Related
Google Sync is a free service that allows you to sync your contacts, email and calendar with your gmail account.
It is a two-way sync, meaning that if you add an appointment or contact to your phone, it will upload to Google's cloud and update your gmail information as well.
I use Google Sync to keep my contacts in the cloud, vs using myPhone since I have multiple phones but only one Windows Live account. If you have ever synced two phones to myPhone under one account, you'll see right away why this is a bad thing.
One of my favorite benefits from using Google Sync is the fact that it not only stores my phone contacts, it also stores their facebook links and contact pictures as well. This means that I can freely flash another ROM without worrying about backing up all of my contacts to SIM or myPhone and then manually updating all of the information for them.
The best part of Google Sync has to be the push email service. As emails arrive (assuming you have set the account up correctly), they will be pushed to your phone via ActiveSync. You don't have to be at your computer for this, it's done over the air.
The only think Google Sync can't do is sync Tasks. If you choose Tasks during the setup, you will receive a cryptic error.
Now that I've told you about the benefits of Google Sync, let's go over how to use it. This assumes you have an existing gmail account. I don't know how to sync with Google without a gmail account, sorry.
I always add my hotmail account first. For some strange reason you can never go back and edit the settings for the first mail account you setup on Windows Mobile, so I use my hotmail account for this.
Steps:
Select your Mail tab and hit the Menu button
Choose "Add Account"
Under "Choose a Mail Provider", select "Outlook" (Don't select Gmail!)
Put your entire gmail address ([email protected]) in the "Email address" box, followed by your password.
Select "Next"
Under "User name" put your email address ([email protected]) again.
The Password field should be filled in, if not just put it in again.
Scroll down.
Leave "Domain" blank.
Scroll down.
Leave "Save password" checked.
Under "Server address" put m.google.com
Leave "This server requires an encrypted (SSL) connection" checked.
Select "Next"
If all options are selected, deselect Tasks (Very Important!)
If not, select Mail, Contacts, Calendar
Hit Advanced Settings
Peak time and Non-peak time (I have "As items arrive" on both here) sets how often your emails are pushed to your phone.
I have nationwide coverage, so I also select "Sync data when roaming".
Hit "Done"
Hit "Done" again.
The phone will now connect to the Google Sync server and begin updating your contacts, calendar appointments and email. This may take a few minutes, depending on the number of contacts and such. If you have any unread messages in your gmail inbox, they should now appear on your phone in short order. You may choose "Send/Receive" from the mail Menu if you think it is taking too long.
You will now be able to receive your email sent to your gmail account as soon as it arrives. I have also forwarded my email from my other accounts to my gmail account, but this may be too much for you.
I would not recommend this to anyone who does not have the "Smart Phone" plan (so-called "Unlimited Data Plan"), as it will eat up your bandwith quickly. It may also have a detrimental effect on your battery, due to the fact that it requires a constant data and Active Sync connection to work properly.
If you are concerned about your battery, you can try changing the Peak and Non-peak options under "Advanced" to longer intervals. If it makes a big difference in the life of your battery, I would love to hear about it here!
You can view the original Google Sync video and tutorial links here:
http://www.google.com/mobile/sync/
Hopefully this will be of use to someone out there! Please let me know if you use Google Sync or if you have trouble following my directions.
---Issue With Labels/Folders---
If you have set gmail to tag messages with labels as they come in, you may not be able to read the messages on your phone. XDA-DEV user pantyshot has managed a workaround and posted it here. Be sure to thank pantyshot for the fix if you find it handy!
Also, newer versions of Outlook Mobile (any available as a cab install so that people don't have to use a custom rom?) support sorting messages by subject. Pretty darn close to the threaded messages in the orgasmic Android Gmail app.
I've been doing this since I got the phone, but it is nice to see someone write up the details.
Nice thx man. I didnt even know this was possible on WM coming from a Nexus. I synced my phonebook with MS outlook but nice to know this is possible.
This should be a sticky!!!
Thanks... nice sticky note.
On Friday, I bought an HD2 to replace my Nexus One (which I gave to my daughter). The N1 & Android are just fine but I wanted to play with the HD2 and WinMo. Not too worried about the lack of support for WinMo 7 as I am certain that we will find versions we can use thanks to XDA.
Ok, back on-topic... I was using Google Sync to get my messages from Gmail to my Nexus One. I now know how to do this with WinMo 6.5. I will address this when I get back home as I am on a business trip in Amman, Jordan and I don't want to rake-up astronomical data roaming charges while over here.
this is helpful for newbies/ beginners..
