Tutorial: Syncing iPhone, Exchange, Mobile Me, and Google

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There are many tutorials talking how to sync between iPhone and Mobile Me, or iPhone and Google, or iPhone and Exchange. However, in my situation, I need to sync all of them at once so I have all the information I need on my iPhone anytime anywhere. To begin with, let me give you the background on why I have to synchronize so many services at once.

• I have a Dual G5 PowerMac at home, a company provided 17″ Intel Macbook Pro, and a 15″ Intel Macbook Pro to carry around for personal works. In order to share information, I use Dot Mac (aka Mobile Me) to sync the calendar, address book, and files. Recently, I switch over to Drop Box for file syncing because my Acer Aspire One, my Ubuntu box @ home, and Cent OS desktop @ work can take advanage of it as well.
• I am a very heavy GMail user. Currently, I’m using the personal Gmail plus 3 Google App accounts. I tried to use Apple calendar for all the personal scheduling, but the other organizations are using Google Calendar for scheduling. To make things more complicated, my girl friend shares her calendar to me so that I know when she was work appointment on the weekend or not.
• The company I’m currently working with is using Exchange Server for corporation email/calendar. It is very important for me not to miss any meetings and emails.
• I love my iPhone. I have tried so many mobile platforms (Palm OS, Symbian, UIQ, Blackberry, and Windows Mobile) and this is the most balance OS I ever used. Of course, if I have chance, I would like to play with Android and Palm Web OS as well.

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OK, sounds so complicated? I think so too, but let’s start on how to link everything together.

1. Since I have my Dual G5 turns on all the time, I am using it as the primary “synchronizing center”. To begin with, I turn on Mobile Me on the Dual G5 desktop and allow it to sync automatically on Calendar, Address Book, and iDisk only. I turned off Keychain and Dashboard because I don’t want to conflict the company Mac setups.
2. Turn on Mobile Me on the 15″ Macbook Pro and 17″ Macbook Pro. Make sure every machine is synchronized without conflict.
3. In my personal Google account, I shared with the other Google Calendars from my other Google App accounts. In addition, I shared my girl account’s busy only calendar as well.
4. You probably will guess me to use the build-in Address Book sync with Google? Wrong! I use Spanning Sync so I have full control on which calendar to sync across Google and my iCal. I installed Spanning Sync JUST on my Dual G5 PowerMac so it will sync my Mac’s address book and calendar with Google. I create a duplicated set of calendars locallly in the OS X calendar and use Spanning Sync to sync the corresponding calendars from Google.
5. On my iPhone, I added Mobile Me account and turn on Push on email, address book, and calendar. In addition, I added company Exchange account into the iPhone as well.
6. Now, on my iPhone, I have everything I need. By the way, I have been using this setup since July 2008 and I don’t have any problem at all.