Gigaom Free Mobileme Alternative: How To Set Up Google Sync For Mac

The ability to store files with iCloud has radically changed the way people work. It means that all of your crucial documents – including presentations, spreadsheets and correspondence – can be stored simply and securely away from your device. It’s an additional failsafe so that if your Mac suddenly runs out of battery, your work isn’t lost or inaccessible until you find a place to charge.

It also means that if you’re frequently moving between different machines, such as between the office and home, you don’t have to worry about emailing everything across or transferring it with an external drive. Managing documents produced with iWork apps couldn’t be simpler on iCloud – just follow the steps to see how the process works. Step 1: Set up iCloud In Preferences click on the iCloud icon under Internet & Wireless.

You’ll be asked to enter your existing Apple ID and also to agree to the terms. Step 2: What to sync? Select which apps you’d like iCloud to store online. For now we’re just ticking Documents & Data, but it’s worth returning to explore its full compatibility. Step 3: Open up Pages Next time you launch an iWork app, you’ll see a window asking if you want to move any previous documents to iCloud.

Drag and drop as required. Step 4: Text The next time you create a new document with the app, you will be asked whether you want to save it locally or directly to iCloud. Name it and hit Return.

Step 5: Hit up iCloud When on another Mac, go to and log in with your Apple ID. It’s worth checking ‘Keep me signed in’ if it’s a device you use regularly. Step 6: Access iWork Click on iWork and it will show you a page with all of the documents which are available to download, as well as the last time that they were edited. Step 7: Retrieve a file Select a document on either of the three tabs, and then choose which format to open it – particularly useful if you have to switch to a Windows PC. Step 8: Check settings Click in the top-right to unlock more options, such as the ability to delete, duplicate and rename files – handy for keeping multiple versions of a project. Step 9: And repeat Now Pages is set up, you can repeat the process for Numbers and Keynote. Remember to set up iCloud locally on iOS devices for maximum accessibility.

Click on the image below to zoom in and view the annotations. There are a number of reasons why you may want to cancel Photo Stream, whether it’s a space issue on your iPad or iPhone, or just an urge to set the system up again with fresh snaps. The only way to reset the system is to go to the heart of iCloud –. Here you need to log in and then access your account information.

From here you can reset the stream. Apple has made the OFF switch online so that you can access the controls from anywhere. So if your iPhone, iPad or Mac is stolen, you can wipe the personal information in the stream using this reset technique.

In order to have the change filter through to your hand-helds, you’ll need to turn the stream off in their settings, too. We’re rounding off our month of Mac, iPhone and iPad tutorials with a syncing service that brings them all together – iCloud. Over the course of, we’ve lined up some of the best tutorials we’ve produced to help you to get to grips with Apple’s own cloud-based syncing service. We’ve got the best guides to setting iCloud up on any device, as well as troubleshooting information to help you solve any problem you have. As ever, we’ll be finishing things off with our online iCloud Genius Bar – giving you the chance to ask questions and have your iCloud problems solved.

On top of this, everyone who submits a question to the iCloud Genius Bar will be entered in to a prize draw to with something for your Mac, iPhone or iPad from our famous ‘cupboard of dreams’. To get involved with the iCloud Genius bar, post your questions on our, with the hashtag #LearniCloudWeek or email. We will answer your questions in the iCloud Genius Bar on Monday 7th May and the prize draw will follow shortly after. Everything you need to know about the prize draw is below, but before you look there check out the to see all of our Learn iPad Week posts and get in touch with us with your questions!

See you on the other side. Don’t forget, for a complete beginner’s guide to iCloud, check out our, built in iBooks Author specifically for the iPad. It’s available on iTunes now for just £0.99/$1.99. Terms and conditions: To enter into the Learn iPad Week online Genius Bar competition you’ll need to have submitted an iPad-related question or problem to us via Facebook, Twitter or Email (details above) by 11.59PM GMT on Sunday 6th May 2012.

Out of everyone who submits a question, we’ll draw one winner at random to win a prize from our cupboard of dreams on Tuesday 8th May 2012. The prize not transferable and there are no cash alternatives. Editors decision is final. Double-entries will not be counted (you can submit more than one question, but you’ll only be counted in the draw once).

With the recent launch of iOS 5, iCloud was finally unleashed on the world, and now is the time to take advantage of its features if you own more than one Apple device. ICloud makes it very straightforward to keep all of your data in sync across a Mac, iPhone, iPad and iPod touch thanks to a clever sharing system that will update everything at once whenever you make a change. However, setting up your devices correctly is very important.