Anyway I had done set up the gmail as "PRIMARY" account only when i got HD2. why i need hotmail set up as primary account then add gmail? I just curious..
I've been using this method as well, but has anyone noticed that you cannot sync your labels from gmail? Is it just me or Outlook just syncs the inbox aside from contacts and calendar?
The only glitch I have seen with using google sync is that when you import your contacts from google, they get sorted as Last Name, First Name. (Doe, John.)I have always liked seeing my contact list as first name last name. (John Doe.) If you manually try to switch this in your contact list, it gets over written once google syncs again. Does anyone know how to possibly fix this?
This method is GREAT. Big thanks to OP
GAMERIG said:
this is helpful for newbies/ beginners..
Anyway I had done set up the gmail as "PRIMARY" account only when i got HD2. why i need hotmail set up as primary account then add gmail? I just curious..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not sure why, but whenever you add a new email account to Windows Mobile and attempt to go back and edit it, the first account you added will always be grayed out. This means you can't modify, or even delete the first account.
Since you may decide you want to change how often you check your gmail, I thought you might want to add a hotmail account (Windows Live) first, since those settings are automatic and can't be changed anyway.
I've always had to do a hardreset in the past to get rid of bad gmail settings, so I learned to always put hotmail first.
Hope that helps
adamhlj said:
The only glitch I have seen with using google sync is that when you import your contacts from google, they get sorted as Last Name, First Name. (Doe, John.)I have always liked seeing my contact list as first name last name. (John Doe.) If you manually try to switch this in your contact list, it gets over written once google syncs again. Does anyone know how to possibly fix this?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I know, this is annoying. I have added two new contacts and both of them were sorted like this.
You can try deleting the "Last Name" field in your phone contacts, then add the last name beside the first name, but I haven't actually tried that.
If it works, please get back to us
pantyshot said:
I've been using this method as well, but has anyone noticed that you cannot sync your labels from gmail? Is it just me or Outlook just syncs the inbox aside from contacts and calendar?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When I used the official Gmail App, it represented labels as folders. Because Google doesn't actually have different folders (just different flags for each message), I don't know of any way to split the messages by folder.
As a matter of fact, I don't think you can do this with regular folders via Outlook, due to the way the built-in email client works.
If anyone knows a fix to this please post; we would all like to separate our messages by folders if possible!
Snarksneeze said:
I know, this is annoying. I have added two new contacts and both of them were sorted like this.
You can try deleting the "Last Name" field in your phone contacts, then add the last name beside the first name, but I haven't actually tried that.
If it works, please get back to us
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
adamhlj said:
The only glitch I have seen with using google sync is that when you import your contacts from google, they get sorted as Last Name, First Name. (Doe, John.)I have always liked seeing my contact list as first name last name. (John Doe.) If you manually try to switch this in your contact list, it gets over written once google syncs again. Does anyone know how to possibly fix this?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can try this app I have called Contact Changer. Just install to phone, hit the change button and soft reset. After that they should display correctly, and it's actually WinMo that displays contacts like that b/c I have mine sync'd through Microsoft Myphone (b/c gmail messes up the contact pics) and they display the same way.
Now once you run the app, if you add a contact or delete a contact it will revert to last name first. Just run the Contact Changer and reboot again and you will be golden.
pantyshot said:
I've been using this method as well, but has anyone noticed that you cannot sync your labels from gmail? Is it just me or Outlook just syncs the inbox aside from contacts and calendar?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes this is the unfortunate aspect of using gmail this way.
chrisrj28 said:
...It's actually WinMo that displays contacts like that b/c I have mine sync'd through Microsoft Myphone (b/c gmail messes up the contact pics) and they display the same way.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Funny you mention that.
I actually used the built-in option to link my favorite contacts to their respective facebook account in my friends list. This changed the contact picture from the camera image I had to their facebook avatar. When next I flashed my phone, Google loaded the contacts back with the facebook linke and facebook avatar, which was very surprising to me.
Does myPhone do the same thing if you use them to keep track of your contacts?
chrisrj28 said:
Now once you run the app, if you add a contact or delete a contact it will revert to last name first. Just run the Contact Changer and reboot again and you will be golden.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for this app. I didn't even know it existed!
OTHERWISE
HTC HD2 PRODUCT SUPPORT-SYNCHRONIZATION..
