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Outlook users, post info here

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wlh99

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Feb 7, 2008
272
0
I have tried everything many many times, and can't get mobile me calanders to sync with outlook. I don't care about email since mac mail can retrive that from exchange via IMAP. If you have or haven't got it working could you post here to help me find what is wrong.

Working or not?

Windows Version?

Outlook Version?

Outlook protocol? (Exchange, POP, IMAP)

New member or old .mac member?

Did it just work or did you have to do something special?

The best I can have happen is that "Home" and "Work" calendars appear in outlook, but are empty. I can't get any events in them, or get any events to move from outlook to MM.

It intermettienly works on my iMac, but I think that outlook sycning with MM is screwing up iCal somehow and that if it were just my iMac it would work fine.
 
Working or not? Yes
Windows Version? Windows Vista
Outlook Version? 2007
Outlook protocol? (Exchange, POP, IMAP) - POP
New member or old .mac member? New MobileMe Customer
iPhone? v1

Did it just work or did you have to do something special?

Had to play with it to get it to work. Someone said to create a dummy group which is what I had to do to get ride of errors access the calendar from the web interface.

You said that you can't get anything to go "from" Outlook to MM. I had to START EVERYTHING from MM not from Outlook. Example: You said you have Home and Work Calendars in Outlook. I am not sure that matters but I started with "Calendar". Then added new calendars on MM which then Sync down to Outlook. Then I was able to add entrys to these calendars on Outlook which then Synced back to MM. Hope that helps.
 
Working: Maybe
Windows: XP
Outlook: 2003 & 2007
new MobileMe member
iPhone v1

At first tried to sync according to apple's getting started directions. Syncing from Outlook to the Cloud, the contact's birthdays & anniversaries, and all-day-events in Calendars would be incorrect.

So, I went in and one by one, I made sure all my contact information in the cloud was correct, then I deleted everything from my Outlook programs, and synced everything down from the cloud to Outlook.


Outlook 2007: seems to sync Calendars correctly, though appointments keep appearing and disappearing from the calendar. Outlook 2007 seems to require a calendar called "Calendar" and this will always sync, regardless of if I want it to or not. I can't delete it from Outlook2007 because it's the default cal, so I just learned to live with it.

Outlook 2003: doesn't seem to sync Calendars correctly. It is downloading appointments from the cloud, but I have yet to see it sync anything TO the cloud.

Both seem to be syncing Contacts, except Outlook handles the groups differently.
In mobileMe, all the contacts are placed in an address book called "All Contacts" and the contact groups you make acts as filters.
In Outlook, when the contacts are synced, instead of syncing all the contacts into "Contacts" and placing the contacts in seperate "Categories"(contact groups on MobileMe), Outlook is placing all contacts without a contact group into a "Contacts" Address Book, and all contacts with a contact group into their own individual Address Books.

I don't use the .me email in my outlook programs.

[update] yea my experience was the same as d21mike's. Everything had to be set up in the Cloud first, and then synced down to Outlook, or nothing would work right. Especially the web calendar.
 
How do you set up everything in the cloud first?

Do I have to re-enter all my contacts and appointment in MM and then tell it to replace what's on my computer?
 
drober30 said:
How do you set up everything in the cloud first?

Do I have to re-enter all my contacts and appointment in MM and then tell it to replace what's on my computer?
Click to expand...

No. After you have the Sync working then you can add your Contact and Calendar entries to Outlook and they should Sync with MM. The idea is to get it working with just sample entries which you delete later. My guess is that there is something wrong with either your MM or you Outlook PST Files (assuming you are using Windows Outlook). Make sure you can easily update the MM Web Page first before you try to Sync with Outlook. Then do a Sync from MM to your Outlook. After that I think you will be able to add your "saved" Contacts and Calendar Entries back. Of course you must save your current entries first. If you continue to have problems I would probably just start with a fresh Outlook PST File.
 
I think the problem is on Apple's end. I can't sync my calendars from Outlook 2003 to MobileMe (however my contacts did sync) and the MobileMe webapp gives me error every time I open my calendar. I guess your trying to do it the other-way-round but Outlook 2003 for me couldn't make a connection to MobileMe's servers...
 