Setting up iCloud itself is relatively simple, whether you own a Mac or just convert a current email address to the new system. But you will need to decide carefully what you want to sync before you input your iCloud address into your iOS device.

Do you want your mail in the cloud, or do you just want your contacts to be updated regularly with new data? Do you want photos you take to be saved and beamed instantly to your other devices, and will you need documents and data to be saved between iDevices? All of these are possible, but only optional when you sign up to iCloud, and you can pick and choose what your 5GB of free iCloud storage space will be used for. Read on to find out exactly how to set up each of your devices with iCloud, and how to get everything syncing instantly across your setup. Step 6: Deleting accounts If you want to get rid of iCloud on your iOS device, you can do so by tapping Delete Account.

Gigaom Free Mobileme Alternative: How To Set Up Google Sync For Mac Mac

You can choose to delete everything taken on iCloud from your iPad, but doing so won’t affect what is saved in the cloud. Click on the image below to zoom in and view the annotations. This tutorial is part of our series; for more articles just like this, visit the. At the end of the week, we’ll be giving away a prize to one lucky person who gets in touch with a question or problem related to the iPad. To get involved, simply tweet your question, plus the hashtag #LearniPadWeek, to or post on our wall. Dropbox is a free service that lets you share photos, docs and videos wirelessly via the internet. Use the software for personal sharing with friends and family, or commercially at work as you transfer files for review and approval.

This app is so easy to use and so universal that it may well become an essential part of your daily sharing routine. With an initial 2GB worth of free storage memory (additional $9.99 for 50GB, $19.99 for 100GB), the Dropbox app’s most notable function is the ability to host your files across desktop and mobile devices simultaneously.

This app is, as we’ve mentioned, very simple (that’s the true beauty of it), letting you perform a number of upload and share operations. Some of our favourites include its ability to synchronise with other image- hosting apps – PSD Viewer, for example – and also its direct Email Link option. Here’s a quick rundown on how to perform functions inside this app. Step 1: Image uploads Uploading an image is simple. Load the Dropbox app, tap the Uploads option, select your folder, tap your image(s) and the Upload button. Step 2: Share image links You can instantly share your uploaded images or anything else in your Dropbox folders by tapping the ‘+’ icon and selecting Email Link. Step 3: Making favourites Your Dropbox folder library may fill up fast, so the interface lets you designate images as favourites.

Simply click on the star icon in the interface. Step 4: App syncing Multitask in Dropbox with third-party app syncing. Compatible apps are instantly recognised and presented as options – in this case the free app PSD Viewer Lite. Step 5: Dropbox website Linked through your desktop options, the Dropbox website allows uploading from your home terminal hard drive, automatically syncing back to your iPad or portable device.

Step 6: Preview sharing Select SharingShare Folder. Send to a specific email address, with attached image link that will load in your browser – great for sharing images for approval. Click on the image below to zoom in and view the annotations. Setting up iCloud on your iOS 5 device is actually pretty easy, especially because Apple gives you the option to either use your existing Apple ID or set up an entirely new account to get the process started.

Here’s how it works, from beginning to end. Step 1: New or existing ID First, go to the Settings iCloud screen on your iOS device. By default, Apple will begin with the email address for the Apple ID you use to make purchases via the iTunes Store on your device entered into the sign-up field. If you want to use that ID to create your new iCloud ID, then go ahead and sign in. If not, click the “Get a Free Apple ID” link at the bottom of the Settings page. If you choose to use an existing Apple ID, you’ll simply have to sign in with your credentials, then agree to iCloud’s terms and conditions.

Apple will send out an account verification email to the address that is your Apple ID, which you can then follow a link from to complete the process. If you choose to create a new Apple ID, you’ll be guided through the entire sign up process on your iPhone or iPad. Step 2: Grant permissions and set syncing preferences Once verified, iCloud will automatically turn syncing on for most services, and ask your permission to either merge or replace data on your device, as well as use your location for Find My iPhone, iPad or iPod touch. Whether to merge or replace your data is up to you. Merging is probably the safe bet in most cases, since even if you don’t yet have anything on the cloud, it won’t affect what you have on device. Even in cases where you have a lot of duplicate information on your device and already on iCloud from a previous setup on your Mac or elsewhere, I’ve found that Apple’s service is smart about what to keep, and where to put what information, so there’s little clean-up required after the fact. Step 3: Choose what syncs You can selectively set which data does and doesn’t sync via iCloud once you’ve got it set up on your device.