GAMERIG said:
HTC HD2 PRODUCT SUPPORT-SYNCHRONIZATION..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not sure what you posted this link in reference to. Unless you are confusing Google Sync with ActiveSync...
ActiveSync is the method of connecting your phone directly to your PC, for file transfers, updating your ROM image and standard backups. It is also the name of the protocol that the Microsoft Exchange Servers use to sync data between the Server and ActiveSync-enabled devices.
Google Sync is a free Microsoft Exchange Server that allows "push" email via your phone's data connection. You don't have to be near a PC to sync your calendar, contacts or gmail.
I think the threaded e-mail conversations are only available in the WM 6.5.x versions of WinMo. I am also unable to sync my other folders (Sent, Saved) from Gmail. I have them checked off as well in the Manage Folders option, but nothing appears in these folders after syncing. I think the only possible folder to sync is Inbox.
cu2cool said:
I think the threaded e-mail conversations are only available in the WM 6.5.x versions of WinMo.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am about to flash to a 21903 ROM in a bit and I'll let you know if it breaks my threading.
cu2cool said:
I am also unable to sync my other folders (Sent, Saved) from Gmail. I have them checked off as well in the Manage Folders option, but nothing appears in these folders after syncing. I think the only possible folder to sync is Inbox.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you sure they are actually folders? I thought gmail only has labels that appear as folders in the native clients.
Also, this is the same as most Outlook syncs; it will only give you the unread messages. There may be a setting in gmail that will allow you to retrieve old messages, but I'm not sure why you would want to do that on a mobile phone.
If you want to just get your emails, you can use the "Gmail" option when setting up your new email account on the HD2. This won't "push" like the "Outlook" option will, but you can still set it to manually check as often as every 5 minutes if you can spare the battery life.
Of course, you would be much better off getting the official gmail client for that, since that will also support your lables-as-folders option.
Myself, I prefer to use Google Sync and let that push emails to my phone as well as syncing all of my gmail and phone contacts. I don't use labels any more and don't want all the "Sent" or "Archived" messages to clutter up my phone.
Yea, you're probably right about the labeling/folder issue. I just want to see a saved e-mail to look some thing up at times, but maybe I'll just log onto gmail.com for that on my phone. Is there any Gmail client available for WinMo phones? I haven't seen any. Also, does push kill battery life? (ex. sync every 5 minutes) Or is it a more sophisticated syncing method that will only connect to data when new messages arrive?
I am up to purchasing the Galaxy Tab 10.1 but I see that no clear solution is available to below.
Here is my question in order to sure about what is going on:
Is there any simple way to import and/or sync outlook (mail,contacts,calendar etc) with android phone and/or tablet?
e.g:In my outlook I can export -as back up- all above (mail,contacts,calendar etc) in a pst file. Can i import same to android phone and/or tablet? without using anything like Google account, exchange server etc?
This i am telling since my mail, is a company mail account so -as I am sure you understand- i cannot have company mails out on the net.
ps:I am from Greece and i hope my writing is understandable
It's very understandable, you just need a google account only for the sake of the Market and apps and everything, but im sure you can import your contacts. I really don't know if you can use company mail as a solution for Market but all Android tab's require a gmail dummy account to track market. The stock Email client I think can import, not sure in pst file. Id love to try it but I stopped using Outlook for 2 years now and I don't have any pst file lying around
Two solutions
Hi,
There are 2 ways to solve this:
1) Define a corporate account on your android phone with your Company's exchave server settings. This will allow you to sync all your emails, contacts, calendar... The bad part of this is that if your company's exchange server has some security setup, you will be forced to setup a security code to punch in everytime you try to use your phone. For me, this is pretty annoying.
2) Second solution, there is a SW called Touch Down which you can find in Play Store. This will allow you to sync all contacts, emails... and you don't need to use the security code thingy. The only limirations, I have faced, is that all updates will need to be done through Touch Down interface with your company's Exchange server (e.g. contacts updates will not be possible from People application).
Give this SW a try... you might like it
You could also put a "thank you" for me
Hi everyone,
I'm using CM9, but I tried different ICS roms and I encounter this problem with all of them.
- I'm trying to add a local phone (non gmail) contact to my phone, but it doesn't let me do that. When I add a new contact, a message box pops up saying, that: "Your new contact will be synchronized with <my gmail account>". How to add a local phone (not a SIM card) number?
