Has anyone else noticed every time you update a contact or who's in a group on Me.com, it apparently puts duplicates on the phone instead of updating the original??
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Duplicate contacts and groups on iPhone?
- Thread starter dguisinger
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Weird, i now have about 20 "Friends" groups on my phone....neither me.com or Address book on my mac reflect it......and there is no way to delete the stupid groups on the phone....
i was editing the groups on the website, dragging and dropping friends into the groups.
every time a new contact was dragged into the group, a new group would appear on my phone with the correct # of contacts, the old versions of the groups stayed behind.
likewise, when i created a new contact on me.com, i went back to it twice and edited it. I ended up with 4 contacts on my phone, one with no info, one with the original info, and the next two had the following edits.
I had a problem where contact groups made in MobileMe could be pushed down to the iPhone, but groups deleted in MobileMe were NOT deleted OFF the iphone ( thus giving me duplicates or ghost groups )
What I did to fix it was, I went into settings > mail,cal,contacts > mobileme account > Turned Contacts syncing OFF...
Then all my phone's contacts disappeared.
Turned Contacts syncing back ON, and voila, all my contacts and groups matched MobileMe again.
I dunno why I didn't think of that earlier.
If MoMe would 'just work', then we wouldn't have to think up these stupid work arounds...
What I did to fix it was, I went into settings > mail,cal,contacts > mobileme account > Turned Contacts syncing OFF...
Then all my phone's contacts disappeared.
Turned Contacts syncing back ON, and voila, all my contacts and groups matched MobileMe again.
I dunno why I didn't think of that earlier.
If MoMe would 'just work', then we wouldn't have to think up these stupid work arounds...
QFT
I had this and fixed it in precisely this way, I think they need to iron out a few bugs still.
Thank you, philamac!!
I was having the same exact problem.
Your solution worked perfectly.
Finally
Thanks to Philamac for the tech support - I couldn't find anything on Apple's support area to help (perhaps I looked in the wrong place but I did spend about half an hour searching iPhone, MobileMe and Snow Leopard support) - obviously some number of us are having this problem and they should have enough of an awareness to post the fix.
Thanks to Philamac for the tech support - I couldn't find anything on Apple's support area to help (perhaps I looked in the wrong place but I did spend about half an hour searching iPhone, MobileMe and Snow Leopard support) - obviously some number of us are having this problem and they should have enough of an awareness to post the fix.
Thanks again
Hey philamac, I join the long list of poeple that like to thank you so much,
i could not have this working right ever since i subscribed to me.com
(ok, was an early adopter - but this doesn't justify anything, it is still full of bugs and wit a total lack of support which is embarrassing given the price paid for the service...)
Hey philamac, I join the long list of poeple that like to thank you so much,
i could not have this working right ever since i subscribed to me.com
(ok, was an early adopter - but this doesn't justify anything, it is still full of bugs and wit a total lack of support which is embarrassing given the price paid for the service...)
More Thanks
Hello Philimac
Yet another grateful person now without any duplicate contacts on her iPhone. Much appreciated.
Hello Philimac
Yet another grateful person now without any duplicate contacts on her iPhone. Much appreciated.
A week ago I would have agreed about the poor service, but have since discovered the 'chat support' service offered MM's website. The person I 'spoke' to was incredibly helpful. Couldn't be more positive about my treatment.
Remove iPhone duplicate contacts
There is an app called Remove Duplicates, it works pretty well.
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/remove-duplicate-contacts/id312352867?mt=8
There is an app called Remove Duplicates, it works pretty well.
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/remove-duplicate-contacts/id312352867?mt=8
thank you!
once again,,,
RE :
>Hey philamac, I join the long list of poeple that like to thank you so much,
i could not have this working right ever since i subscribed to me.com
(ok, was an early adopter - but this doesn't justify anything, it is still full of bugs and wit a total lack of support which is embarrassing given the price paid for the service...)
I thank you as well. in my 20 years of Mac-ness I haven't experienced something so UN-Mac as this in the year 2010, or their launch of the iphone with no copy -paste on it.
we're getting there, people.
We just have to stay on top of them, like this!
thanks, again. PhilAMAC.
once again,,,
RE :
>Hey philamac, I join the long list of poeple that like to thank you so much,
i could not have this working right ever since i subscribed to me.com
(ok, was an early adopter - but this doesn't justify anything, it is still full of bugs and wit a total lack of support which is embarrassing given the price paid for the service...)
I thank you as well. in my 20 years of Mac-ness I haven't experienced something so UN-Mac as this in the year 2010, or their launch of the iphone with no copy -paste on it.
we're getting there, people.
We just have to stay on top of them, like this!
thanks, again. PhilAMAC.
The problem for me started when my Macbook Pro Address Book wouldn't save all the changes I made and even erasing all new contacts on my iPod Touch and Nokia N80 when syncing.
I gave up and tried MobileMe's 60 day trial, hoping it would override whatever is messing up my Address Book. It then duplicated my contacts on iPod and on MobileMe.
