Sync iCloud’s Contacts and Calendars with Outlook

Synchronize iCloud’s Contacts and Calendars with Outlook

In this year of 2020, more and more jobs require people to work from home due to COVID-19 pandamic. Syncing calendar, contact and task remotely from home in order to cope with colleagues has become an issue for those who have not done this before.

Someone asked me about “Can he sync iCloud contacts and calendars to Outlook since iCloud Control Panel breaks down from time to time?” Of course, you can do it with EVO Collaborator for Outlook, aka ECO.

ECO is an outlook plugin for CardDAV and CalDAV.

With a file size of less than 4MB, ECO and Outlook work together and perform a two-way sync of contacts, calendars and tasks between CardDAV/CalDAV services and Outlook 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, and 2019.

What are CardDAV and CalDAV anyway?

CardDAV and CalDAV are standard protocol API by IETF’s RFC for contacts and calendars. Apple is using this open standard to take care of contacts and calendars between Apple devices.   How do I do it? It is easier than a breeze with ECO. Simply:

1. Download ECO from EVO Official Site and install it with admin’s privilege on your Outlook.
2. Open Outlook and click on EVO ribbon at the top banner.
3. Click on Configure profile(s)

   

4. Select Profile #2 for iCloud profile. Edit it by filling in your iCloud account and app password (you have to enable 2 steps verification on Apple and create an app password)
5. Upon sync completion, Items on your iCloud account will be sync’d to your Outlook.

Build your own Cloud!

iCloud is a great tool for individuals, but it may not be suitable when it comes down to a company-size scale where lots of information scatter around. Why not build one for your company itself? EVO Mail Server Download and install EVO Mail Server along with CardDAV and CalDAV addon (ECA). Once ready, all Outlook’s contacts, calendars and tasks can all go sync’d. Again, this solution I just mentioned is not a bad choice to choose from.

Sync Google Calendar and Gmail with Outlook in real-time Push Notification

Sync Google Calendar and Gmail with Outlook in real-time Push Notification

It has been 2 years since I last wrote the article about “How to synchronize Google Calendar with Outlook”. Lots of things have changed since then. Now, many of you already know how to sync Google Calendar and address book with Office 365, Outlook 2019/2016/2010/2013/2007. Today, I am going to update this article and elaborate on how to also sync Google Task with Outlook, how to sync Google Calendar in real-time, and how to sync Gmail’s INBOX under Outlook in real-time using IMAP and Push Notification technology.

To refresh our memories:

Google Calendar Sync: Error syncing your calendar.Error code: 2016.Please see our Help Center for more information.

The above error message started to pop up back in August/4/2014 when you were trying to use Google’s free Google Calendar Sync for Outlook. The reason was that Google terminated access of this free application to its synchronization services. Instead of providing free services, users must pay to continue using the successor called GASMO (Google App Sync for Microsoft Outlook) while Microsoft still has not yet implemented a way to sync with Google’s contact/calendar/task in its most recent Outlook 2016/2019. Free Gmail users have been looking for an alternative to GASMO on their Outlook even until now.

Push Technology

Other than GASMO matter, I believe that many of you are using Android smart phones. When your Gmail account has e-mails coming in, your smartphone will notify you. Perhaps you are getting so used to it and you do not realize that it is the Gmail Push Email feature doing the job. With this push notification scheme, you can receive emails in real-time. However, when you use Outlook, it is still only designed to check for emails every few minutes. Is there any way for Outlook to also achieve such real-time Gmail INBOX sync?

What is real-time Google Calendar Sync with Outlook?

Calendar entries you created elsewhere (for example on an android smartphone) are pushed to your other devices or software immediately.  As far as I know, almost all other sync tools still rely on manual or sync-counter to pull new entries from Google Calendar. 

What is Gmail Push Notification?

Gmail’s new email arrivals can be pushed via Gmail Push Notification. When new mails arrived at your Gmail INBOX, Google will send a notification to your device or software. Then, you will hear an alert sound and automatically initiate a quick mail sync for the Gmail INBOX.

Is it possible for us to sync both Gmail emails and Gmail Calendar with Microsoft Outlook in real-time as mentioned above?

Of course, you can! EVO Collaborator for Outlook is handling the jobs for you. Other than synchronizing Gmail contacts and tasks with Outlook, you will experience the advantage of real-time sync upgrade from timer-sync over Gmail Calendar and your existing Gmail IMAP INBOX.

