Version 0.1.1 of gContactSync is out and available for download here. Right-click and hit Save Link As, then install it in Thunderbird.
New Features:
- Greatly improved Preferences dialog (thanks to some help from Leszek(teo)Życzkowski)
- Bug 19960 – Add a preference to enable/disable the toolbar button
- An icon (again, thanks to some help from Leszek(teo)Życzkowski)
- Verbose logging is disabled by default (should speed things up slightly)
Bug Fixes:
- Bug 19964 – Log file window is too small in Thunderbird 3.0b1pre
- Bug 20099 – gdata.makeAuthBody does not encode the e-mail address or password
- Bug 19959 – the sync toolbar item got a wrong icon and can’t be removed from toolbar – UPDATE – this may not have been fixed according to the bug reporter. Please let me know if this still happens.
Basic Features
- Synchronizes contacts between Google Mail and Mozilla Thunderbird (2 or 3)
- Can synchronize several accounts with their own address books
- Adds attributes and “types” for phone numbers and screennames to Thunderbird
- Customizable with a preferences dialog
- en-US and es-ES locales
More Information
As always, feedback, feature requests, and bug reports are appreciated, but please be patient as I’ve been extremely busy with college, work, and co-op/internship hunting. Thanks to everybody who has provided feedback up to this point.
TraceMonkey Note – if you are using Thunderbird 3.0b1pre, you can try enabling TraceMonkey. It made the synchronization process faster for me. Great job everbody who worked on it!
5 Comments
Mark S · October 18, 2008 at 7:24 PM
I have a couple suggestions and questions.
Do you plan to make this available on addons.mozilla.org?
I work for a large non-profit organization. We are currently piloting Google Apps and may move over to it full-time. I’m the main person for the pilot (and possible migration).
Right now most of our users are using Outlook, Entourage or Apple Mail.
Because of Thunderbird 3 + Lightning + gContactSync’s potential seamless integration with all of Google’s PIM services I would love to recommend it to our users. There is currently no PIM that I know of that offers to sync with all of Google’s services (Calendar, gmail and contacts).
This is why I feel it’s important that gContactSync appear on AMO. Honestly, I would like the gContactSync functionality integrated into TB, but I know that’s asking a bit much.
Another topic is the name. I think gContactSync is not very smooth or memorable. Also, I feel it looks long and ugly in the Edit Card Tabs. How about renaming it to gContacts? I know that there is another project with this name out there, but there are *multiple* projects with this name. In fact, there’s another project with the name gContactSync out there.
I think a simpler easier name such as gContacts would change user perception, thereby positively influencing usability and adoption.
Thanks for all your hard work!
carl · October 19, 2008 at 6:14 AM
Nice to see improvements!
I seem to have some problems with the extension. First of all my account is not listed when i go into the settings, accounts. But when I try to add my account again, it gives me a message that my account is already listed. (i’ve tried to hit refresh button, restarting etc.)
Maybe this is related to upgrade issues, so I wondered, how do I delete all the preferences related to gcontactsync in the thunderbird profile, and start all over?
Bill · October 26, 2008 at 10:55 AM
I have the same “my account doesn’t appear in the list but I can’t re-add it” problem as Carl.
I’m also having the issue of the sync toolbar button having the wrong icon. Here’s what it looks like: http://lh5.ggpht.com/bhaelochon/SQSRlIkA9_I/AAAAAAAAAyo/zzNxCO7d7JQ/s288/TB%20Toolbar.jpg
My toolbar options are:
* Show: Icons
* Use Small Icons: Yes (checked)
Bill · October 26, 2008 at 11:04 AM
I forgot to mention I’m using TB 2.0.0.17 (20080914) on XP SP2. I’m also having an issue where the gContactSync options don’t appear on a “new” contact card, but they do when I edit an existing card.
pi · October 26, 2008 at 11:40 AM
@Mark S:
Once I get a few bugs straightened out and a faster sync time I would like to get it on addons.mozilla.org (AMO).
I agree that the name is less than ideal, I’m not very creative 😉 If I do put it on AMO I’ll probably change the name.
Thanks for the comments!
@carl
Open the Preferences for Thunderbird (Tools -> Options on Windows), go to to the “Privacy” tab, then the “Passwords” tab and click on “Edit Saved Passwords.” You should see a saved password with the URL: “chrome://gContactSync” or a HTTP address containing “clientlogin” and your username. Select it and click delete.
@Bill
See the instructions above for the login problem.
The incorrect icon is a known issue (see Bug 19959 [1]). It should work in the next version, which I will release later tonight and publish tomorrow. If you want to try the pre-release of 0.1.2 [3], could you let me know if the icon works?
The extra options added by this extension aren’t visible in the new card dialog in Thunderbird 2 because of some limitations of Thunderbird 2. They are visible in Thunderbird 3. See Bug 19753 [2]. If enough people would like it, I should be able to add them if I change the new card dialog to make a new card then edit it, but I’m not sure if it is worth the time when TB 3 is coming soon.
Thanks for all the comments!
[1] https://www.mozdev.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=19959
[2] https://www.mozdev.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=19753
[3] https://www.mozdev.org/projects/overview/gcontactsync/