Your options include Mail, Contacts, Calendars, Reminders, Bookmarks, Notes, Photo Stream, Documents & Data and Photo Stream. For Documents & Data, you can choose to allow iCloud to sync that information either only over Wi-Fi, or over both Wi-Fi and 3G.

As developers incorporate Documents in the Cloud into their apps, this will become more important for customers looking to ease their 3G mobile bandwidth usage. Note that you can also opt to back up your device to iCloud. This will work the same as a backup in iTunes, allowing you to remotely restore your iPhone’s settings, some content and information. Note that this backs up the camera roll, account information, documents and settings. You’ll have to replace any movies or music from iTunes on your device manually, as well as reinstall any apps in the event of needing to restore from an iCloud backup.

Step 4: Download the apps Apple’s iCloud works together with some official apps from Apple, too. To complete your iCloud experience, go ahead and download and Find My Friends from the App Store. These will help you both locate your own device should you lose it, and locate friends and family on a map if they choose to share their location with you, and vice versa.

You can also grab Apple’s iWork apps from the App Store if you want to see Document syncing via iCloud in action, but note that these cost money. The rest iCloud comes free with 5 GB of storage, but if you shoot a lot of video or backup many devices to the service, you might just want to upgrade your storage options. $20 a year gets you 15 GB total, $40 per year allows for 25 GB, and $100 a year will provide 55 GB of iCloud storage. You can upgrade to each option (or downgrade for your next payment cycle) via the iCloud settings on your device.

Not too difficult to set up, but I’d be curious to see what percentage of iOS buyers end up going through with it. Are you planning to use iCloud? If you are, do you foresee any reason to need to upgrade your storage level? Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro: Subscriber content. The arrival of Apple’s iCloud service has now been dated along with iOS 5.

We’ll get our hands on iCloud for Mac and iOS beginning, and it should make everyone’s mobile lives a lot simpler. Here’s a quick look at exactly what it offers. Find My Friends. A new app that lets you locate family and friends who agree to share their location with you on a map. This is included free in iCloud, and you have lots of controls over privacy, including setting specific times for sharing.

Find My iPhone. Introduced under MobileMe, included free with iCloud. Lets you track your registered devices should tehy get lost. Now works with Macs, too, under Lion.

ICloud borrows the Me.com domain from its predecessor to provide free email addresses to anyone who wants one. Contact, calendar, reminder, bookmark, note syncing.

Automatically, in the background, all of the content listed as well as email will be synced across iOS 5 and Lion devices, so long as you’re signed in, have an active network connection (Wi-Fi or 3G) and have syncing turned on. Photo Stream.

View photos taken from your iPhone automatically in your iPad’s image gallery, or in iPhoto on the desktop, or on your Apple TV. Basically take a photo once and have it everywhere. Photo Stream automatically takes your 1,000 latest photos and keeps them on iOS devices, plus you can opt to keep them in your Camera Roll permanently. Documents in the Cloud. Will make it easy to start a document in an app on your iOS device and continue it on the desktop, or vice versa.

This will gradually make its way out to third-party apps, too. Backup and automatic downloads. You can now restore purchases of apps, books and music (U.S. Only for now) to devices associated with your Apple ID, and also set them up to automatically download content you purchase elsewhere. Finally, you can back up your device’s settings, data and apps directly to iCloud and then restore from that should you need to do a fresh install.

5 GB free; storage upgrades available. Everyone gets 5 GB of iCloud storage (including your email, backups and other data) free, but if you need more you can pay to get it. $20 per year gets you an additional 10 GB of storage, $40 gets you 20 GB more and $100 secures 50 GB for a total of 55 GB. ICloud will be available to all iOS 5 users when that update arrives on Oct. 12, and to Mac owners running OS X Lion at the same time. Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro: Subscriber content. One of the popular soundbites from was “the truth is in the cloud.” Some have suspected Jobs of adopting metaphysical hyperbole in pitching Apple’s new iCloud service, but the ”truth” of the matter (sorry) is a bit more nuanced.

Jobs was using “truth” both to make an insider’s reference to an old Apple technology, and also to look forward to brand new technology in iCloud. Truth as used here has an inside technical meaning — the master or “truth” database in a distributed data system is the authoritative record for resolving conflicts. The master store in Apple’s existing Sync Services is the “truth database.” Here’s an image from that illustrates the term.