- I have a backup of all my local phone numbers from GB made with MyPhoneExplorer, and restoring it works when I'm on ICS. The contacts are shown as local phone contacts (PCSC). However, after restarting the phone and waiting a few minutes, all the local contacts are completely gone. MyPhoneExplorer confirms that there are no contacts in the phone either. What's going on?
I really do not want to sync my contacts with google. Looking forward to hearing some answers!
Cheers!
I use CM9-alpha4 (i9001) and it works for me.
I did completely turn of "accounts and sync" and I also didn't flash gapps.
When I first created a new contact I was notified that it will be local and not synced. No problem there.
I'm using the CM9 9-20120614 version (the newest beta). I have Accounts and Sync on, since I want some stuff synced with my phone (facebook, linkedin, gmail calendar, etc.). And I experience the beforementioned problems...
I fiddled with the options but found nothing that would allow me to store my contacts locally and prevent the existing ones from being deleted
There is an issue in the Bugtracker:
https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=26834
You could also use some other account that doesn't sync with Google. Funambol[0] would be my choice.
[0] http://f-droid.org/repository/browse/?fdid=com.funambol.androidsync
Thanks for that link.
However, I'm not sure, how is that cloud solution about to help storing my contacts locally without sharing it with any 3rd party?
You have to assiciate your contacts with some account. The funambol client creates such a "account provider" for you. But I just tried it and it seems like the client always wants you to sync with some server. You could set up your own server but that might not be what you want.
Sorry I can't really help. There is another thread about this:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=27747450
Alright, thanks a lot for your replies! Sigh, I guess I will just stick with google contacts for now -_-
here's my fix http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1808037
haydent said:
here's my fix http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1808037
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks! I will test it soon, although I have already moved my contacts to Google's cloud. Also, will this fix prevent me from synching google contacts? If so, it's more of a workaround than fix.
It breaks contact syncing deliberately. If you want to keep that while enabling local storage of contacts you need to edit the contacts.apk . I initially decompiled it and identified the line of code that enables or disables the local option.
Sent from my MB526 using xda app-developers app
My understanding is that this is a known issue, I'm looking for a workaround or resolution.
Using KitKat, and the standard AOSP email client, I setup my corporate email account in the usual way. Everything works the way it is supposed to except for syncing contacts.
Normally I have fewer than 100 contacts, but with KitKat I end up with over 600. From my research into this issue it is because KitKat is syncing the "suggested contacts" from exchange, not just the contacts listed in my address book. I'm not sure who made the decision to do that, but it doesn't sound like the best idea to me.
I see this problem on my tablet which is running the CM 11.0 nightlies, but I do not see it on my HTC One running AndroidNow, even though Android Now is at 4.4. That is what tells me that the problem is in Exchange Services for the standard AOSP client. I confirmed this by finding this site:
http://www.androidpolice.com/2013/1...4-4-with-gmail-style-ui-and-a-slide-out-menu/
I downloaded the appropriate files and installed the apks on my HTC One. When I setup my corporate email there I started seeing the same issue.
Does anyone have any news or recommendations on this issue? By the way, I'm not looking for "install such-and-such email client, it's better" type recommendations. I've tried the majority of them already.
Thanks
It is interesting to me that no one has anything to say on this issue. Perhaps no one saw my post?
At any rate, I found a "solution" which is clumsy but seems to do the trick. The suggestion I found in the google forums was to delete the "Suggested Contacts" folder (I did it in the Exchange web mail app), delete the Corporate account and recreate. I did and I now have the correct number of contacts.
From what I have found this problem is caused by code added to KitKat for syncing sub-folders. It is an issue that Google is aware of, but has marked at a very low priority. I assume that means that a real fix for this will be a long time coming.
dlbarron said:
It is interesting to me that no one has anything to say on this issue. Perhaps no one saw my post?
At any rate, I found a "solution" which is clumsy but seems to do the trick. The suggestion I found in the google forums was to delete the "Suggested Contacts" folder (I did it in the Exchange web mail app), delete the Corporate account and recreate. I did and I now have the correct number of contacts.
From what I have found this problem is caused by code added to KitKat for syncing sub-folders. It is an issue that Google is aware of, but has marked at a very low priority. I assume that means that a real fix for this will be a long time coming.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In case you may not have noticed, there is a open issue for this now:
http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=61979
Im having the same problem with you, but removing the "suggested contacts" folder from Outlook didn't work (not that I should have to do that). It was if the contacts were cached to the phone.... even after removing the account. I even tried disabling sync, putting it in airplane mode, and using "Contact Remover" from the Play Store to delete the contacts from my phone (disabling sync and airplane mode to prevent a total deletion of all contacts on next sync). After that, I removed the account from Android, removed all phone pairings from Exchange (through OWA), and cleared the cache of the phone. As soon as I resynced, they all came back.