I followed the instructions you guys posted and now I have TRIPLE entries for every contact on MobileMe!
I've only been using Mac (and Apple) since December, and this isn't what I got used to with OS X.
EDIT:
Ok. I erased MobileMe sync info from my Macbook and re-entered it. It then asked me if I wanted to replace info on the laptop or MobileMe Account. I chose the second option.
I don't have triple entries anymore... only duplicates. Erased everything from my iPod. Synced again, now it show's 4 entries of each contact. It seems it shows "groups": MobileMe contacts and Macbook Contacts, hence 4 entries per person (two per group).
I can't believe in all this mess! I manually erased all my contacts from MobileMe (after disabling sync between Macbook and Me). Also erased all contacts in iPod and forced copy everything from Macbook to iPod using iTunes........
and still duplicate entries on iPod, even though my Mac's address book doesn't show any duplicates, even when I ask it to locate duplicates in the database.
It's now been 5 hours since I started all this... I'm tired. I need help!
I gave up and tried MobileMe's 60 day trial, hoping it would override whatever is messing up my Address Book. It then duplicated my contacts on iPod and on MobileMe.
I followed the instructions you guys posted and now I have TRIPLE entries for every contact on MobileMe!
I've only been using Mac (and Apple) since December, and this isn't what I got used to with OS X.
EDIT:
Ok. I erased MobileMe sync info from my Macbook and re-entered it. It then asked me if I wanted to replace info on the laptop or MobileMe Account. I chose the second option.
I don't have triple entries anymore... only duplicates. Erased everything from my iPod. Synced again, now it show's 4 entries of each contact. It seems it shows "groups": MobileMe contacts and Macbook Contacts, hence 4 entries per person (two per group).
I can't believe in all this mess! I manually erased all my contacts from MobileMe (after disabling sync between Macbook and Me). Also erased all contacts in iPod and forced copy everything from Macbook to iPod using iTunes........
and still duplicate entries on iPod, even though my Mac's address book doesn't show any duplicates, even when I ask it to locate duplicates in the database.
It's now been 5 hours since I started all this... I'm tired. I need help!
I managed to erase everything from MobileMe and iPod and deleted a few database files on the Macbook's Library (stuff I assumed related to the address book).
I managed to clear all duplicates everywhere. For an hour the Address Book seemed to be working fine until it locked again. I can't save changes on my macbook address book and so any changes made on MobileMe and/or iPod are always overrun by the faulty MB Address Book.
This doesn't make any sense to me. I found a forum thread where a user mentioned some Apple Tech helped him to delete several corrupted sync files from the MB library, which temporarily solved the problem.
What can cause the files to be corrupted in the first place? This is a major issue. I'm going to buy an iPhone and I don't want my contacts to be erased everytime I sync it with my macbook...
I managed to clear all duplicates everywhere. For an hour the Address Book seemed to be working fine until it locked again. I can't save changes on my macbook address book and so any changes made on MobileMe and/or iPod are always overrun by the faulty MB Address Book.
This doesn't make any sense to me. I found a forum thread where a user mentioned some Apple Tech helped him to delete several corrupted sync files from the MB library, which temporarily solved the problem.
What can cause the files to be corrupted in the first place? This is a major issue. I'm going to buy an iPhone and I don't want my contacts to be erased everytime I sync it with my macbook...
The various suggestioned work arounds are not easy to do, particularly if you also have an iPad. I found the ultimate solution by calling Apple's Express Lane support line. It took about an hour on the phone with a tech, but the job got done. The guy was a wizard.
MobileMe should be ashamed that this is happening and seemingly are just going to ignore it.
MobileMe should be ashamed that this is happening and seemingly are just going to ignore it.
Last edited by a moderator:
PhoneBook CleanMaster really helped me
I have tried a couple of apps for cleaning up contacts, I recommend PhoneBook CleanMaster. Try it out, it is a lot simpler than other apps and helps clean out junks and duplicates. I really like it's interface, it gives you the option for reviewing the detailed information before deleting or merging. I also believe PhoneBook Plus can help clean out groups.
I have tried a couple of apps for cleaning up contacts, I recommend PhoneBook CleanMaster. Try it out, it is a lot simpler than other apps and helps clean out junks and duplicates. I really like it's interface, it gives you the option for reviewing the detailed information before deleting or merging. I also believe PhoneBook Plus can help clean out groups.
To remove a group on iPhone
1 - Download free app Easy Group : group your iPhone contacts
2 - Launch it
3 - Type "Edit"
4 - Type on red cross next to your unwanted group.
Easy Group Community
Note: As I am Easy Group developper, I may receive some form of compensation, financial or otherwise,from my recommendation or link.
1 - Download free app Easy Group : group your iPhone contacts
2 - Launch it
3 - Type "Edit"
4 - Type on red cross next to your unwanted group.
Easy Group Community
Note: As I am Easy Group developper, I may receive some form of compensation, financial or otherwise,from my recommendation or link.