In the existing Mac-centric sync model, the truth database is stored on the computer. Applications that want to interact with Sync Services don’t talk directly to the underlying database itself, but rather communicate through the Sync Engine, part of Mac OS X, which maintains the integrity, or truth, of the authoritative master data.

The other side to the “truth in the cloud” comment is that iCloud is more than just online document storage. Jobs made reference to this on Monday, saying: Some people think the cloud is just a hard disk in the sky. We think it’s way more than that. ICloud is integrated with your apps, so everything happens automatically. It just works. After a demonstration of iWork apps saving documents to the cloud, Jobs quickly added that iCloud Storage APIs would also include key value data. If Apple follows some of the existing conventions of Sync Services, developers would not interact directly with the master store, but would rely on system-level services, the APIs, to maintain the integrity of the cloud data.

These system services will remove a tremendous burden from developers, making it much simple to integrate iOS apps with iCloud. Syncing key-value pairs is also more flexible than syncing documents, and perfectly suited for several common uses.

For example, to keep track of which levels are unlocked in a game like Angry Birds, the developer could update the key-value pair for each level independently from the others. In this scenario, the key might be the level id (“world-3-2″), and the value would be “locked” or “unlocked” as appropriate. It is simpler to fast sync just the one key-value pair that has changed instead of updating the entire settings file each time. This key-value pair approach also makes it much easier for developers to avoid situations where updating settings on one device would overwrite or erase all the settings on another device. Some might be skeptical since Sync Services has suffered from a number of issues like mistaken duplication of contacts and calendar events. Jobs poked fun at Apple’s missteps with their previous cloud efforts when he said joked that users might ask “why should I believe them?

They’re the ones that brought me MobileMe,” but he continued finished by admitting that while “it wasn’t Apple's finest hour,” the company “learned a lot.” Apple will have to put all of that learning to use to build a rock-solid online key-value store that can deal with billions of transactions coming from hundreds of millions of devices. That learning will be especially important when safe-guarding all that customer data in the key-value store. Key-value stores have gained a lot of recent attention in web development circles because they offer a flexible, and fast, way to access small bits of data like user preferences.

Solutions like MongoDB, Redis, Tokyo Cabinet, Memcache, Hadoop, MapReduce, Cassandra, Google’s BigTable, and Amazon’s Dynamo are all examples of web-friendly datastores that work with key-value pairs. Derrick Harris, over on our Structure channel, broke down how some of these technologies are being used to power, and highlighted a job listing which called for experience with key-value store technologies like Hadoop, Memcache and Cassandra. ICloud is not just about online document storage, but a whole infrastructure for syncing data and preferences with an online key-value store — a new Sync Services built around the idea of keeping the truth database in the cloud instead of on a computer. The, in other words.

A ‘key’ difference (again, so sorry) between iCloud and other key-value stores is that Apple is focused on providing infrastructure for native iOS and Mac apps while others are working on platforms for web apps that run in the browser. Apple wants to make things “just work” for iOS apps without placing unnecessary burdens on developers as they incorporate iCloud services. This tension between open and fragmented and closed and integrated, which we’ve already seen in the Android and iPhone platforms, is being played out again here.

But the fight is a good one for consumers, since it should lead to ever-better apps that test the limits of what we thought we could do with mobile devices. Related content from GigaOM Pro (subscription req’d):. If you’ve been waiting to upgrade your MobileMe Calender to the “new” CalDAV model, the deadline of May 5 is fast approaching. Since my business runs on iCal, I approached the upgrade with reluctance and some healthy fear. Here are my recommendations and a walkthrough of the process that should hopefully make the task less daunting for you.

Backup, Backup and Backup No matter what backup solution you use (Time Machine, online, manual), now is the time to run a full backup just in case. Additionally be sure you’ve synced all your iOS devices to your Mac. If you do “over the air” syncing you should be fine. Just to be extra safe, I ran two additional backups within iCal. Under the File Menu in iCal is the Export Function.

First, create a full iCal Archive under the Export Menu. That backs up your entire iCal calender list en mass. However, I alo backed up each and every calender to an.ics file by choosing each one and then going to File, Export, and then Export. This backs up each calender manually. Log Into MobileMe and Begin the Process Now that you have triple redundancy on your calenders, you can begin the process. Log into your MobileMe account via Safari (just to play it safe don’t use alternate browsers) and then click the icon in the upper left for iCal, which is the familiar spiral day-at-a-time calendar icon.

