So, my gf has a Samsung S III with stock Samsung ROM, and we're having a hard time in synching contacs with gMail.

This is what happens.

1. She had a Nokia. Exported all her contacts in a .csv file on her PC
2. .CSV file was uploaded on her GMail account - which already contained some other contacts -, successfully.
3. All contacts in GMail synched on the S3 successfully, all fields included.
4. On the S3, she added her Facebook, Linkedin, G+, Twitter accounts.
5. She started to "merge" accounts on her S3, as obviously many users have accounts on several social networks. All seemed fine.

At some point, for some reason, people accounts get disconnected, specifically the GMail account of a specific contact gets split from all the others for that contact (Twitter, G+, Facebook, etc.), which stay connected.
In addition, what is really bad, this affected contact's phone number is just gone.

This happened several times, on several contacts, in the very same way, so there is a clear pattern.

Of course, she re-merged the contacts sevreral times, addeed phone # back, each time, but this happens again.

In gMail, on the web, there's a contacts "subfolder" (tag-based, actually), called "imported on ...." and a date of when the orginal .CSV import occurred. It is possible (but it may be just coincidence) that the above problem occurs only with contacts tagged as "imported on...", so she is now removing this tag.

Do u have any idea what is causing this? Especially losing somebody's phone nr is very, very annoying.

I'm sorry, I don't really know what the solution is. I just know that in my experience, Samsung's contact manager is pretty awful, and I wouldn't let it manage my GMail contacts by telling it to merge anything.

Theoretically, it should automatically merge the contacts on the phone side. It should be smart enough to know that if you have a Joe Schmoe as a Facebook friend, that's most likely Joe Schmoe from your GMail contacts. That's how it works in stock Android in ICS and above with the People app. I didn't have to do anything, but the app knows that my wife is the same person in my contacts, Facebook, and Twitter.

I would also recommend that before messing around with your contacts in any way shape or form, you should always go to GMail and make a backup of them. Then at least if you mess something up, you can always go into your phone and turn off all those social networks, restore your contacts in GMail, then bring them back down to the phone.

Sorry I couldn't be more helpful...

The "Merge" only occurs on the Phone, and no gMail contacts editing should occur due to the merge; it basically consists in the Phone Contacts App showing one single contact item per person, called, for example, John Smith, which includes John Smith's fields from GMail + John's Facebook data + John's Twitter Data + John's G+ data, etc. So, it is in essence a more effective way the phone has to show contacts to you.

Yes, the S3 merges some contacts automatically, but occasionally that needs to be done manually (some people spell their account name in Facebook differently, or use nicknames, etc. In twitter, that is even more frequently the case). In any case, once it is done, it is ok, until the problem occurs. As I said the really bad part of the problem is that, when it occurs, gMail contacts DO get edited, and, precisely, it is the phone field that gets erased.

Matt, ok, I did not think about it. I assumed "Contacts" App in the S3 was the stock Android Contact Management app. If the stock Android one is called "Peolpe", then I don't have it anywhere. Or, do I? Maybe that is not listed as a normal App? If I don't have the People App, can I get it and install it? Is it a normal App I can download and install?

Thank you!

As far as I know, the only contacts manager on plain old Android 4.x is now called "People" (and it's pretty neat). I'm not at all surprised that Samsung is still using their own contact manager, even though I personally dislike it intensely.

As much as I think the S3 is a really great phone, I'd recommend to anyone that they put Cyanogen on there so they can get something akin to the intended Android experience.

Again, I realize that this isn't helpful at all, so I apologize that I can't help you with this specific problem, because I have no hands-on experience with the S3.

The SIII does appear to have a customised Samsung app along with the calendar (which I personally don't like).

I've not found a way to install the stock Android calendar but then I haven't looked all that far. It's not on Google Play that I can see.

If you disable the Samsung app you'll probably lose the instant contact call. Can't remember what they call it. The feature that lets you have a contact open and just put the phone to your ear to call.

I am downloading Cyanogen for S3 Int'l. Maybe she'll agree in trying it. So Matt, do you recommend this over the basic plain Android firmware? Is this the best firmware in yur opinion of course?

I am not against Custom firmwares, on the contrary. I think that's the beauty of Android. I don't know if she'll be happy to go through the change, but maybe so (she's a lot into testing new GUIs). However, this must really be her main work phone, and it needs to work reliably, and perform well some basic functions like synching her contacts correctly.



