I am trying to come up with a good way that I can sync my email (already sitting on gmail with a custom domain) my google calendar and my google contacts with my Windows Laptop, my Macbook Pro and my iPhone.

Iv considered using mobile me for it but I really like the way gmail sorts emails in to folders server side rather than client side.

Running an exchange server is too painful and I can only have one exchange profile on my phone and thats works.

What do you guys use? Im trying to get thunderbird and lightening to do it atm but not much success.

You can now connect to Google Apps using ActiveSync so try setting that up on the iAwesome & MBP. For Windows I use Outlook 2007.

I can't speak to Mac/thunderbird etc but for iphone Google sync provides an Active Sync interface for iphone users to sync OTA. http://www.google.com/mobile/products/sync.html#p=default

Enjoy. I use it and it works brilliantly.

Update: You need to activate this option for your domain as I understand, it's no on by default.

Just use IMAP to access your email (all decent mail clients support it)? Not sure about syncing calendar and contacts, other than I sync my Google calendar to Tbird with the add-on for it

I use tbird for windows with IMAP and Apple mail with IMAP at the moment as well.
Works a treat. I just want to find an easy way to have my personal calendar and contacts all synced up.

Cheers for the replys so far, will have a look at the options suggested.

This is the thing I use to sync calendar: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/sunbird/addon/4631

Lemme know what you find with contacts; that was the next thing I was about to tackle :)

Out of curiosity, how come you guys prefer Thunderbird over the GMail interface?

I used to use T'Bird flat-out but now I just live in a browser. It's one less app to worry about having installed on my comp. Plus, back in the POP3 days T'Bird used to corrupt the mailboxes quite a lot, so it drove me away.

Out of curiosity, how come you guys prefer Thunderbird over the GMail interface?

I used to use T'Bird flat-out but now I just live in a browser. It's one less app to worry about having installed on my comp. Plus, back in the POP3 days T'Bird used to corrupt the mailboxes quite a lot, so it drove me away.

99% of the time I use Gmail's web interface. I am migrating my work email to Tbird though so trying to use it as much as possible. Plus I also like knowing I have an offline copy of my Gmail stuff in case Google collapses tomorrow.

The MobileSync service syncs all of the required information, Email/Contacts/Calendars (supporting multiple calendars).

I'd suggest it's far and away the best option for the Iphone.

As above: http://www.google.com/sync wins hands down.

The MobileSync service syncs all of the required information, Email/Contacts/Calendars (supporting multiple calendars).

He already said he can't because he's already using the iPhone Exchange account with his work account and the iPhone only lets you have one Exchange account in use at a time.

Problem Solvered.

Imap, plus the plugin that trog linked (except not the sunbird version, the lightning version) and http://www.zindus.com/download-extension/ to sync my contacts, thunderbird now does it all :)


damn happy.

lol @ Twitter feed on that site:

next release of the addon will do a better job of setting expectations for new users.

Doesn't fill you with confidence - how is it?

He already said he can't because he's already using the iPhone Exchange account with his work account and the iPhone only lets you have one Exchange account in use at a time.

You're right, my bad.

Plus I also like knowing I have an offline copy of my Gmail stuff in case Google collapses tomorrow.

I'm pretty sure Gmail has a feature now to download all of your email to your drive while still accessing it through the web interface. It's in the Google Labs features, I think.

For the mac, get Snow Leopard, no plugins required. Both address book and iCal have options in the preferences to sync with Google.

Address Book:
http://img.skitch.com/20091021-fwtp3frusyeguk6sixp4fhpn8d.jpg

iCal
http://img.skitch.com/20091021-gyjykncqcb2qn2qpgacji18k2m.jpg

Email:
Use IMAP, IMAP does sent/receive syncing by default

I'm pretty sure Gmail has a feature now to download all of your email to your drive while still accessing it through the web interface. It's in the Google Labs features, I think.

Google Gears - http://gears.google.com/

what about seamonkey?

http://www.seamonkey-project.org/

The SeaMonkey project is a community effort to develop the SeaMonkey all-in-one internet application suite (see below). Such a software suite was previously made popular by Netscape and Mozilla, and the SeaMonkey project continues to develop and deliver high-quality updates to this concept. Containing an Internet browser, email & newsgroup client, HTML editor, IRC chat and web development tools, SeaMonkey is sure to appeal to advanced users, web developers and corporate users.