You should be presented with a window reminding you to “Upgrade to the new MobileMe Calender.” Click “next” and you’ll be presented with the system requirements. Since CalDAV only works with Leopard or Snow Leopard, Tiger’s been fully de-clawed for iOS. If you fail to move to CalDAV your MobileMe calender sync won’t work unless you move to 10.5 or 10.6 and if you do, Tiger will no longer sync without a third party helper like BusySync. After confirming your devices meet the requirements, click “Upgrade Now” and the process begins.

You’ll see a series of conformations that the calenders are being prepared and upgraded. What’s happening in the background is your existing calendars that were synced with your computer and MobileMe are making their move off your computer and into the cloud.

When complete, your calenders exist on MobileMe servers and your iCal merely provides another way of accessing them. Your iOS device should be smart enough to notice the change and modify itself as well. Now your calenders will exist on MobileMe’s servers and your other devices merely access the data, similar to the way IMAP works for email. Syncing is virtually instant since modifications are transferred directly to the cloud.

Trust, but Verify Just to play it safe, I had some preset test routines ready to make sure everything when smoothly. I waited about 20 minutes to do the following to make sure all the changes propagated:. Add an item via iCal and verify it shows up on my iOS and Mac OS devices and MobileMe’s website. Add an item via each iOS device and verify it shows up on all other devices. Modify an event on each device and make sure that change shows up.

If you have any calenders shared with someone, make sure they follow steps 1-3 for your calendar and you do the same for theirs, after they’ve also performed the upgrade Snags, Errors, and General Weirdness If all goes well, you are done! However with computers, everything doesn’t run so smoothly all of the time. In my particular instance one of my calenders was somehow corrupt enough to not make the move to the cloud, but I could still access it on my desktop. I kept getting errors in the upgrade process until I deleted the calender from my desktop. After the upgrade was complete, I then imported the.ics file I backed up earlier manually. It work, but if it hadn’t, I was going to use Time Machine to restore a version that wasn’t corrupt and then I’d again move it to MobileMe manually.

I was a big user of BusySync and on how to make the move with their software. As for other secondary services, I’m disappointed that syncing with Google became more complex after the upgrade.

I had to manually add my Google shared calenders. Once the upgrade is complete, the way others subscribe to your calender has changed. They now can have both read as well as write access to your calenders and most likely you’ll manually have to invite them to your calender by using the Share command under the Calender Menu within iCal. I had to manually re-invite people.

Another snag I personally ran into was on my MacBook, when I first launched iCal, it kept all the old calendars and then MobileMe created the proper CalDAV settings automatically but kept those old local calenders so everything was duplicated. Two great websites to help ease the transition are. If you ran into any snags or have any suggestions about upgrading your MobileMe calander, be sure to let us know in the comments. Related content from GigaOM Pro (subscription req’d):. A new to-do app for iPhone, aims to bring the most obvious omission from MobileMe to subscribers of the cloud services package from Apple. It does this without much flair, and it has a fairly high asking price. So is it worth it?

Much could be improved with MobileMe, starting with a, but Apple’s cloud service does wirelessly sync personal info like bookmarks, contacts, and appointments, but frustratingly not tasks. To fill that gap, there are apps like OmniGroup’s, but it’s both more powerful and more expensive ($19.99) than most people need. Appigo’s app is also feature-rich, and at $0.99, it’s a bargain, and even syncs wirelessly over a local network.

The downside of apps like Appigo’s ToDo is that they usually require companion server apps running on your Mac, as well some user intervention when syncing wirelessly. Also, the recent upgrade to online calendars for MobileMe users caused havoc with ToDo for me. All my tasks were stripped from their respective calendars, and while there’s a workaround, it’s still frustrating.

Gigaom Free Mobileme Alternative: How To Set Up Google Sync For Mac Free

BusyToDo from BusyMac, the makers of the iCal-on-steroids app BusyCal, provides the syncing that Apple should have included natively. It’s a spartan to-do list with few of the advanced features of task apps like those from OmniGroup or Appigo, but BusyToDo is still missing a few basic features, too, like a badge on the icon indicating due tasks. There isn’t a native version yet for the iPad, either. What you see in the screenshot is what you get, though if you use BusyCal in combination with BusyToDo, you can get a little more, like repeat to-dos and tags.