Ok, so I guess I am still finding my way into this issue, and I have not yet decided what the best course of action is. Thinking out loud - please feel free anyone to step in to fill in the blanks or correct me:

1. I assumed that "Contacts" was an App, like many others, and that I could always install a different one, including whatever Android comes with by detault in Googlephones. I think now I oversimplified this whole thing. ?

2. "Contacts" does seem very integrated in the system. It shows call logs, for example. I wonder how well integrated another third party App could be. But hey, this all depends on how well you want to design it as a developer, so, maybe there's something great out there. Any recommendation is welcome.

3. "Contacts" icon does not have the Samsung "S" letter, which seems to preceed every Samsung Appl in this phone, but of course I can't necessarily expect consistency. This may definitely be a Samsung thing, and it definitely is not called "People"

4. I can't find any "People" in the market. There's "MyPeople" and many others, but they all seem third parties.

If you bring up the app info for the People app on 4.1.1 on the Nexus 7, the actual name of the app appears to be Contacts, it just displays as People in the list of apps.

So, maybe it is the same app. "People" could be a rename to indicate the richer feature set, as it indeed behaves somewhat similarly to the "People" hub in WP, for those who know it. I can't find the App info. Where's that?

Tap and hold on an app in the app list. The view switches back to the home screen. At the top of the screen is "View app info" or something like that.

Drag the app onto the "View app info" thing.

A very odd bit of UI, no idea whether that is standard across all version of Android or not.

Edit:

The less odd route to it is:

Settings -> Apps -> All

And then just tap on the app.

Thank you Andy.

Contacts
Version 4.0.4-I9300XXALF6

The first method did not work here. I had to go to
Settings -> Application Manager -> All ->...

Yes, the international SGS3 is different than the AT&T one I have, but I would advise you to stay away from CM9 and definitely CM10 for now.

At least on the US versions that use Qualcomm chips, many drivers are broken or barely working. Wi-Fi, camera, and bluetooth in particular. I will expand on this in a moment, but I just want to post this before you do something you may regret...

EDIT: More info

I've had the SGH-I747 (AT&T) SGS3 for a couple weeks. I flashed CM10 to it within a couple hours of purchasing. It was so insanely buggy, that I then flashed CM9. CM9 wasn't in a much better state, but it was usable in a very basic sense. Bluetooth was broken, wifi was buggy, and the camera would crash, but it could make calls and not need random reboots.

Right now, I'm on CM10 again and I'm using it as my daily driver. There are some big bugs, however. Apple access points will crash the WiFi. Other access point may crash the WiFi. The only access point that definitely works is DD-WRT on my Linksys E3000. When I'm at work, I have to turn off Wi-Fi since we use Apple AEBS as access points.

Bluetooth is actually working to some degree now. A2DP and hands-free calling seem to work for me, but a lot of people are complaining still. If you need to use a bluetooth headset, I would stay away from Cyanogenmod at this time.

The camera driver still crashes if you refocus too many times before snapping a photo. The camera won't work again until you reboot the phone.

Early CM10 ROMs were plagued by "black screen of death" issues. The phone wouldn't wake from sleep. The only remedy was to pull the battery or hold Vol +, Vol -, and Power for 20 seconds to force a reboot. This has happened to me once on the most recent release, so it's still not totally fixed yet.

There is an issue with some phones losing their IMEI if flashed improperly. The cause isn't really known the last time I checked. I believe this is limited to Qualcomm-based phones (LTE models).

I still have a problem with the phone sleeping too deeply when on cellular data only (no active wifi). Notifications don't come in after the screen has been off for some amount of time. This seems to just be down to the ROM being immature and not having proper power settings worked out.

Other than that, I have been happily living with the phone for 2 weeks now. Things are getting better, but I would just stay away from AOSP-based ROMs for now. It's just too new.

Sorry, I forgot that CM wasn't ready for prime time on the S3 yet.

And it may say that it's "Contacts" in the app info, but that doesn't mean it's the same app. Here's what the "People" app looks like:

Rob, thanks, I won't flash the phone.

Matt, what I have looks different. I'll post a screenshot when I get the chance.

I am afraid to speak too soon, but it seems that after removing completely the "imported on...." tag, the phone # issue has gone. I'll confirm this after more extensive testing.

I noticed that tagging and un-tagging contacts from the phone is not reliably replicated in gMail. Sometimes changes need to be applied twice or more times. But, eventually, changes are reflected on gMail too.

Taym, sorry to hear you're having these issues. I really hope that more phones have stock Android in the future, because that's the long-term solution to this issue...

The problem appers to be fixed. The only change we made was just to remove the "imported on..." tag on some of the contacts. I can't be sure yet, but it seems to me the issue was there.