Rich's RamblingsI met with the Lotus user group support people during the Spring '97 COMDEX (COMputer Dealers Exposition) in early June and talked about the U.S. Robotics (USR) PalmPilot I had and my frustrations with its supplied calendar program. Being familiar with the Lotus Organizer product, I asked whether an interface to my PalmPilot was on the way. They said they would get back to me.by Rich Schinnell
A Tale of Software for the U.S. Robotics PalmPilot
Lo and behold, a few days ago I received a package from Lotus: the new Lotus Organizer 97 GS. This new version of the very popular PIM (personal information manager, referring to calendar and contact database software) now includes support for the USR PalmPilot handheld computer device. I was pretty enthusiastic when I first received it. Now I am not so sure. Lotus Organizer is a great product and very widely used, but its USR PalmPilot support is confusing.
To reiterate what I frequently say about installing something new: Always backup thoroughly before installing anything new, especially if you are installing software on a computer you depend upon to perform real work. Backup your registry under Windows 95 and, if possible, your complete \WINDOWS directory and its subdirectories.
I am fortunate in that I have two computers capable of supporting Windows 95 and the software for the USR PalmPilot. I have the software installed on both computers so that I can keep the old version of the software on one machine while I test the new on the other. I can always get the computer back to where it was when it worked. I never upgrade both machines at the same time unless I am pretty darn sure the upgrade works properly.
Rich's rule No. 401: You can never have too many backups.
The USR PalmPilot comes with database and calendar programs that are barely acceptable by themselves. You can cut and paste from other Windows programs into your schedule, and the database can import standard .DBF files from dBASE or other database programs. Exporting to other PIMs or back to dBASE is another matter.
To continue with my trials of Lotus Organizer 97 GS -- I had read as much as I could about how to install the product and thought I knew it all. <G> (That's a big grin.) The installation went quite well after I had a false start from forgetting to delete the unsatisfactory USR PalmPilot software. I deleted it after I was reminded by the install program that I could not install the Lotus Organizer software until I uninstalled the USR PalmPilot software. The USR PalmPilot software uninstall did not remove any of my personal data from the Pilot subdirectories, so I felt I was safe.
The USR PalmPilot software has a Hot Sync program that synchronizes the data files on your PalmPilot and the computer where you have the PalmPilot software installed. This synchronization software works via a serial port and a small cradle that your PalmPilot rests in. Connection and synchronization work very well as long as you have an available communications port. Lotus Organizer 97 GS comes with a replacement for your USR PalmPilot Hot Sync software. It transfers data to and from your PalmPilot without a lot of aggravation.
Except. I could never get it to work properly. I had the latest PalmPilot software installed, but the Hot Sync from Lotus Organizer would not do the job properly. I was able to get it to work partially, but the calendar portion would never transfer. I went through the process of uninstalling the Lotus Organizer PalmPilot Hot Sync and such from my computer, and received the message that this was successful.
But this uninstall software evidently does not really take out all of what was installed. When I re-installed the old USR software, its Hot Sync would not work either. Something had changed, and I was really worried. I was sure glad that the PalmPilot has a hard reset button on the back of it. Also, you can just remove the batteries for 1 minute, and it will reset to ground zero.
But all was not lost. The old format C: command worked in getting rid of the offending file that was left over from the aborted Lotus Organizer install. After re-installing Windows 95 and a few other goodies, the USR PalmPilot software re-installed properly. Lotus Organizer is a good product, but something tells me that the PalmPilot synchronizer software is still in beta mode.
So, being the glutton for punishment that I am, I thought I would give the search for better PalmPilot software another shot, but this time I was going on the Internet to see what kind of software was available there. I was amazed at the amount of PalmPilot software, but it was a bit of a chore to filter out the games and junk from the good stuff.
I eventually went to a World Wide Web site at
http://www.pumatech.com belonging to a
company named Puma. Puma
sells a program called IntelliSync for the PalmPilot. The
software allows you to synchronize your PalmPilot with Lotus
Organizer, Goldmine, Sidekick, Microsoft
Scheduler, Day Timer
Organizer, and many others. An option for Symantec's ACT! may be
available by the time you read this. The cost of the software,
which I ordered online, was $69.95. Puma will ship you the
diskettes for an additional $9.95. A bargain for what it does.
I have used SideKick for Windows 95 -- it came as part of Corel's WordPerfect Suite 7.0. I have plenty of calendar and database stuff in SideKick. Contrary to my experience with Lotus Organizer GS, I was able to bring all the SideKick data into the PalmPilot without a lot of aggravation. It also sent my existing PalmPilot data into SideKick. Wow! What a joy!
I might be a bit hard on Lotus, but the IntelliSync from Puma Corporation is great. They have products for other palmtop computers as well as the USR PalmPilot. I had been about ready to try to write a calendar conversion program for the PalmPilot. One thing I will say in defense of Lotus is that the database part of the PalmPilot synchronization program does work.
One caution: You can never return from the dark side! Once you
have upgraded to the IntelliSync software, do not try to install
any PalmPilot upgrades. That could be a problem for some people
-- remember, never look back. By the time I am ready for an
upgrade, I will probably have a new device to link with my
computer via wireless communications. <G>
U.S. Robotics (3COM) PalmPilot
- Source: http://www.usr.com; and computer
superstores
Lotus Organizer GS
Rich Schinnell is the First Vice President of the Capital PC User
Group and enjoys all the new toys. He is retired from the U.S.
Navy and from Vitro Corporation and now does a limited amount of
small business consulting. He is available to answer questions
during the evening from 6-9pm. Of course, for members only. He
can be reached via e-mail at
schinnel@cpcug.org, and all his
columns are available at
http://
www.cpcug.org/user/schinnel/ramb.html.
He has been writing this "Ramblings" column since the early 1990s
and really enjoys it.
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