I'm beyond pissed. I literally have 5,000 contacts, and I can barely open the People applet. This is ridiculous.
Flapjack said:
In case you may not have noticed, there is a open issue for this now:
http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=61979
Im having the same problem with you, but removing the "suggested contacts" folder from Outlook didn't work (not that I should have to do that). It was if the contacts were cached to the phone.... even after removing the account. I even tried disabling sync, putting it in airplane mode, and using "Contact Remover" from the Play Store to delete the contacts from my phone (disabling sync and airplane mode to prevent a total deletion of all contacts on next sync). After that, I removed the account from Android, removed all phone pairings from Exchange (through OWA), and cleared the cache of the phone. As soon as I resynced, they all came back.
I'm beyond pissed. I literally have 5,000 contacts, and I can barely open the People applet. This is ridiculous.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can't argue with your assessment, especially since it is a known issue that is, apparently, not getting any attention from Google. That is disappointing.
dlbarron said:
I can't argue with your assessment, especially since it is a known issue that is, apparently, not getting any attention from Google. That is disappointing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have this same problem, but it seems to be Exchange email address history (start a new email: start typing address and the autocomplete list appears)that is causing the problem for me. If I delete the history the contact is now longer shown in my contact list. The problem is this history list is ever growing and changing. It seems we are forced to live with excess users until Google gets this fixed.
zoaguy said:
I have this same problem, but it seems to be Exchange email address history (start a new email: start typing address and the autocomplete list appears)that is causing the problem for me. If I delete the history the contact is now longer shown in my contact list. The problem is this history list is ever growing and changing. It seems we are forced to live with excess users until Google gets this fixed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ahhh, well that would make sense why deleting the "suggested contacts" folder doesn't fix it. I don't want to flush my autocomplete history. It's quite useful.
In the interim, I'm just 'pushing' my contacts from Touchdown using the "Copy to Phone" option, and not adding the corporate email option for now.
Here is a pretty nice work around to this issue.
Go into outlook and create a new category for all of the contacts you want to sync with your device. Once the contacts are part of the new category, go to your device and in the contacts>>accounts to display>>select the corporate account>> and select which list(select the category you created in outlook>> thats it and resync your contacts.
zoaguy said:
Here is a pretty nice work around to this issue.
Go into outlook and create a new category for all of the contacts you want to sync with your device. Once the contacts are part of the new category, go to your device and in the contacts>>accounts to display>>select the corporate account>> and select which list(select the category you created in outlook>> thats it and resync your contacts.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
A slick solution to the problem. To bad it is necessary.
dlbarron said:
A slick solution to the problem. To bad it is necessary.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Agreed, a true fix is still needed. The biggest problem with this solution is making sure you put new contacts into the new category when they are being added.
I have the issue that my phone will not sync to the exchange contacts PERIOD.
It downloaded them fine apparently, but any changes made on the device do not get updated on the server.
WTF? How ****ing stupid is google to break activesync!?
I'm not just having problems with contacts... my entire calendar will not sync. I basically get no meeting reminders. I can log into exchange webmail and check my calendar there, but that is ridiculous.
As for the contacts, none of the tips and tricks in this thread have helped. I have completely deleted "suggested contacts" (which is a shame, because it was actually useful), but my phone is still pulling them from somewhere....
The only thing that works for me is installing Touchdown and using it to sync, then push the contacts to the phone. It does pick up the bullshvt ones...
Sent from my Galaxy S4 using Tapatalk
This is by far the most irritating part of KitKat.
I work for a mobile phone company with business customer and its a very common complaint.
Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk
BazmanFoo said:
This is by far the most irritating part of KitKat.
I work for a mobile phone company with business customer and its a very common complaint.
Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can't understand why it cannot be fixed. I don't even fully understand the problem, as I've gone through Outlook/Exchange multiple times cleaning out the "suggested contacts" and still had my phone's contact list spammed with every email address that is and ever was.
It took a long, long time... but I used "Contact Remover" from the Play store and just went down the list checking contacts I wanted to delete. It's much faster than going into each contact, hitting menu, then hitting delete. Still, you have to be careful not to delete contacts you want to keep. Many times, they're named exactly the same as the spam ones.
