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Sun, 11 Oct 2009

17:14 – Import contacts to Android?

I gave in and bought an HTC Hero phone this weekend. Everyone I know seems to be lyrical about it. It seems capable of making phone calls and all the features one would expect from a "smart" phone are there.

I am a bit disturbed by the amount of data the phone seems to want to share with Google though. So far, I have not been able to find a way of importing my contacts without going through GMail (which I don't use), short of typing them in by hand - an error-prone process I'm not willing to try. The phone does not appear to support vcard-over-bluetooth.

None of the people who have given me their phone number have allowed me to share this data with Google and I would prefer not to ask all of them.

So, dear Lazyweb: how do I import approximately 300 phone numbers into this Hero contraption?

[ category: /activism | 11 comments on this entry ]

copy paste from the simcard ?

paul

Posted by Paul Cobbaut at Sun Oct 11 17:56:55 2009
Some of my contacts have more than one number and have names which don't fit the SIM.  I would have to spend a ridiculous amount of time post-processing the contacts.  Plus, 300 contacts won't fit on the SIM, so that would be a multi-stage operation too.

Sucks, since I have all my contacts in vcards on my pc and I can mount the sd card on my pc too.  Why is there no application on the phone that can read vcards on the sd card and plug them into the phone book?  I wonder if I can write one. 

The fact that no application appears to exist in the 'android market' suggests that people either don't mind typing out hundreds of phone numbers, or worse, that people don't care about sharing all kinds of data with Google.

I can only hope that the many people I know who own hero phones and who have not asked me if I mind them sharing my phone number with Google, are in the "don't mind typing" category.  I have  a feeling however that they may be in the "don't care about sharing with Google" category.

Posted by Philip Paeps at Sun Oct 11 18:07:47 2009
I googled "android syncml" and got a few results. Are they all bogus?
Like this one: https://android-client.forge.funambol.org/

Posted by Andrew Pantyukhin at Sun Oct 11 18:26:27 2009
Andrew: I don't know.  What is "syncml"?  I'll take a look.

Posted by Philip Paeps at Sun Oct 11 18:49:31 2009
I'll admit to belonging to the category that doesnt mind sharing with google. I have several reasons lulling me into a false sense of security, all obviously blatant lies, but they help me sleep at night ;)

(By the way, dont you just LOVE the HTC phone? Android is awesome!)

However, before learning how easy google sync is, I looked into an LDAP solution. (Im still going to do this some day soon, you know, when I find the time :s If only to have a backup when big G does Do Evil) Solution being; running my own LDAP server & synching the Android phones (My wife s getting one too) over the private wifi at home with that LDAP. I found some projects that were doing this, the apps were still in an early stage, but I believe it to be a valid solution to your (our) problem!

This thread: http://directorymanager.wordpress.com/2009/03/24/using-ldap-on-android/ looked very promising, but other than diagonally read it, I didnt find the time to follow through and found out if this is a workable solution.

Posted by Gert at Sun Oct 11 20:19:54 2009
I don't "just LOVE" the phone.  It's a phone.  Android is just an operating system.  I've also discovered that it's not actually possible to do anything with this particular operating system unless you don't mind voiding warranties (which I don't mind doing, but it's just silly) or you like to feel your mind explode by using something as disgusting as Java in something as demeaning as a sandbox.  While that doesn't keep me awake at night, it doesn't make me "just LOVE" the phone.

It makes phone calls and does text messages and has a webbrowser which is as functional as any other (which is not saying much - but you know how I feel about "the web") and has enough radios on board to work in every country I visit or plan to visit.  Those are my criteria for phones.  I really couldn't care less what's running on them.  The user interface is also vaguely useable, in that I can make a phone call and send a text message.  I'm still dubious about the lack of keyboard, but I'm sure that's just a matter of getting used to.

I do care about being able to get my contacts into it without violation the privacy of everyone I know by sharing their details with Google.  Accomplishing this seems to involve "SyncML" in some way.

Posted by Philip Paeps at Sun Oct 11 20:43:46 2009
Christophe pointed me at "vcardio" (http://www.cyrket.com/package/vcard.io) which seems to do what I need.  Now for making it work.

If that fails, I guess I'll just have to buy the cheapest pre-paid sim and send my contacts from the previous phone as vcards over sms.

Dear HTC/Android/Google/whoever: please implement vcard-over-bluetooth.  In addition to being supported by everyone else in the industry and being an excellent way to batch-copy contacts data between phone, it's also the most efficient way to copy a phone number from someone met in passing.

Posted by Philip Paeps at Sun Oct 11 22:19:24 2009
Well, Im sorry the LDAP sugestion didnt help. Good luck with the vcards ;)

Posted by Gert at Mon Oct 12 09:58:10 2009
Hey,

This one backs up to VCards, so I guess this ll restore those too?
http://phandroid.com/2009/11/03/novosoft-releases-handy-backup-for-android/

Good luck with the stuff, pitty we didnt get to talk on the geekdinner

Posted by Gert at Tue Nov 3 23:13:21 2009
With my n1, I have found an app to browse my ldap  directory (from anywhere, not just Wi-Fi); an app that will actually sync my contacts with my ldap (Google ldap2ab); and all of the Bluetooth apps I have played with transfer vcards around.

All of the apps I referred to were free downloads from appmarket except ldap2ab which was free from the author's site. None of them have voided any warranties.  If the phone does not do what you want, write an app,  or find one.

Posted by John at Sat Apr 24 17:09:31 2010
I can't understand why android can't accept a standard like shouldn't be acceptable to anyone...

This great OS can't take a screenshot and won't accept vcards.  Backwards!  This needs fixing!  The public will not adopt this platform unless it uses industry standards.  While everyone seems focused on Flash, I need to get contacts on here!  The android OS really shouldn't be so tied to Google such that industry standards are not adopted by the platform...  reminds ne if iPhone practices...  perhaps there isn't another alternative besides nokia's Linux.  I'll look there if android doesn't improve...

Posted by counsel at Thu Jul 22 04:18:42 2010

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