Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Yahoo! Autosync: where is it?

http://help.yahoo.com/l/us/yahoo/edit/vsp.html?query=auto+sync&lang=us&prop=edit&.p=yahoo

Search Results
We did not find results for: auto sync.

_____________________________

On the same page:

Answers from Yahoo! Users What is this?

How do you prevent auto sync from creating multiple calandar entries?
How do I stop the Auto Sync with my Outlook?
Auto sync says it can only sync contacts in OEX?
my auto sync is not responding?
How do I change my manual sync to auto sync with Yahoo Sync?

_____________________________

Yes, Calendar was misspelled.

How can web sites be so incompetent?

Yahoo cannot find autosync if I search for "auto sync"?  Microsoft wanted to buy Yahoo for its search capabilities?  How hard up was Microsoft?

OK, I searched Yahoo Help on autosync and found this:

http://vsp.help.yahoo.com/index.html?lang=en&query=autosync&Search=Search&.p=yahoo&prop=addressbook&sp=&sp2=

Of note: How is Yahoo! Autosync different from Intellisync for Yahoo!?

Yahoo! Autosync is an upgrade from Intellisync, and the most obvious difference is right there in the name: Intellisync is an intelligent solution to the problem of synchronizing desktop PIM info with your Yahoo! PIM data, and Yahoo! Autosync takes it a step or two further by doing this automatically—in the “background.”

When you make a change in Outlook, Palm, or Yahoo!, Yahoo! Autosync will mirror the data across automatically. Your data always stays consistent and synchronized without you having to remember to synchronize it manually.

Also built into Yahoo! Autosync are advances in protecting your data from loss or duplication.

_____________________________

Wow, sounds great!

Also on that Yahoo page under Tutorials:

"Downloading and Installing Yahoo! Autosync"

OK, just what I was looking for!

http://help.yahoo.com/tutorials/ab/ab/ab_intellisync2.html

Yesterday when I tried this after a hard day of having my contact data mangled by google and Goosync, I got here but could not find how to download Yahoo! Autosync.  Ii thought maybe my brain was fried and/or maybe it Yahoo did work properly in my browser: google Chrome.  Today I am trying this in Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) Version: 7.0.5730.11IC.

Yahoo calls this:

"Syncing Your Yahoo! Address Book With Other Applications"

Address Book.  My data is called Contacts in the current version of Yahoo on the web.

The next meaningful instructions:

Open your Yahoo! Address Book. 

Click the Sync link on the top-right side of the page.

The word sync does not appear.  I even used IE Edit Find to search my Contacts page for sync but it was not found.

The Yahoo instruction above had Address Book highlighted.  I clicked it and it took me to ... the OLD version of Yahoo on the web:

http://address.yahoo.com/

The logo uses the words Address Book.  There are also the words "printable Address Book".  However, the tab is called Contacts and the words above the data are "Contact Information".

Yahoo seems dysfunctional.

This OLD version of Yahoo on the web does contain the magic word sync.  I click it.

The original page on this had stated :

"The Yahoo! Autosync page opens."

No it doesn't.  What opens is an OLD Yahoo page with no way to download or otherwise get started as described in Yahoo.

There are a bunch of details on how to get this app working but no way to get the app.

You read stories about Yahoo and then you encounter this and you wonder how this company continues to function.  Did anyone at Yahoo ever try this?

Maybe it's just as well.  I just read a bunch of negative comments about Autosync.

2 comments:

Adam Edell said...

I feel your pain! Yahoo! Go for mobile phones has a killer auto sync feature (I use it on my Nokia 5310). I just got the announcement today that Yahoo Go is being discontinued as of January 1, 2010! There goes the last remaining way I know of to keep my address book in sync! I've been such a loyal yahoo user since the beginning and my address book is everything to me!

Kenneth Matinale said...

See my November, 2009 comment on the Motorola Droid sync function.