Task can be shown or hidden by associated calendar, and the list can be sorted by due date, priority, calendar, or alphabetically. I prefer to sort by calendar, but since calendars are shown alphabetically, I used “00″ as a calendar for today or priority tasks.

As can be seen in the screenshot, you can’t hide tasks that fall outside a timeframe like you can in iCal. Again, as the settings illustrate (not shown is a slider switch to display alarms as local notifications), BusyToDo is a basic task list. At $4.99, such a simple to-do app would be way overpriced, except for its singular “killer” feature. BusyToDo syncs iCal or BusyCal tasks through MobileMe, which is also the only way to sync with BusyToDo, but then that’s the point. Having logged in once to MobileMe, I created tasks and calendars on my MacBook, iPad, and iPhone, and they were instantly pushed to the other devices. There were no problems, no additional software or services were required, and BusyToDo worked over Wi-Fi and 3G. It’s not fancy, and it’s not exactly cheap, but it works, and until Apple introduces its own solution, BusyToDo is your best bet for syncing MobileMe to-do tasks quickly and easily over-the-air.

Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d):. Way back in March I about Xmarks, the bookmark sync and backup service. Unfortunately, the developers that, due to loss of money and having found no interested buyers, it’s shutting down for good on Jan.

10, 2011, meaning all syncs will cease, and all backups will be lost. At least they were considerate enough to give a couple of months’ notice before pulling the plug; it gives everyone time to move over to alternative services. The Xmarks developers, but the only one they can suggest for Safari users is Apple’s MobileMe service. As MobileMe costs $99 a year, subscribing just for the sake of syncing your Safari bookmarks is a bit costly. If you use any other browser, there are free alternatives such as Firefox Sync and Chrome Sync. I’ve seen some weird and wacky ways of syncing Safari bookmarks, including emailing yourself every time you change your bookmarks, or simply “remember which bookmarks you’ve added and add them on the other machine(s),” neither of which are helpful. I’ve discovered a much more useful method involving Dropbox.

It’s not as automatic as Xmarks was, but it gets the job done. There are two ways of doing this: one uses a free download called SymbolicLinker, and the other uses Terminal.app. I’ll start by going through the steps for using SymbolicLinker, then I’ll talk about the Terminal method.

Using SymbolicLinker. Download SymbolicLinker. It can be found. It’s not an application, but a Service you can install, which adds a new option when you right-click an item in the Finder. To install it, simply double-click the SymbolicLinker.service icon. Get Dropbox.

A free Dropbox account gives you 2GB of space. Obviously you can skip this step if you already have Dropbox. Quit Safari. Safari will get confused if you start messing around with its files while it’s still running. Create a ‘Bookmarks’ folder in Dropbox. It doesn’t matter what you call it, as long as you remember that it’s for your bookmarks. Move the Bookmarks file from Safari to Dropbox.

The file is called Bookmarks.plist and is located in your Home folderLibrarySafari. Make sure you move it rather than copy it over. Create a symbolic link to the Bookmarks file. To do this, right-click Bookmarks.plist and choose Make Symbolic Link, which is the new option added by SymbolicLinker.

Now drag the new file, ‘Bookmarks.plist symlink’, back to where you found the original file. Rename it back to ‘Bookmarks.plist’. You can now re-open Safari to check that all your bookmarks are still there and that they work properly. Next, repeat these steps on the other computers you want to keep in sync:. Download and install SymbolicLinker. Do this exactly the same way as before. Sync the computer with Dropbox.

Make sure the new Bookmarks.plist file is completely downloaded before continuing. Quit Safari. Create a symbolic link to the Bookmarks.plist file in Dropbox. Delete the Bookmarks.plist file in LibrarySafari and replace it with the symbolic link, again renaming it to simply ‘Bookmarks.plist’. Reopen Safari and check it works. It should work first time, but if it doesn’t, retry the steps, and make sure Bookmarks.plist has a capital ‘B’. The Terminal Method Using Terminal ( ApplicationsUtilitiesTerminal) achieves exactly the same thing, using the same method, but just doesn’t involve any downloads.

For this example, I’m going to put the Bookmarks file into DropboxSafari, but it works for any folder. Just switch out the file paths in the Terminal. Create your folder in Dropbox. Again, doesn’t matter what you call it. Move the Bookmarks file into Dropbox. Once again, you need to make sure that you’re moving the file and not copying it, otherwise you get an error saying that the file already exists.

