Thursday, January 28, 2010

Announcing Yahoo! Contacts Sync

We’re proud to announce public beta testing of Yahoo! Contacts sync. Yahoo! is now available as an option for the contacts sync source for all NuevaSync users.

Features
  • Synchronizes with almost every smartphone available, including the Apple iPhone, Nokia N900, Motorola Droid, Palm Pre and Pixi, and Windows Mobile phones.
  • Secure OAuth authentication.
  • Two-way synchronization of all contacts.
  • Two-way support for contact categories.
  • Synchronizes even unusual fields like Radio Telephone or Customer ID to Yahoo!
  • Works with Contacts Capture.
  • Avoids clutter by syncing only contacts that have more than IM info, such as a phone, email, postal address, etc. If you add more contact information to it later, the entry will be automatically added to the phone. (Optional)

Setup

To setup your account, open your service selection page and choose Yahoo!

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On the configuration page, enter your Yahoo! id and click ‘Request Account Access’:

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Sign in at Yahoo! with the account you want to sync:

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After signing in, click ‘Continue’ to finish link your account:

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And you’re done!

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Notes
  • We will be adding support to download contact pictures from Yahoo!
  • Since each contact chooses their own photo, Yahoo! does not allow you to update the picture for a contact. However, the service stores any picture sent from the device to be used in subsequent syncs.
  • Web site configuration validation isn't available yet for Yahoo! Until it is enabled, instead of a green ‘ok’ dot, the status page will show either a blue ‘configured’ dot or an orange ‘needs configured’ reminder.
  • During the beta preiod features may be added or improved.

We’re eager to know how it works for you. If you have any questions or problems visit our forum.


UPDATE: Support for downloading pictures from Yahoo! is now available for testing.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

New Feature: Contacts Capture

There's a new feature available today as part of the Premium Service package that we're calling "Contacts Capture". Inspired by a few users who have contacted us asking if we could provide an archive service, and also by this unfortunate incident, Contacts Capture stores contact data as it flows through the service and allows users to download their data from the web site. The popular vCard format is used. ".vcf" files can be imported into a wide range of applications and services.

Even contacts that have been accidentally deleted can be recovered (as long as those contacts had been sync'ed). So if a contact has been "seen" by the service (after capturing was enabled), then it is safely stored and available for download.

Capturing can is optional, and for existing Premium Service users must be enabled on the account settings page:



The device status page shows if your device's contacts have been captured:



Contact data can be viewed, and a snapshot taken of the current contacts state via the device management page:



Here's an example after contacts have been syncing and 4 contacts deleted. All the contacts, included the deleted ones can be downloaded from this page:




This example shows a snapshot (the lower table row) and the changes since the snapshot was taken. A snapshot allows recovery of contact data from the past even if the contacts have since been changed.




More information about this feature can be found on this page.