On a side note, I am struggling to understand why there are so many contacts that have been "augmented" by apps such as Facebook and Lync 2013. I never choose to sync those, but it appears to have done so anyway.
same problem here, contacts on phone (nexus 5) are filled with rubbish now
I have 5 gmail accounts on my V10. Only one is selected to sync contacts. When I use the dialer I start typing a number and start to see choices from other unsynced gmail accounts. When I select other account as visible in the contacts app it populates the supposed unsynced account with names. I have tried clear contact storage a couple times but it keeps syncing the contacts I told it not to. This is getting frustrating. Any suggestions?
drewcam888 said:
I have 5 gmail accounts on my V10. Only one is selected to sync contacts. When I use the dialer I start typing a number and start to see choices from other unsynced gmail accounts. When I select other account as visible in the contacts app it populates the supposed unsynced account with names. I have tried clear contact storage a couple times but it keeps syncing the contacts I told it not to. This is getting frustrating. Any suggestions?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
5 gmail accounts? amazing, i just have 1, did not see this issue before. try some email app.
The issue isn't related to an email app.
Do you use Google +?
If so, the first time of use, it asks if you want to sync all your G+ contacts.
I made this mistake once and now I have thousands
Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk
I don't use G+ and all the contacts are not synced to one account. The are listed under each individual gmail account. The issue only happened after moving to the V10. My note 4 didn't have this issue.
Any further suggestions?
can anyone confirm they have same problem
Anyone able to try duplicating this issue?
This happened to me on the Moto X (first generation) ... I've been screwed ever since.
My problem with this is how invasive - while at the same time disruptive, repetitive and completely unnecessary this unauthorized merge is as it duplicates contacts.
Example:
1. I have 1 email (& matching Contact List) for work and work related contacts. These contacts include only their work phone and email - and in some instances their work cell # -- which of course would be labeled "mobile" as that was the only labeling option a decade ago.
2. I have 1 email (& matching Contact List) for my friends. These contacts include only their personal phone and email. Although there are a few cell phone numbers that match the business cell, the rest of the info is unique to their personal life.
*** Part 2 of this Contact List is their wives/sig-other gets a Contact Listing - to which repetitive info like the land line and maybe e-mail address is entered, but more importantly their individual cell number. This makes contacting them individually an easy task without guessing what cell number goes to the husband or the wife ... and in some instances ... their kids (who sometimes baby/dog sit). [This may sound rather convoluted to you younger kids, but 10 years ago we didn't have the option of custom labeling the phone numbers, only a short pull-down list of Home, Cell, Fax ... so this is how we did it ... and a decade later with several hundred entries, we're NOT going back to redefine all these fields and merge contact lists as this is still an easy system].
Well - a while back when the Droid X came out, I loaded each email profile into the phone separately - Google/Droid decided to merge all contacts and it's been a friggin' disaster ever since! I went from 200 to 800 contacts in different email/contact profiles, to one, bigass, convoluted, double, triple, quadrupled contact list that is impossible to tell which one is from the Work List or the Personal List or any other miscellaneous list I had .... a 4000K Contact list for every email account - not just g-mail, but Outlook and Windows too! ! !
I've yet to find any app that can simplify or remedy this for me ... (I've spent WEEKS looking for one ... so about a year ago, I took several days and merged all the Contacts into one Gmail list and custom labeled EVERYONE on those lists into one, clear, concise list. I admit that I'm anal about keeping things organized and in clear and concise manner and this may seem nutty to some ... but I also don't make the mistakes my friends make with mis-dials and wrong numbers.
I've had some issues ... (hint: once done, copy to a window computer, then go and delete every back up you ever made of every contact list in every e-mail file to prevent reloading old files into the new, revised Contact list.) ... but I stay on top of it and delete or modify any duplicate. I'm almost back to being sane ... probably because I haven't stopped drinking ;- )
It's going to be a long and lonely road back to sanity. Google is invasive and loves getting all the info it can and will "F" up the way you kept it.
Good luck with a solution. Please post a solution if you find one.
I have three Gmail accounts on my phone. Mine, my daughters and wife's. I only want to sync the calendar, but it also syncs the contacts. Especially if I get a text from my brother, it will come up as Uncle.....(my daughter's account). I tried contacts sync fix as I read in a forum once that LG phones have an issue with broken contacts if you have an I.C.E. contact listed (in case of emergency). This did fix it for about two weeks and then something happened and I was back to seeing my wife's and daughter's contacts over mine.
If you find a solution, please let me know.