Nokia Asha 310 – Sync Contacts With Google Contacts using SyncML

Nokia Asha 310 Image

Nokia Asha 310

Today I swapped my aging 4 year old Nokia 5800 Xpress Music with Nokia Asha 310 (Dual SIM with WiFI) from a local mobile store. The phone after the swap cost me Rs 3600/-.

From last more than 8 months or so Android is my primary phone and prior to that for close to two year it was Blackberry. Along with these two devices I was using Nokia 5800 Xpress Music and another Nokia 500 for my second phone.

The primary requirement I had was to ensure that I find some way of syncing contacts with google contacts as my android is configured to do so. This provides me a backup of all my contacts at google and will ensure that I can enter/edit my contacts at one devices and they will be available everywhere. Also google provides ability  to recover contacts (upto a certain amount of time) in case they are accidently deleted.

In order to sync contacts I used SyncML. Support for which is enabled by google from quite some time.

In order to configure Nokia Asha 310 to sync with google contacts, follow the following steps. We need to start with creating a personal configuration option first –

  • settings -> configuration -> personal configuration -> add new
    • Specify the account name. Anything will work here as it is just an identifier text entry, in case you are syncing from  multiple sources. My account name is “Gmail Contacts”.
    • server address should be https://m.google.com/syncml
    • username must be your username including the domain name (e.g something@gmail.com). If you are using google apps then you should use that domain instead of gmail.com.
    • password must be your password. You will be asked to enter it twice for verification.
    • contacts database -> database address is the one which is important for us as we will be syncing with it. For Gmail (and Google Apps) you should specify ‘contacts’ here. There is no need to specify username and password again here.
    • calendar database -> database address should have the value of ‘calendar’. In case you do not want to sync calendar you can leave it blank.
    • notes database -> database address should have the value of ‘notes’. In case you do not want to sync notes you can leave it blank.
    • use pref. acc. point – Set this to either ‘Yes’ or ‘No’. In case you set it to ‘No’ the you need to setup the access point values. I have set it to ‘Yes’, so that whatever my preferred access point at the time of sync is, will be used.

NOTE Database names is a place where SyncML protocol lacks standardisation as different providers use different names, so you must know the database name in case you have a different provider.

Next the sync settings can be configured as below –

  • Settings -> sync & backup -> sync with server -> sync settings
    • synchronised data – select the databaes which needs to be synced here. I have all three databases viz. contacts, calendar and notes selected
    • sync settings – Since this is a dual SIM phone, you will have to select either SIM1 or SIM2 and the select the configuration profile which you created above viz. ‘Gmail Contacts’.
    • automatic sync – This can be set to daily, weekly, monthly or off modes. In case you set it to off then you need to initiate sync manually when you wish to sync the databases.
    • rules for incoming – There are three possible values – Always allow, Always reject, Confirm first. The meanings are obvious. The first will always allow the incoming data and sync it, the second will always reject incoming data (in this case changes on your phone will be sent, but changes from google server will not be received) and confirm first will prompt for appropriate action each time. My setting is ‘Always allow’
  • Settings -> sync & backup -> sync with server -> sync now can be used to initiate the manual sync.

Hope this post will help interested folks.

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31 Responses to Nokia Asha 310 – Sync Contacts With Google Contacts using SyncML

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  2. Arun Kumar says:

    i have used both connection wi-fi or mobile data conection but both time are same error so tell me what i can doo
    ??????

  3. JR says:

    Hi, this is a very useful post. However, when I try to do this with my Nokia 301 Dual SIM, there is an error message which states: “Data transfer not possible. Check data connection”. However, I have full H+ reception and sufficient data remaining and I only have one SIM in the phone which is the main data SIM. Any tips Ajitabh?
    Thanks

  4. haseeb says:

    when i synco contact thn mobile show msg “data connection error please check connection” whats wrong with cell or connection

  5. Nokia Asha 310 to sync with Google contacts the following steps also follow but it returns “Data transfer not possible. Check data connection.”

