.
just tried it on mine, on a google contact that was not linked to a facebook account.
The phone shows the birthday no problem, but it does not seem to have synched that up to the google account, even after forcing the sync two or three times....
very odd.
I'm experiencing the same exact problem, new contacts simple get deleted.
So my mom recently got a samsung galaxy s3, she originally had a galaxy nexus, and before that an envy 2.
We used verizon backup assistant to backup all the contacts on her envy 2, because that was the only simple contact backup available for the envy.
She now has
A. Google sync backing up all her NEWER contacts
B. Backup assistant backing up her older contacts
C. A bunch of hotmail contacts.
Basically I created a huge mess... If I were to use backup assistant on the SGS3, how would I go about changing each and every contact to sync with google past that point?
I'm just wondering if there is a simple way to go about this without going through each and every contact.
Dudenell said:
So my mom recently got a samsung galaxy s3, she originally had a galaxy nexus, and before that an envy 2.
We used verizon backup assistant to backup all the contacts on her envy 2, because that was the only simple contact backup available for the envy.
She now has
A. Google sync backing up all her NEWER contacts
B. Backup assistant backing up her older contacts
C. A bunch of hotmail contacts.
Basically I created a huge mess... If I were to use backup assistant on the SGS3, how would I go about changing each and every contact to sync with google past that point?
I'm just wondering if there is a simple way to go about this without going through each and every contact.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In people or contacts there should be an option your whole library as a .vcf . If you put that file on the new phone it will get all your contacts. But in reality your Google account should be backing up All your contacts. I had issues back in the of days with duplicate contacts. Turns out if you go into gmail on a computer there is an option to merge duplicates. If you don't think they are all being synced with Google then the .vcf method would be the safest. Then if you get dups just merge them in gmail
animal24 said:
In people or contacts there should be an option your whole library as a .vcf . If you put that file on the new phone it will get all your contacts. But in reality your Google account should be backing up All your contacts. I had issues back in the of days with duplicate contacts. Turns out if you go into gmail on a computer there is an option to merge duplicates. If you don't think they are all being synced with Google then the .vcf method would be the safest. Then if you get dups just merge them in gmail
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Here is what I did.
Removed the hotmail account.
Exported the contact list and then imported into google
Merged contacts
Done
What I thought would happen originally was that removing my hotmail account would leave all the contacts associated with it, this was not the case.
Dudenell said:
Here is what I did.
Removed the hotmail account.
Exported the contact list and then imported into google
Merged contacts
Done
What I thought would happen originally was that removing my hotmail account would leave all the contacts associated with it, this was not the case.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If I export the list and then import it to google. Do I need to delete contacts between exporting and importing as I assume your phone will have duplicates on the phone itself? (I already have contacts on the phone and not google so not sure if importing will now just cause the phone to have duplicates)
It depends on how your contacts were originally backed up. Assuming you wanted to start over clean it would export all your contacts, then clear the app data for the contacts (this will delete everything!) and then import the file into Google on your pc.
Sent from my SCH-I535 using xda premium
Hi all.
My set-up: LG G4, Lollipop 5.1, not rooted.
Google Account, Outlook.com, LinkedIn, Skype etc.
The proplem is that during my night-time, Google Contacts Sync starts syncing my contacts (to somewhere; the are NOT visible in my Google account) generating xxx copies of each contact. I have no exact timeline when this has started to realize, but by using Simpler Contacts 5.0.2 (paid version) I was able to clean that horrible mess (took overall ~5 hours with 55.000+ contacts).
Currently I have disabled all contacts syncing.
So should I:
1) Copy all my contacts to Google (already exported cleaned .vcf to my SD card) and import that to Google account?
2) Do something else, what?
What an earth is causing that!?!?
Much appreciated.
BR,
Timo
Any hints / thoughts on this?
Anyhow I will wait for overnight now to see if it still happens even that now Google contacts sync of OFF.
Additional wonder: I can not find those contacts synced to either my Google.com or live.com (Outlook.com) accounts, so it seems they to replicate locally on my phone... Which makes this even more weird.
tjsuominen said:
Any hints / thoughts on this?
Anyhow I will wait for overnight now to see if it still happens even that now Google contacts sync of OFF.
Additional wonder: I can not find those contacts synced to either my Google.com or live.com (Outlook.com) accounts, so it seems they to replicate locally on my phone... Which makes this even more weird.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In your gmail, try look in contacts tab..Its happened since kitkat, must be something with google services.
faizalotai said:
In your gmail, try look in contacts tab..Its happened since kitkat, must be something with google services.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just looked, there's (on Gmail contacts tab) basically only my Google+ contacts and some random e-mail contacts...
Any further tips?
//timo
tjsuominen said:
Just looked, there's (on Gmail contacts tab) basically only my Google+ contacts and some random e-mail contacts...
Any further tips?
//timo
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try delete all contacts from your gmail then syncing once with phone, disabled auto sync, if you have update your contacts, just sync via account and sync in settings--->google>your email>contacts
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.accaci
Sent from my LG-H815 using Tapatalk
OK, still definitelly NOT working. What I did:
SCENARIO 1:
0) Ensured that all contacts syncs from my Phone were off
1) Cleared (= deleted) all contacts from my Google.com account
2) Started my [email protected] Contacts syncing from my phone
SCENARIO 2:
0) Ensured that all contacts syncs from my Phone were off
1) Cleared (= deleted) all contacts from my Google.com account
2) Imported the exported .csv file into my Google.com account
3) Started my [email protected] Contacts syncing from my phone
-->>
RESULT on BOTH sync scenarios:
NOTHING seems to sync to my Google.com account BUT on my phone contacts start to copy themselves... Generating duplicates, triplicates...
