Treo 700 Outlook Sync

[PSYCHO]

First time post... Hello everyone and Happy Holidays!!

Within my small business we use Treo 650's with Goodlink software. Does anyone know if the new Treo will have background push sync with Outllok and Exchange 2003?
We need contacts to sync in addition to email & Calendar.

[J Teezy]

considering I sync my 650 with ouylook now I am sure you will be able to on the 700

[PSYCHO]

Over the air real time sync direct with Exchange 2003 including contacts?

[gadjtguy]

Psycho,

Can you detail how expensive and how hard it was to get the 'server' side of this Goodink program working? Or, is there no server side to mess with?

Since you have a small business, can I assume you handle your own Exchange server?

I work for a big company and have no idea how hard it would be for me to say 'install this Goodlink stuff'.

Thanx

[Beachbum26]

Hello - I'm not familiar with the Goodlink software, but I am an Exchange 2003 Admin. I just got this working for one of our users (Treo 650 w/Cingular). It works great. Sync's email, Calendar and Contacts. Exchange 2003 SP2 added a lot of new and cool mobile features (direct push etc.)

SP2 Details
http://www.microsoft.com/exchange/ev...ew.mspx#mobile

It took a few tweaks on the server side and a firmware update on the Treo to get it working flawlessly, but it wasn't a huge deal. If you work for a big company, it might be worth asking the Exchange admin if they're on SP2 yet and if you can test the Treo with them.

My next step is to get the Treo 700w (Verizon) working with our Exchange server (when it comes out).

Good luck.
Ted

[gadjtguy]

Beachbum, Thanks for the reply. Thats good information. I'll see if our people are using SP2.

One question then, our computer people tell us that our exchange server does not face the internet. So does that matter? Or does this 'push' technology 'send out' from the server. Instead of the traditional computer coming in to the server?

Did that make sense? Let me restate that:

Normally, a computer with the outlook client would 'call in' to the server to get email. Thus that server must be viewable from the internet. But since we are talking about a mobile device (Treo 650), that uses a 'push' technology that reverses the communication stream. Using Push, the server sends info to the mobile device and could therefore stay hidden behind firewalls.

If it works in that fashion, than the computer people should be allright with setting this up, right? You say it was no problem to tweak. Care to share some of those tips with the class?

[MystaMax]

We currently use Goodlink with about 45 users. Setup w/ goodlink was very easy, IMO. We actually setup another exchange box, and put goodlink on that. So we have 2 boxes running exchange and one has goodlink.

I'm very interested in moving to Exchange 2003 SP2 for the mobile features. I'm not exactly sure, but goodlink isn't cheap, and to have it built in would save money (just what an IT director wants to hear). The feature set looks good, and it makes you wonder what goodlink is going to do to continue to compete. Any other info you can provide would help!



I'm actually grabbing the 700w tomorrow for myself, and I can't wait.

[Beachbum26]

Originally Posted by MystaMax

I'm actually grabbing the 700w tomorrow for myself, and I can't wait.

I hope to have one very shortly too. I hope they go on sale right after the CES show.

Anyway, I'm heading off to a Microsoft Seminar today on Exchange 2003 and Sharepoint. Maybe I'll pickup some more info about the mobile aspects of SP2 etc.

As for internet-facing or not, I think they're referring to whether the Exchange box is a front-end or back-end server. Either way, the box that runs the web-services (OWA and OMA) must still be accessible to the internet or no email. I think that in a two or more server configuration you'd need to install Goodlink on the front-end server that has the web services. Firewall rules can be added to allow the appropriate connections.

As for tweaking. On Exchange we had to create a new virtual directory (on the IIS portion of the Exchange server) for the OMA portion to work without a connection error and to allow our OWA permissions to stay the same. The new virtual directory was mainly to allow us to set a different set of permissions from the default. This may or may not be necessary for others. (this problem was with connecting the Treo 650 and may not even happen with the Microsoft OS) I know others have done this workaround as a Google search should turn up similar cases on the Exchange forums.

Tweaking the treo 650 just meant getting on the latest firmware that fixed some Versamail/Active sync errors.

Gotta run. I'll check this thread later after the seminar.

[rivviepop]

Originally Posted by Beachbum26

Hello - I'm not familiar with the Goodlink software, but I am an Exchange 2003 Admin. I just got this working for one of our users (Treo 650 w/Cingular). It works great. Sync's email, Calendar and Contacts. Exchange 2003 SP2 added a lot of new and cool mobile features (direct push etc.)

Yay for google search! Hey Ted, I was just tasked with getting this working, so I'm sitting here with a borrowed 650, and having a problem. I'm upgrading Exchange to SP2 this weekend as well.

Care to give a quick cheatsheet on what you had to tweak in Exchange? Right now I'm about to dig into this error IIS is throwing, it's giving a 403 when the Treo tries to post to /Microsoft-Server-Activesync. I'm about to dive in, but you sure could save me some time.

[PSYCHO]

Originally Posted by rivviepop

Yay for google search! Hey Ted, I was just tasked with getting this working, so I'm sitting here with a borrowed 650, and having a problem. I'm upgrading Exchange to SP2 this weekend as well.

Care to give a quick cheatsheet on what you had to tweak in Exchange? Right now I'm about to dig into this error IIS is throwing, it's giving a 403 when the Treo tries to post to /Microsoft-Server-Activesync. I'm about to dive in, but you sure could save me some time.

Are you running ISA 2000 or 2004?