Need help with email/contacts/calendars and blackberries

[Mark Phillips]

On Mon, 2007-09-24 at 18:17 -0700, Jon M. Hanson wrote:
> Mark Phillips wrote:
> > I have a blackberry curve and I was trying to find a way to sync my email, 
> > calendar, and contacts. I use debian and kmail or evolution on my PC, and 
> > cox.net for my email. I am looking for an inexpensive and easy to maintain 
> > solution for syncing my email, contacts, and calendar.
> >
> > 1. I found that the blackberry can get email from my cox account, and when I 
> > delete an email on my blackberry, the email is deleted on the cox.net server. 
> > However, I can't find a setting in kmail or evolution that does the same 
> > thing - basically leave the email on the cox.net server until I delete it in 
> > kmail or evolution. They both have options to leave the messages on the 
> > server, but no way to delete the messages other than from the server itself. 
> > Am I missing something?
> >
> > 2. I have looked at creating a funambol server (http://www.funambol.com/) 
> > which looks like an open source version of RIM's BIS using syncML. However 
> > the blackberry plugin is not being actively supported, so it seems it might 
> > be a dead end. Funambol is more focused on Microsoft Mobile devices. Anyone 
> > have any experience with funambol and blackberries?
> >
> > 3. There is a free (?) service called ScheduleWorld 
> > (http://wiki.scheduleworld.com/) that provides syncing calendar and contacts 
> > (no email) for blackberries. It is based on the funambol server and SyncML. 
> > Anyone use this service?
> >
> > 4. GMail is an option with gmail mobile, but then I give up a local email 
> > client. Google calendar on the blackberry is not very good.
> >
> > 5. There are hosting companies that provide a shared BES server with an 
> > Exchange backend. Evolution is supposed to talk to exchange. Could I forward 
> > my pop email accounts (i.e. cox.net) to an hosted exchange server and then 
> > have evolution talk to the exchange server and my blackberry talk to the 
> > exchange server. Would all my contacts, email, and calendar objects be in 
> > sync? Does this sound feasible, or am I missing some fundamental concept that 
> > makes this plan infeasible?
> >
> > Does anyone on the list use a blackberry? How do you sync your contacts and 
> > calendar entries, and how do you have email set up?
> >
> > Thanks!
> >   
> I just picked up a Curve this weekend. It sure is an improvement over
> the Windows Mobile phone it replaced.
> 
> I started an account with ScheduleWorld (which is just a Funambol
> server) so that I can sync my Google Calendar with my new BlackBerry. It
> works but sometimes I get double to triple events on the Google Calendar
> and/or the BlackBerry. I've posted a question about this on the
> ScheduleWorld forums and the maintainer is pretty prompt with responses.
> 
> One thing that concerns me is that there doesn't seem to be any facility
> in the BlackBerry's calendar for different calendars. On Google Calendar
> I have one calendar for personal stuff, one for work stuff, and another
> for my side business. It's unclear how ScheduleWorld will know which
> calendar to stick something in if I create an event on the BlackBerry
> but am unable to specify which calendar it belongs to because the
> BlackBerry lacks that functionality.
> 
> There is a Linux support forum for BlackBerry here that you might also
> want to frequent: http://www.blackberryforums.com/linux-users-corner/.
> 
> I couldn't get the BlackBerry Funambol client to install on the Curve.
> It didn't like the version or something. I installed the SyncML client
> from Nexthaus (http://www.nexthaus.com) which is not free but has a trial.
> 
> 

Thanks for your ideas!

I signed up for a free trial at MailStreet - a BES and Exchange hosting
company. We managed after an hour to get an account setup and working
with Evolution 2.6.3. MainStreet has excellent customer service so far.
The main problem is that the exchange plugin for Evolution is only
compaitble with Exchange 2000 and 2003. All the new accounts at
MailStreet use Exchange 2007. 

The cost for one account with 200 MB storage is $9.95/month. Adding the
BES server is another $9.95/month. However, I found out after putting
this all together, that I need the BES mail service from T-mobile, which
is $29.99/month, as opposed to the standard data plan which is
$19.99/month. I am waiting for account to be upgraded at T-mobile to see
how the hosted BES solution works. 

A hosted exchange/BES solution is a little pricey ($600/year to keep
email, calendar, and contacts synced), so I may look at installing my
own funambol server and using the NextHaus plugin. 

Mark

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