Navigate to the Safari folder using Terminal. This can be done by typing (or copying and pasting): cd /Library/Safari. Create the symbolic link.

Do this by entering the following into Terminal: ln -s /Dropbox/Safari/Bookmarks.plist Bookmarks.plist. Restart Safari. The Problem Unfortunately, the problem with changing the Bookmarks.plist directly is you have to quit and reopen Safari in order to update the bookmarks on each machine. It’s still definitely a lot easier than remembering the bookmarks you’ve got and adding them to your other machines manually. Also, it doesn’t cost $99 a year. I’m sure that there are a whole bunch of other methods, perhaps using Automator or maybe another service similar to Xmarks, which accomplish the same task.

If you know about any of those, please share below. Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d):. GooTasks syncs tasks from Google We all know that trying to sync up tasks from your Google account to your iPhone / iPad can be a laborious, if not impossible, task!

And if you don't, now you do. The only way to access Google tasks is through mobile Safari or another web browser. Even will direct you to the web based version of Google tasks, via Safari. And, as it stands, there is no way to access Google tasks on the iOS Mail.app either, only notes can be synced through that. No one's saying the web-based version of Google tasks is such a bad thing, but if you're desperate to deal with your Google tasks through an app, with that app feel, shine and shimmer, then check out GooTasks. Is a straight forward and very simple app. It allows you to manage, create, edit and delete Google tasks from various Google accounts, and lists, so you have all your tasks in just one place.

And, it's free. I must admit, it's not all that different from Google's own mobile, web based version. The only difference that I could find is an offline mode, for use when you're off the grid. Naturally, your tasks will only sync once you're back on-line. GooTasks is made by French developer. You can check out the GooTasks website in English, but be warned, the iTunes App Store is in French only. Another word of caution, GooTasks has an in-app purchase to upgrade to GooTasks Pro at £2.99.

For the life of me, I can't figure out what added features you get from this and I can't gleam any further details from their website. So, play it safe, kids! If you're in the market for something similar to GooTasks, check out or, but these are paid for apps.

Or, why not make a little web shortcut on your home screen? That way, with one touch, your tasks will appear before you - just remember to save your log in details! Originally appeared on on Thu, 23 Sep 2010 09:00:00 EST.

Please see our. Over-the-air notes syncing option disappears from iPhone 3G in iOS 4.1 For the iPhone 3G, the biggest new feature for many users under iOS 4.1 is the. Making the iPhone 3G usable under iOS 4 came with some trade-offs before the new OS was even released - app multitasking and wallpapers didn't make the cut on the older iPhone - but it looks like a couple more features have been pruned from the iPhone 3G after iOS 4.1. One missing feature we noticed right away: Spotlight no longer searches through MMS messages on the iPhone 3G after the iOS 4.1 update. Given that disabling Spotlight searching was the most common suggested remedy for poor iPhone 3G performance on earlier builds of iOS 4, this omission is somewhat understandable. More puzzling, however, is another omission the folks at geek.com noticed:, too. Up until now, the iPhone 3G, like its newer siblings, has been able to sync Notes between the iPhone and a Mac/PC via Gmail or MobileMe rather than through iTunes, allowing for near-instant Notes updates between devices.

According to, both the iPhone 3G and second-generation iPod touch have lost this feature. You can still sync Notes with the iPhone 3G via iTunes, but you'll no longer enjoy device-to-device updates without syncing your iPhone first. Given the plethora of alternate apps on the App Store that offer far more flexibility and features than Apple's built-in Notes app, though, this omission is something we might never have noticed if one of our readers hadn't brought it up. We're not sure why Apple removed this feature in 4.1; it's possible that, like Spotlight searching of MMS, it was one of the things dragging down performance on the older devices. Either way, losing over-the-air Notes syncing in IOS 4.1 is a small price to pay for an iPhone 3G that actually functions properly in iOS 4.

Thanks to Jeff for bringing this to our attention. Originally appeared on on Fri, 10 Sep 2010 14:30:00 EST. Please see our. Apple recently unveiled iPhone OS 4, which brought many much needed features to the platform, including a lot which our own Charles Jade thought would.

Despite rectifying some long-standing oversights, however, Apple still hasn’t allowed its iDevices to sync wirelessly with people’s home computers. One user and developer decided not to wait for Apple to implement the feature, and instead created his own iPhone app in order to solve the problem. Greg Hughes, the man in question, created a Wi-Fi syncing app that works with a companion desktop client to sync your iTunes library with your iPhone, iPod touch or even your iPad. Check out the video below to see it in action. It may sound like something that shouldn’t even be possible using Apple’s closed playground of development APIs, and maybe Hughes is stepping slightly out of bounds, but the YouTube video showing the app in action proves that it does indeed work.