We use an exchange server, and therefore it's not working.
I haven't found anyone yet with an exchange server who has been able to get it to sync content off the server. Most users with locally stored content (PST files) seem to be okay.
 
Working or not? No

Windows Version? XP SP2

Outlook Version? 2003 SP1

Outlook protocol? (Exchange, POP, IMAP) Exchange

New member or old .mac member? Old

Did it just work or did you have to do something special? It just didn't work. It has deleted all my outlook events twice. It deletes outlook events as they expire. I have never gotten outlook events to show up in mobile me. Mobile Me calendars Home and Work do sync to outlook. Too bad I don't use them.
 
Maxamillious said:
I think the problem is on Apple's end. I can't sync my calendars from Outlook 2003 to MobileMe (however my contacts did sync) and the MobileMe webapp gives me error every time I open my calendar.
Click to expand...

Think you hit the nail on the head. Even though 2003 is supported it does not work. With all the other failures of MM it seems that Apple "forgot" to test it properly with Outlook 2003.
 
^ Agreed. What's even funnier however, is that while the initial sync with Outlook 2003 may be what's still causing those errors, resetting your MobileMe preferences in the Control Panel not to sync to with calendars in Outlook 2003 and then re-syncing MobileMe with your PC (which at this point MobileMe shouldn't be syncing any calendars), is that MobileMe's calendars STILL don't work.

This kinda' reminds me of that annoying lama song, only it's: "Here's an error, there's an error. Error, error, error." ;)
 
d21mike said:
Working or not? Yes
Windows Version? Windows Vista
Outlook Version? 2007
Outlook protocol? (Exchange, POP, IMAP) - POP
New member or old .mac member? New MobileMe Customer
iPhone? v1

Did it just work or did you have to do something special?

Had to play with it to get it to work. Someone said to create a dummy group which is what I had to do to get ride of errors access the calendar from the web interface.

You said that you can't get anything to go "from" Outlook to MM. I had to START EVERYTHING from MM not from Outlook. Example: You said you have Home and Work Calendars in Outlook. I am not sure that matters but I started with "Calendar". Then added new calendars on MM which then Sync down to Outlook. Then I was able to add entrys to these calendars on Outlook which then Synced back to MM. Hope that helps.
Click to expand...

I don't want Home and Work calendars in outlook. They magicly appeared when I tried to sync to mobile me. But even if I add events to them, they don't sync back to MM. And I don't know why they are there, as I deleted them in Mobile Me and on my mac and had syncing working between those to for a bit with only one calendar.

In any case, with hundreds of contacts and a busy calendar, I am not going to attempt to enter it all into MM. I'l cancel the service first.
 
Working? No
OS? XP
Outlook? 2007
Protocol? Exchange

*copied from my post in another outlook thread*

I spent most of yesterday working on this with Apple for them to finally ask a "specialist" who said that a "data class" can only sync with one service. So it syncs with Exchange and therefore can't sync with Mobile Me.

I asked if it would be possible to have my phone sync with Mobile Me for my home stuff and use iTunes and dock cable for syncing my work calendar and have the phone merge them and was told the iPhone can only sync with Mobile Me OR iTunes but NOT both.

The solution I have found (not fully implemented yet, so I can't guaruntee, but I have a friend who says he's using it) is to use Plaxo (http://www.plaxo.com/) to sync my Outlook calendar with iCal on my macbook, then use Mobile Me to sync the combined calendar to the iPhone. Plaxo is free.

I was told by support that they are "compiling customer concerns" to take to management or something like that.
 
wlh99 said:
In any case, with hundreds of contacts and a busy calendar, I am not going to attempt to enter it all into MM. I'l cancel the service first.
Click to expand...

Since you replied to my post, I don't want anyone to think I suggested that you manually re-enter your contacts and calendar. I don't think anyone has had to do that. At least I have not seen a post of anyone doing that.
 
Working or not? Yes

Windows Version? Windows XP

Outlook Version? 2003

Outlook protocol? (Exchange, POP, IMAP) IMAP

New member or old .mac member? New

Did it just work or did you have to do something special? Didn't do anything special.