    • Ajitabh says:

      Yo will have to do what it says. Normally in dual SIM phones, while data connection is allowed from both the SIMs, but some operations can be only performed if SIM 1 is your data connection SIM. You can check this factor also. Alternatively, try getting onto a WiFi to test and see if its really a problem with your data connection or something else.

  6. Jacob says:

    Upon synching, will my Google contacts configuration, e.g. 1 contact with 3 mobile numbers copied/transferred exactly at Nokia contacts on “as-is” basis? I’m bit worried about this. Regarding calendar events, will it synch the entire appointments or from a certain period only?

    • Ajitabh says:

      I am not sure about calendars as I don’t think you will be able to sync calendars on SyncML with Google. For contacts, yes a contact having three mobile numbers will retain all three upon syncing. You add/modify details on phone and when you sync, your Google contacts will be updated with the newly added or modified details. If you make a change on the Google contacts then changes will be added to the phone upon next sync.

      This is how I used to sync my iPhone 5 with Nokia Asha 310. iPhone 5 used the standard Google Contacts syncing which was made available by installing Gmail application, and Nokia Asha 310 used the SyncML to sync with Google Contacts.

  7. Robert says:

    Thank you very much, works perfect with nokia301

  8. Jun Ng. says:

    Ive tried this but failed. My Nokia 515 said “No Authorisation”. Any advice, pls??

  9. mircea says:

    nokia asha 210 not working… help please !

    • Ajitabh says:

      Jun Ng and Mircea, Please double check the steps. It works, I have recently reset my Nokia 310 to factory setting and followed the same steps and mine is working fine. So it looks like till date syncml support is still available with google. If it works with 310 then I do not see any reason as to why it will not work with any other phone / model supporting SyncML.

  10. suyog says:

    Many thanks, I had forgotten details of this method which i used to have in old S60 days.
    Surprised to find it working even today in February 2014 as Google has announced long time ago that they will close it 🙂
    Anyways good for me. Got my contacts on Nokia Asha 302

  11. haseeb says:

    awesome post

  12. L C says:

    Hi
    This is really helpful I have. Nokia 515. I ve followed the steps but only some contacts have come over (older version it seems). Any tips ??

    • Ajitabh says:

      In one pull only certain number of contacts flow. Check the syncml log for how many contacts have been synced. My case it was 50 in one time, so for the first time sync of my 200+ contacts, I had to manually initiate the sync around 4-5 times.

      HTH

  13. On the other hand it still works fine with my google apps account. Maybe the apps it the reason, I failed set up it with @gmail.com account yesterday.

    • Ajitabh says:

      Not sure, my gmail is still syncing fine. Basically google apps free and gmail are essentially the same infrastructure, in the usual gmail login screens you can specify the full email id of your google apps and it will work. So if gmail works, googel apps should work and vice-versa. According to a previous comment by pumin, google seems to be in plans to decommission this service, so they may have stopped new configurations but are continuing for the existing configured accounts.

  14. David says:

    Fantastic post! Worked like a charm, thankyou!

  15. Pingback: Nokia Asha (feature phones) how to sync with Google Contacts | The Blue S

  16. Shrikant says:

    Thanks Ajitabh. It worked well for Asha 310

  17. I have an Asha 210, when launching sync it returns “Data transfer not possible. Check data connection.”

  18. lolkowatylol says:

    it works but only for contacts on nokia 301

  19. Just a Guy says:

    Thanks a ton bro. 🙂

  20. pumin says:

    Thank you for you post. Anyhow, Synml may stop working someday soon.

    http://support.google.com/a/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=2716936

    SyncML: SyncML, which is used to sync contacts with a small number of older Nokia and Sony Ericsson devices, will no longer be supported and stop syncing on January 30, 2013. This service is used to sync contacts between your device with your Google account. We recommend you to download your contacts and uninstall SyncML.

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