Syncing is working OK for other parts: various E-mail accounts, Calendar etc.
My analysis: my Phone's google.com CONTACTS account is NOT somehow connected to my account on google.com - weird...
I did NOT yet do this (advise from https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=42641):
Clearing out the Contacts Storage. Settings > Application Manager > All, went into "Contacts Storage", force stopped it, and cleared the data. When I went to re-sync, Google Contacts started syncing again.
I am afraid deleting the contacts data (although the CSV file has been exported successfully).
So any further help appreciated.
//timo
tjsuominen said:
Hi all.
The proplem is that during my night-time, Google Contacts Sync starts syncing my contacts (to somewhere; the are NOT visible in my Google account) generating xxx copies of each contact. I have no exact timeline when this has started to realize, but by using Simpler Contacts 5.0.2 (paid version) I was able to clean that horrible mess (took overall ~5 hours with 55.000+ contacts).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried a Factory data reset ? I know it's a bit full-on and will mean you have work to do, but might help ?
pcoulson said:
Have you tried a Factory data reset ? I know it's a bit full-on and will mean you have work to do, but might help ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nope, not yet.
Let's see if something else can be done to fix this prior doing that.
I might even wait as long as 6.0 update.
Frustrated, yes.
tjsuominen said:
Nope, not yet.
Let's see if something else can be done to fix this prior doing that.
I might even wait as long as 6.0 update.
Frustrated, yes.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Any further possible fixes for this?
Next: Should I try importing the exported .CSV to my Google.com account using the phone functionality (use file manager and select the created .CSV file -> import to my Google account?)
//timo
Hello All,
I am frustrated with automatically contacts adding without name into my device contact.
For example I have John Doe contact saved already then same contact number will be saved without name automatically, and those contacts appearing into whatsapp and other apps and I cannot recognize the contact untill I remove it. I have disabled contact sync from all the accounts.
Some contacts I have deleted many times but they are added again and again.
Anybody else is facing this issue?
Many thanks in advance.
Shoaib.Khan said:
Hello All,
I am frustrated with automatically contacts adding without name into my device contact.
For example I have John Doe contact saved already then same contact number will be saved without name automatically, and those contacts appearing into whatsapp and other apps and I cannot recognize the contact untill I remove it. I have disabled contact sync from all the accounts.
Some contacts I have deleted many times but they are added again and again.
Anybody else is facing this issue?
Many thanks in advance.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Never heard of that. Try changing which contacts to display in Settings. Also you could edit your contacts the way you want it (delete duplicates), save them on the phone as .vcf, clear storage/cache of Settings and import the saved file. I always save my contacts on the phone, not on Google and from time to time back them up to vcf.
Shoaib.Khan said:
Hello All,
I am frustrated with automatically contacts adding without name into my device contact.
For example I have John Doe contact saved already then same contact number will be saved without name automatically, and those contacts appearing into whatsapp and other apps and I cannot recognize the contact untill I remove it. I have disabled contact sync from all the accounts.
Some contacts I have deleted many times but they are added again and again.
Anybody else is facing this issue?
Many thanks in advance.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you use 'Google' contacts? Or some apps have access contacts that syncs automatically (i.e. Telegram syncs my contacts sometimes without permission, and I''m wondering my contacts are gone, sometimes duplicated )
Sometimes, it happens here, syncing contacts even when syncing turned off. I revoke 'contacts' permission on most apps (Telegram, Instagram, Messenger, etc.), not using Google's contact apps (I dunno if it's the default contacts app on stock, as I don't use stock) and that problem went away.
celrau said:
Never heard of that. Try changing which contacts to display in Settings. Also you could edit your contacts the way you want it (delete duplicates), save them on the phone as .vcf, clear storage/cache of Settings and import the saved file. I always save my contacts on the phone, not on Google and from time to time back them up to vcf.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I did it many times but again everything messed up automatically. The same contact already available in phone memory and duplicate created with empty name and this duplicate contact act as default contact for every application. it happens only with around 50 contacts out of 200.
RFD80M-75679 said:
Did you use 'Google' contacts? Or some apps have access contacts that syncs automatically (i.e. Telegram syncs my contacts sometimes without permission, and I''m wondering my contacts are gone, sometimes duplicated )
Sometimes, it happens here, syncing contacts even when syncing turned off. I revoke 'contacts' permission on most apps (Telegram, Instagram, Messenger, etc.), not using Google's contact apps (I dunno if it's the default contacts app on stock, as I don't use stock) and that problem went away.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I use Google contacts, MI A2 lite comes with stock Android 9 and stock Google apps. Let me try to revoke the contact permissions from all the apps.
So I backed up call logs and contacts from titanium backup before and when I tried to restore it, it messed up my contacts and phone app. Contacts app cannot import contacts from google account, it shows error. while contacts from vcf files imports but it doesn't show up in app. phone app does not logs call history, though calling and recieving calls works perfectly. Any fix for this. I'm currently using third party contacts app and dialer app.
You can access the contacts in your google account at contacts.google.com, maybe have a look at them there first, and if they're good, delete the ones on your phone and synch again.
MarkRobert said:
You can access the contacts in your google account at contacts.google.com, maybe have a look at them there first, and if they're good, delete the ones on your phone and synch again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Contacts are there on my account, but contacts app is fails to import contacts from account or even from a vcf file. if i create a new contact than it also doesn't shows up in it.
Anyway I had to factory reset to resolve the issue.