I only use Outlook for my calendar and contacts. I use Thunderbird for my email. Both seem to be working fine right now. Items I add to calendar or contacts in Outlook show up pretty soon on me.com as well as iPhone and vice versa. In Thunderbird, I have it set to expunge my inbox when I leave, so deleted messages don't appear on me.com (they still do appear if item is deleted on iPhone though).
 
d21mike said:
Since you replied to my post, I don't want anyone to think I suggested that you manually re-enter your contacts and calendar. I don't think anyone has had to do that. At least I have not seen a post of anyone doing that.
Click to expand...

I had to re-enter every single contact with a birthday or anniversary. I originally synced all my Outlook info up to MobileMe, and everything looked fine in the contacts list, the birthdays were correct. But when I turned on the birthdays calendar, every birthday entered in Outlook was off by 1 day. I thought it was a timezone thing so I spent a couple days changing timezone settings on everything, trying every combination. Nothing worked.

Eventually, I noticed an anomaly. Birthdays that I knew I entered on my iPhone were showing up correctly, Birthdays that I entered in Outlook were not. So i did a test, I deleted one contact's birthday from mobileme. Then I re-entered it on my iPhone. Then i checked my calendar and voila! the birthday was showing up on the correct date!

So thats why I said I entered in my contact and cal info manually into mobileMe, then deleted my outlook info, and synced everything back down form the Cloud to Outlook. Cause Outlook understands Apple's contact/cal information correctly, but Apple's servers don't understand Outlook's info 100% correctly. Apple's time parsing is probably to blame, since people in other countries are having all sorts of problems with their calendars being totally out of sync due to timezone issues.

summary: MobileMe Calendars are out of sync with Outlook, due to a non-conspicuous bug in the way contacts are parsed upon up-sync from Outlook. This bug only shows up on all-day events entered in Outlook and synced up to the cloud, such as contact birthdays & anniversaries.
 
upon writing that last reply, I had to change a contact's bday.
I changed it in MobileMe webapp, and BOOM, it messes up the calendar event. It's one day off again. So now I have to erase the bday, and enter it on my iPhone. I can't be doing anything wrong right?!?! I stayed within the scope of the webapp so, Why can't the webapp Calendar keep itself in sync with the webapp Contacts?? Frustrating bugs...
 
Working or not? Working

Windows Version? Vista

Outlook Version? 2007

Outlook protocol? (Exchange, POP, IMAP) pop

New member or old .mac member? old

Did it just work or did you have to do something special? just worked (download latest itunes and use the control panel app as instructed)

Occasionally it seems to forget to sync and takes a little long to get calendar update but has worked very well. Mass contact reorganization (new groups, etc) and edits appeared instantly on my iphone.
 
philamac said:
upon writing that last reply, I had to change a contact's bday.
I changed it in MobileMe webapp, and BOOM, it messes up the calendar event. It's one day off again. So now I have to erase the bday, and enter it on my iPhone. I can't be doing anything wrong right?!?! I stayed within the scope of the webapp so, Why can't the webapp Calendar keep itself in sync with the webapp Contacts?? Frustrating bugs...
Click to expand...

Hello, I'm new, but have been reading for some time, and could not have set the whole MobileMe lark thing up without all you posters on MacRumors Especially the whole .plist thing on Tiger. Bless you all.

Anyway, regarding all this....

Not working

XP SP3

Outlook 2003

Exchange

60-day MobileMe trial

All went well with my first Outlook sync from my work PC (my 2 Macs at home already worked). However, since then, My work PC always throws up "Your calendars (or contacts) could not be synced because of inconsistent data. Please...." etc. etc. 3 days now, even with doing all the reset stuff it asks you to.

Also, I have duplicate birthdays now for everybody - in the second instance of some of them it adds a 'I' to their name. Can't really comment on any other PC syncing stuff, as it doesn't work.

Should one assume, that since the 'MobileMe' add-in in the Control Panel didn't turn up until iTunes 7.7, that it might well stay like this until an update (i.e it's the PC end that's fecking about), or is MobileMe arguing with my PC? (if so can I get a commentary;) )

Timbo
 
My horror story...