Technology behind EVO Collaborator for Outlook

EVO collaborator for Outlook uses many different Google API, including Google Contacts API, Google Calendar API, Gmail API, Google Tasks API so that Outlook can talk to Google services. Meanwhile, CardDAV and CalDAV are also implemented to make synchronizations with popular CardDAV and CalDAV services possible, such as iCloud, Synology, Yahoo!, GMX, ownCloud and etc. 

Recap of ECO sync with Google contacts, calendars and tasks

1. Download and install EVO Collaborator for Outlook with Run as administrator

2. Open Outlook 2007/2010/2013/2016 and click on EVO ribbon

3. Click on Configure profile and select Profile #6 

4. Enter your Gmail account (if you have Gmail configured in Outlook, your Gmail account is auto-detected and listed in the email space) and click on TEST to proceed Google OAuth 

5. Once authenticated, click on Apply and Quit to leave Confgiure profile window. Synchronization will take place. Be sure to click on Calendar/People/Tasks section at lower-left within Outlook and you will find your contact/calendar/task entries inside Gmail contacts/Gmail calendar/Gmail task respectively.

An ultimate and complete Gmail companion for outlook is finally here.

With ECO’s Google contacts/calendar/tasks sync as well as Google Calendar Push Notification and Gmail Push Notification technology on Outlook, now Microsoft’s Outlook and Google’s Gmail are now finally like a family.

This is also the main reason I think EVO Collaborator for Outlook works better than gSyncit, Outlook Google Calendar Synchronization or Companionlink's Google Calendar Sync tool. When it comes to calendar sync matter, it would be much nicer if users gets reminded via Gmail Push Notification. Otherwise, a meeting invitation may be past due before the calendar event is synced periodically or manually.


References:
* Synchronize Google Calendar with Outlook

How do I sync Toodledo with Outlook?

How to sync Toodledo with Outlook?

Toodledo online has been a popular task management service provider for the past few years. Being different from regular Google Tasks, Outlook Tasks and  iCloud Reminder, Toodledo provides multi-dimensional ways of keeping your tasks in various areas such as Life Goals, Folder, Location, GTD (getting things done), and Subtasks. Especially, GTD believers found Toodledo suitable to arrange their to-do lists efficiently that they will not drop or forget what has to be done.

A task is capable of existing in several categories at the same time through its relative interconnectivity to other task items. It is only available if you have either free or paid services from Toodledo.com. Toodledo interface is available in Toodledo’s own web GUI, iPhone app and Android app. Even some 3rd party applications support it with write/read or read-only one way or another. Somehow, discussions have been going on for quite a while on a working and useful plug-ins that sync between Toodledo and Outlook environment.  Before I start to try all those plug-in recommendations, I received a newsletter from EVO staff about the availability on supporting Toodledo. I guess I might as well start with this since I bought EVO Collaborator for Outlook a long time ago.

How do I configure EVO Collaborator for Outlook to sync with Toodledo?

1. Click on Configure profile
2. Select Profile 13 – Not configured (this is the profile for toodledo)

   

3. Click on TEST
4. In Toodledo’s OAUTH Authorize window, enter your username and password

   

   .
5. Click on Authorize
6. Once completed, click cross at top-right
7. A Success box will pop up and we are done

   

After your Toodledo account is properly configured, we need to verify if we are able to sync tasks.

1. Create a task on Toodledo web GUI
2. Manipulate task’s property such as folder, context, goal, location, status, priority and tags
3. Once task is synchronized with Outlook, go to Outlook and check the matching item in Tasks section
4. Take a look at various symbols under category, they match each of the task’s property that you just manipulated on web GUI.
5. Reversely, edit the testing task’s properties such as title and elements in category. Then check back with your Toodledo web-GUI and see if sync takes place.
6. Here is the emoji mapping table for your reference: Star emoji: ★☆ Folder emoji: 📂 Context emoji: ＠ Goal emoji: 🏁 Location emoji: 📍 Status emoji: ☑ Possible values:         ☑None,         ☑NextAction,         ☑Active,         ☑Planning,         ☑Delegated,         ☑Waiting,         ☑Hold,         ☑Postponed,         ☑Someday,         ☑Canceled,         ☑Reference Priority emoji: 🏃 Possible values:            🏃Negative,            🏃Low,            🏃Medium,            🏃High,            🏃Top

I believe EVO Collaborator for Outlook is doing a decent job this time to incorporate Toodledo into Outlook 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016 or 2019 and it comes in handy for those who use both Toodledo and Outlook.

