7:31 p.m.
On Fr, 2013-11-22 at 00:12 +0100, Christian Heinrich wrote:
So, after I lost my 6 years old phone, I decided to get a new phone
and
my choice was the Google Nexus 5. Unfortunately, since I never owned a
smartphone before, I didn't know how tightly Google integrated their
services into Android, so I decided to get rid of them (as much as
possible).
Thanks to syncevolution, syncing my laptop with my cell is now (mostly)
a piece of cake, but the learning curve was steep. Please note that I
have never used Android before, so I was a complete newbie in that
regard.
Installing syncevolution is easy - I used the package available in
Ubuntu 12.04 and I installed "sync-ui" as well. I really thought I could
sync directly via bluetooth (I read the HowTo on the page), so I tried
it - but it wouldn't work. I had to figure out that the reason was the
syncml client; Android does not have one.
-> I'd suggest to add a comment to the howto that Android (and most
likely iOS?) will not be able to use this method (at least out of the
box) and that they should use a different approach.
I suppose you mean:
https://syncevolution.org/wiki/sync-your-phone-bluetooth
It's a Wiki page, so you could do the editing yourself. All of your
changes make sense; you would be more than welcome to apply the proposed
changes directly. I can review afterwards.
If some part of an HOWTO doesn't make sense, leaving an inline comment
explaining the problem would help.
(2) I would explain how to find out which "backend" to
choose and what
the right database is, like "By printing all databases, syncevolution
will list all available backends with all contained databases; the
backend can be determined as the value after the "=" sign, in the
previous example this would be "evolution-calendar". The database names
are at the beginning of each subsequent line. The values in brackets are
only identifiers, not database names. In the example above, the
available databases would be "Personal" and "Work". Note: Database
names
are case-sensitive!" (I don't know if the latter is true but I simply
presume they are :) )
Actually, database names are case-insensitive, or at least should be.
(4) This is by far the most important issue for me: The SyncML-Client
by
Synthesis was mentioned a couple of times in this howto, so adding more
databases using the Synthesis SyncML-client should be explained. How can
that be done? For my part, I really don't know how to do that!
Does the SyncML client support multiple databases? I am not sure.
In general, I thought that the user experience could be seriously
improved by cleaning up the webpage; the "Wiki articles" box on the side
is just so chaotic, I didn't exactly understand the difference between
"documentation" and "wiki" (I clicked on a link in the documentation
and
I ended up reading a wiki page). I would get rid of one of them!
For example, an introductory page would be neat (needs formatting, of
course): "Welcome and thanks for using syncevolution. If you want to
sync with a phone, click on your OS:
(1) Android (2) iOS (3) MeeGo (Tizen?)
There are currently multiple howtos for phone models:
*list of models, ordered by manufacturer*
If you want to learn more about SyncML, click here."
The OS sub-pages will then tell the user which options he/she can choose
from.
All of that is nice and well and I agree that it would be useful, but
who has the time and motivation to actually go and do this documentation
work? I know that I don't.
PS: I should have mentioned it earlier, but if there's a way you
could
use some (limited) help, let me know.
Ah, finally :-) Yes, as I said above, you would be more than welcome to
edit the Wiki directly. Some other chunks of text on the web page
require additional privileges in Drupal, but even that could be
arranged.
--
Best Regards, Patrick Ohly
The content of this message is my personal opinion only and although
I am an employee of Intel, the statements I make here in no way
represent Intel's position on the issue, nor am I authorized to speak
on behalf of Intel on this matter.