KOrganizer and smartphones

[Tom_ZeCat]

I may finally get a smartphone. I'm curious if anyone here has gotten an Android-based smartphone and has had good luck syncing it up with KOrganizer. I've been checking out that program and it looks really good. However, I know I'll never use it if I don't sync it up with some type of device that I can carry around. Years ago I used Lotus Organizer, which was a terrific program. I printed up my schedules and to-dos and put them in a binder … which was so bulky I never took it around with me.

Enter Palm. When I got a Palm Tungsten E2, I used its Windows-based software that's a lot like Lotus Organizer. It was great to always have my schedule and to-do list with me. To boot, I took Word documents with motivational quotes with me and spreadsheets to track financial stuff. It was great. Alas, Palm became obsolete and would not sync with my new Windows 7 PC.

Right now I just use a pre-paid cell phone, but I might be open to finally getting a smartphone. If one would sync with Korganize that would be a huge deal. This laptop is a dual boot. It will run Kubuntu or Windows 7, but using Windows applications is an absolute last resort. I really want my calendar to be in Korganizer.

Android phones? Anyone here sync with KOrganizer? Dare I consider an iPhone? (gasp)

[claydoh]

You don't usually sync a smartphone to a PC, you sync with The Cloud ie Google, iStuff, etc. so whatever you add to those from your PC is synced to the phone. Kontact works well with Google for me, though I do not use calendars and such so much. For docs and files, you connect the phone to your pc and it it will show as a storage or media device so you can use a file manager for that, or you can use something like dropbox.

[SteveRiley]

An alternative to Google is to run your own server that supports the CalDAV and CardDAV protocols for, respectively, calendars and address books. It's what I do. Mine is a fairly sophisticated setup, because I'm also running SMTP, IMAP, Webmail, and TT-RSS servers on my own .net domain, and I want to access everything over the Internet.

If you're looking for something simpler, where you keep your calendar entirely on your laptop or desktop PC, consider a less complex CalDAV/CardDAV server that you'd run locally. One example is Radicale. It requires no separate database or daemon configuration; a Python script installs and configures the server on your PC. After you install Radicale, configure KOrganizer resources for a calendar and an address book and point them to the Radicale server running locally.

Now for your phone, you'll need to install CalDAV-Sync and CardDAV-Sync from the Play Store. These add CalDAV and CardDAV awareness to Android's built-in calendar and contact applications. Set up an account in each one, and point it to the Radicale server running on your PC. This should be a cinch if you have configured your phone to use wi-fi when you're at home -- your PC and your phone will be able to talk to each other since they're sharing a network.

The result will be a very clean installation where the authoritative repository for your information is Radicale while KOrganizer and Android are now just mechanisms for displaying and editing calendar and contact information.

[Tom_ZeCat]

It blows my mind that people are putting their appointments and info online in places like Google Calendar. I'm not comfortable with that at all. That Radicale server sounds like something that might work.

I've also been googling around and found a utility named BitPim (http://www.bitpim.org/). It's a utility that supports certain phones and allows you to bring the data from the phone to the PC via a cable. I know a lot of people believe everything must be wireless no matter what, but I personally don't consider it an inconvenience to connect a cable from a phone to a PC real quick. For a minute I had some hope that BitPim was the answer even with my current clunky non-smart phone (an LG GPL G500GB). That thing does have a calendar and a to-do list. I haven't used it because I worry I'll lose the phone and all my info (hence my desire to sync the info to my PC). Alas, BitPim does not support my phone.

The good news is I could conceivably buy a phone on BitPim's supported list and use that. They're not even expensive smartphones. They're ordinary phones like mine that have calendars. I can decide whether I even need to go to a smartphone. I've wanted one for simple things like a French/English dictionary, chess, comparing prices, etc. I'm not planning to be on the thing all day.

Thanks for the info, guys. The choice comes down to getting an Android smartphone and using Radicale or getting a different basic phone an using BitPim.

[SteveRiley]

BitPim has seen no development work since January 2010, and both its developer and user mail lists are going silent. Sadly, it appears to be abandonware now.

[Tom_ZeCat]

BitPim has seen no development work since January 2010, and both its developer and user mail lists are going silent. Sadly, it appears to be abandonware now.

That's a shame. I installed it to see what it's like. It's nicely designed. I could use it and then not be able to upgrade my phone. I'm so frustrated by abandoneware:

CP/M, WordStar, WSWin, DR-DOS, Lucid 3D, Lotus Smartsuite, MS Frontpage ....

All abandonware that I once used. That's a big reason why I'm using GNU open source. I've been frustrated by corporate politics and ruthless/unethical competition killing off good applications.

[Snowhog]

Lucid 3D

I used this years ago, at work, to build some remarkable spreadsheets! It was a remarkable piece of software.

[SteveRiley]

I used this years ago, at work, to build some remarkable spreadsheets! It was a remarkable piece of software.

It is natural, I suppose, that remarkable tools would lead to remarkable outcomes.

[Snowhog]

It is natural, I suppose, that remarkable tools would lead to remarkable outcomes.

Such observation is simply remarkable!

[Tom_ZeCat]

I used this years ago, at work, to build some remarkable spreadsheets! It was a remarkable piece of software.

When I tried out Lucid 3D, I remarked that I wanted to use this remarkable software instead of Lotus 1-2-3.

[luckyone]

I guess I'm unmarked.