This is eerily similar to my experience with Plaxo and Yahoo! Sync.

1. I sign up for a trial account.
2. I sync my home Mac calendar and address book with the cloud just fine.
3. I try to sync my work PC Outlook calendar and contacts with the cloud.

The calendar actually syncs pretty well. I set it up to overwrite the cloud with Outlook content. Of course, there's no way to know if this happened because my home Mac and work PC calendars were 99.99% in sync to start.

However, Outlook now has double contacts, but the cloud still has the right number. BTW, this is EXACTLY what Plaxo did.

Fortunately, I had backed up my entire calendar and contacts in temp folders underneath Outlook's Calendar and Contacts folders, respectively.

4. I figure the easiest thing to do is delete the entire contents of my Outlook Contacts folder, reset the sync and try to get MobileMe to overwrite Outlook Contacts with the cloud contents.

Oops. MobileMe interpreted my delete on the Outlook side as "delete everything in the cloud. I can't say that's unreasonable application behavior, more like loose nut in front of the keyboard.

So now, after syncing, I have 250 contacts in Outlook (the correct number) and 36 contacts in the cloud.

5. I reset sync again to have Outlook overwrite the cloud.

No dice. Cloud contacts are now wedged. Updates in Outlook do not get written to the cloud.

Back to Calendar. Oh, it's wedged too. Updates in Outlook do not get written to the cloud, and... vice versa. So instead of dynamic data syncing, my PC might as well be a paperweight. God help me if I need to add a future appointment in Outlook (who would want to do that?).

Yeah, this is eerily similar to Plaxo and Yahoo! Sync.

So, my little proof of concept trial lasted less than six hours.

Not happy. Not happy.
 
Should have been in previous post...

Working or not? NOT working

Windows Version? XP Pro

Outlook Version? 2003

Outlook protocol? (Exchange, POP, IMAP) n/a (not syncing mail)

New member or old .mac member? New trial member
 
marmiteturkey said:
We use an exchange server, and therefore it's not working.
I haven't found anyone yet with an exchange server who has been able to get it to sync content off the server. Most users with locally stored content (PST files) seem to be okay.
Click to expand...

How to detect if outlook use exchange server ?
File pst have to be unique and reside to server and non in local ?
Sorry for the newbie on that ...
 
marmiteturkey said:
We use an exchange server, and therefore it's not working.
I haven't found anyone yet with an exchange server who has been able to get it to sync content off the server. Most users with locally stored content (PST files) seem to be okay.
Click to expand...
Ditto.

Word on the street is that Apple considers this to be working "as designed" and it won't be fixed, which makes this a lot less useful to me. I don't care about the e-mail so much, but I was hoping to have the calendars and contacts synching back and forth between my PC at the office (running Outlook over Exchange), my iPhone, and my MacBook. Doesn't look like that's going to happen.

fa.ce said:
How to detect if Outlook is using an Exchange server?
Click to expand...
This is probably not the most direct way, but go to the "Tools" menu and select the "E-mail Accounts" item. The "E-mail Accounts" dialog box will pop up. Choose the "View or change existing e-mail accounts" radio button and then click the "Next" button. The next panel that is displayed should include a list of the accounts that Outlook is monitoring (probably only one). If the type of that account is "Exchange", you're using an Exchange server.
 
Lyle said:
Word on the street is that Apple considers this to be working "as designed" and it won't be fixed, which makes this a lot less useful to me. I don't care about the e-mail so much, but I was hoping to have the calendars and contacts synching back and forth between my PC at the office (running Outlook over Exchange), my iPhone, and my MacBook. Doesn't look like that's going to happen.
Click to expand...

Well, for those of us using a local PST file, we are still screwed because MobileMess will not work behind a corporate firewall. All of this "fantastic" enterprise integration is just an illusion for most of us. I think the only "enterprise" grade implementation is where the iPhone syncs against the exchange server directly and the still future ActiveSync update for iCal that appears to be part of SL.

The experiment I have not yet run is to sync my work laptop at home when I am off VPN and see if the keeps from screwing things up. It will not help me keep my iPhone calendar up-to-date, but it might be close enough.
 
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