Just because it works, though, doesn’t mean we’ll be seeing it available for purchase in the app store anytime soon. I think it’s pretty safe to say Apple won’t let this one ever see the light of day. It’ll probably play the old “feature duplication” card because it may or may not introduce this feature itself somewhere down the road. It’s a shame because the implementation looks fantastic, and users wouldn’t even have to wait for a new iPhone OS iteration to get it, since it works with iPhone OS 3.X. Judging by the video, the app somehow tricks iTunes into thinking that an iPhone is mounted and then syncs any video and music with that device, so you wouldn’t get the full iPhone sync experience, but it would work perfectly for users like me who are also MobileMe subscribers, since we basically only plug in to update music anyway. Hughes is doing one thing right: He’s promoting the heck out of the app before it even has a chance to run afoul of Apple’s review process.

It worked for, although the organization behind that app has far more visibility and clout than does a single unknown developer acting on his own. Still, even if Apple does block the app, at least people will know it happened and possibly voice their disappointment, rather than just let it pass unnoticed. We’ll probably see the Wi-Fi Sync app grace the halls of the jailbreak app stores even if Apple never lets it see the light of day through official channels, proving once again that no matter what improvements Apple makes to its software, there’s still always a reason to go rogue. Is Wi-Fi Sync enough justification for you? Syncing data to the Internet (“the cloud”) is all the rage these days and with the coming of the iPad, we’ll surely see more of it. Whether you are using MobileMe, Dropbox, or any one of the variety of other syncing programs, you may be one of the increasing number of people using these services to backup their data. The problem, though, is that syncing is not backing up.

Syncing’s main focus is making sure your data is accessible and identical at multiple locations. If you have a disaster at one of these locations, a syncing service will make sure you still have access to your stuff. That’s handy and is seen by people as a way of backing up. Lose your iPhone and your contacts are accessible via the web.

Sync to Dropbox and if your dies, you can access your synced files via the web or another computer. Unfortunately, syncing operates under the age-old computer principle of Garbage In Garbage Out. When syncing is working properly, a change made on one device is propagated to the web and to all other devices.

If that change was unintended, the service might have a previous revision, but don’t count on it. A problem with data on one device is copied to all other devices in your sync scheme.

When it’s not working properly, stand back because things get ugly. I was a recent victim of this. I’ll be polite and won’t mention the name of the service, but it wasn’t a “sweet” experience. Somehow this company’s database was corrupt for my account and instead of syncing changes I made on my Mac to my PC, the server decided I had deleted a critical folder. I literally watched as the software started deleting folders from my Mac without warning or confirmation.

It is an 32bit application and thus limits the (total) usable RAM to approx. The only way to reduce the probability of such a kind of crash is to reduce the settings. If your settings within the fsx.cfg are to heavy (for instance TEXTURE_MAX_LOAD=4096 in combination with LOD_RADIUS greater than 4.500000) you will reach the limits very fast.

I immediately unplugged my Internet connection to minimize the damage. While only the fates of the cloud know what really happened, the post-mortem analysis I had with their engineers indicated my PC’s sync database somehow “thought” I no longer had a folder on my hard drive and then told the cloud to delete it from other computers. Blame it on a PC to mess up a Mac. Of course, their server didn’t have a backup. A two-fisted punch right to the gut. These same concerns also hold true for your calendars and contacts from MobileMe. Even though you sync them to the cloud, you should still perform a local backup of your Address Book and iCal.

Don’t be lulled by the siren of the cloud assuring you that your data is safe. The cloud is a jealous mistress who can swipe data right from your hard drive. Being old school, I don’t fully trust syncing or the cloud and so I fully backup my hard drive via Time Machine and dedicated online backup services. While my sour experience was annoying, I was able to quickly recover. Others have not been so lucky.

Account and database corruption are a fact of computing and because syncing doesn’t only copy data, but remove it, it’s not a backup solution. A true backup solution cannot remove data from your drive, only copy it. Whenever I read backup software reviews, commenters ask why synchronization services aren’t mentioned. Now you know why. Don’t rely on services like MobileMe and Dropbox as a backup.

Your data will thank you.