Neutron :: Bomb

by John Calian |
Topics: Address Book | Contacts | Funambol | iPhone | Outlook

Dilemma: I have an iPhone, which I sync with my Macbook Pro and Address Book, that I need to also sync with my work contacts that rest on the exchange server of my company. I am NOT going to sync my iPhone full time with my new work PC running windows. I will keep it synced with personal MBP. But, I really need all the contacts from my new job on my phone.


So, how do you sync iPhone with both Address Book and Outlook (using Exchange)? And, more importantly, how do I do it with the least amount of manual processing?

Solution found, and in less than 10 minutes of searching Google.

1. Keep my existing setup on MBP/iPhone
   
2. Create a new contact group for company contacts in Address Book
   
3. Sign up for Funambol, my.funambol.com
4. Set up account at Funambol
   
5. Download Funambol Outlook plug in
6. Configure plug in to ONLY sync contacts (waiting on calendar support)
   
7. Sync Outlook to Funambol plug in (One Way)
   
8. Download and install Funambol iPhone app
9. Sync using Funambol app on iPhone
10. One way does not function, so I had to do a full sync. It took me 2 tries with over 700 contacts
    
11. Sync iPhone contacts to MBP (via USB or MobileMe)
12. Open Address Book on MBP
13. Add your new company contacts to new company group (I simply searched for domain name used in the email address of my company contacts)
14. Done.

My iPhone now has all my company contacts on the phone, and can sync new/edited contacts from Outlook at any time, with no manual processing

Email me if you have questions.

Overall, pretty slick.

Problems:
The current version of the the Funambol iPhone app 'should' allow you to sync one way, so that in theory you could : sync Outlook to Funambol server (one way), then sync Funambol server to iPhone (one way), then sync iPhone contacts normally and you are done.

But, the one way on the iPhone is broken... so, I had to sync all 700+ contacts from iPhone BACK to Funambol server BEFORE I could snag the Outlook contacts from Funambol. Oh well. Its all FREE!!!

And it served my needs, as my company contacts are on my iPhone without forcing my iPhone to sync with iTunes on my work PC. Im happy.

Now, waiting on Calendar syncing, that will be excellent as well.