Synchronize iPhone Contacts and Calendars with Outlook 2016 and 2019

Synchronize iPhone 14 Contacts and Calendars with Outlook 365

In this year of 2022, more and more jobs require people to work from home due to COVID-19 pandamic. Syncing calendar, contact and task remotely from home in order to cope with colleagues has become an issue for those who have not done this before.

Someone asked me about “Can I sync iPhone contacts and calendars to Outlook?” Of course, you can do it with EVO Collaborator for Outlook, aka ECO.

ECO is an outlook plugin for synchronization

With a file size of less than 7MB, ECO and Outlook work together and perform a two-way sync of contacts, calendars and tasks between CardDAV/CalDAV services and Outlook 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016.

What are CardDAV and CalDAV anyway?

CardDAV and CalDAV are standard protocol API by IETF’s RFC for contacts and calendars. Apple is using this open standard to take care of contacts and calendars between Apple devices.  How to sync iphone contacts with Outlook 2016/2019 and Office 365? It is easier than a breeze with ECO. Simply:

1. Download ECO from EVO Official Site and install it with admin’s privilege on your Outlook.
2. Open Outlook and click on EVO ribbon at the top banner.
3. Click on Configure profile

   

4. Select Profile #2 for iCloud profile. Edit it by filling your iCloud account and app password (enable 2 steps verifications on Apple's website and create your app password for 3rd party software)
5. Upon sync completion, Items on your iCloud account will be sync’d to your Outlook.

Build your own Cloud!

iCloud is a great tool for individuals, but it may not be suitable when it comes down to a company-size scale where lots of information scatter around. Why not build one for your company itself? Mail Server   Download EVO Mail Server and install along with CardDAV and CalDAV addon (ECA). Once ready, all Outlook’s contacts, calendars and tasks can all go sync’d. Again, this solution I just mentioned is not a bad choice to choose from.  

Five Best Online Calendar services Review (FREE)

Five Best Online Calendar services Review (FREE)

In this year of 2022, more and more jobs require people to work from home due to COVID-19 pandamic. Syncing calendar, contact and task remotely from home in order to cope with colleagues has become an issue for those who have not done this before. If you have not tried it before, it is time to take a look now since we do not know how much longer this pandamic will last in near future.

After 8/1/2014, some of you may be disappointed by the termination of Google Calendar Sync services for Outlook. However, it is not the end of the world. There are still Gmail alternatives to choose from, and these online calendaring services are mostly free. If you want to share you appointments or events with someone else, you may try any of the following.

1. Yahoo! -

   

   This United states based calendar sharing service is always there on its web based interface, OS X, iOS APP, and Android. To use it under Windows Outlook environment, you need an add-in such as EVO Collaborator for Outlook which links your online calendar to Outlook.

2. iCloud -

   

   This service is a good one under Apple machines and devices. Though it has an iCloud Control Panel but it has a few problems like you can only sync with one iCloud account and it is impossible to use Outlook default calendar to sync with iCloud. If you use iPhone then this online calendar reminder service will work very well. It also provides holidays events for your convenience.

3. fruux (Germany) -

   

   This scheduling service has a good web base GUI and tutorials on how clients configure calendar/contact applications in different platforms are well written. However, it does not have its own Outlook add-in. Perhaps you can use ECO add-in to access calendar/contact in Outlook. It is free to sign up for users world-wide although it is a German based service provider.
4. QQ and 163 (China) -

   

   If you are somewhere in China, these two agenda cloud service providers are the ones you can count on and the speed are fast.
5. Google -

   

   Why Google is still on the list? The reason being is that Apple and Android are still good on it for mobility and collaboration. If you happen to be the victims using Outlook, then you can still survive by syncing some kind of add-in by thirld party software vendor such as EVO Collaborator for Outlook.

If you were to use more than one service from above in you Outlook 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016 or 2019, then you may want to try EVO Collaborator for Outlook. It is compatible with all services mentioned plus some other on-premise CardDAV/CalDAV platforms, paid or free mail server such as EVO Mail Server, OwnCloud, Zimbra, SabreDAV and etc. 

REFERENCE: Synchronizace Google kalendáře s Outlookem - postřehy ze světa počítačů a internetu