Share Calendar, Contacts, Notes... Bynari fastmail Set-up

alfazulu · 8 Nov 2004, 01:30 AM

After having spent a solid week testing several ways/software to share (i.e. upload/download) Outook Calendar, Notes, Contacts using the Fastmail IMAP server (or other server), I did it!!!...and I thought of sharing this will all other fastmail users.

1. The only package which I found which works on Fastmail is Bynari 2.0.81.
2. Using Bynari on Fastmail (as opposed to other software which turn your normal non-server OS in a mail server), lets you share your Outlook data using SSL encryption, whic is a big plus!
3. Also, you can then sync your Handheld the normal way (other software solutions do not let you do that which meant more work to figure out how to keep the handheld in sync after having figured out how to keep al my PCs in sysnc).
3. Install Bynari following Bynari manual to the letter - except you must chose to sync folders Manually.
4. Start Outlook and click on one of your folders to share, say Calendar. Bynari wil try to create a Calendar Folder at the same level of your exisitng Fastmail server Inbox folder, but Fastmail Cyrus server does not allow you to do that. Bynary will ask you to create the folder as a sub-folder of your Fastamil server Inbox folder - you must click YES.
5. Repeat step 4 for all of your folders in Outlook until they all become a sub-folder of your Fastmail server Inbox folder.
6. The Calendar folder will appear not to migrate a copy remaining in its original position. do not worry. Close Outlook, re-start the OS, re-start Outlook, and all your original folders should now be a sub-folder of Inbox.
7. Only now import your data (excluding the one already on the Fastmail server), into your Outlook/Bynari .pst set-up. the imported data will appear as new folders outside of your Inbox. Do not panic, just repeat Step 4 above and all you data will now be imported in the Outlook/Bynari .pst.
8. Here comes the trick. Bynari is impossibly slow to deal with syncing folders, and you do not want to be hanging and waiting possibly hours (depending on the size of your data in the folders) for the syncing to complete before before you can read your fresh e-mail in the Inbox. So, create a new IMAP e-mail account in Outllok, and use this one as you would normally use it. take care not to subscribe to the special non-e-mail folders (Calendar, contacts, Notes..) created by Bynari, as these can only be properly synced through Bynari (and to sync download/upload them with the IMAP e-mail account is just a waste of bandwith).
9. Finally, set Bynary to sync only the non-email folders individually as often as you wish, but do set Bynari to sync the Sent folder frequently (I set it to 1 minute) otherwise the e-mail you send will not upload to the Fastmail IMAP folder and reside only locally. I have also set Bynari to sync the Draft folder frequently, but that is my preference.

The above works works because at the moment Bynari allows you to create sub-folders of Inbox. The new 3.0 Beta of Bynari does not. So, be warned. If you get hooked on sharing your folders, and Bynari 3.0 does not let you create sub-folders of Inbox, then you can no longer do the trick. So, do not forget to e-mail Bynariand remind them to modify 3.0 to work like the prior versions with respect to sub-folders of Inbox!

Alternatively, Fastmail could change its Cyrus server to let us crete folders at the same level of the Inbox folder, and we would not have to work with sub-folders of Inbox to share our Calendar, Contacts, Notes...!!!

watchdis · 8 Nov 2004, 04:18 AM

thanks for posting your experiences alfazulu. it looks all a bit too fiddly for me though. i'd love for fastmail to focus a bit more on the outlook synchronising thing. i think full outlook synchronising would put fastmail head and shoulders above the competition and attract alot of new interest. using 3rd party software, which frankly doesn't sound too user friendly seems a bit much for me to make the shift. couldn't fastmail do the same thing that lycos and yahoo have doen and develop their own little synchronising programme?

alfazulu · 8 Nov 2004, 07:01 AM

I am not familiar with Yahoo and Lycos. I had a look, but basically I understand it would involve downoading/uploading and importing/exporting the data file and this is limited to the Address book (in addition to the e-mail). All this would add to fastmail is a better Address book and a more friendly manual way to upload/download Address entries.

What I have done above gives you near Exchange Server 2003 Functionality at a fraction of the cost which is really what Fastmail should aim for as mission.

Hosted Exchange Server 2003 accounts are very expensive ($10 - $ 15 / month per account with only 100 - 200 MB space and you often have to sign-up for a minimum of 2 or 3 users).

8 Nov 2004, 01:30 AM	#1
alfazulu Junior Member Join Date: Apr 2004 Posts: 11	Share Calendar, Contacts, Notes... Bynari fastmail Set-up After having spent a solid week testing several ways/software to share (i.e. upload/download) Outook Calendar, Notes, Contacts using the Fastmail IMAP server (or other server), I did it!!!...and I thought of sharing this will all other fastmail users. 1. The only package which I found which works on Fastmail is Bynari 2.0.81. 2. Using Bynari on Fastmail (as opposed to other software which turn your normal non-server OS in a mail server), lets you share your Outlook data using SSL encryption, whic is a big plus! 3. Also, you can then sync your Handheld the normal way (other software solutions do not let you do that which meant more work to figure out how to keep the handheld in sync after having figured out how to keep al my PCs in sysnc). 3. Install Bynari following Bynari manual to the letter - except you must chose to sync folders Manually. 4. Start Outlook and click on one of your folders to share, say Calendar. Bynari wil try to create a Calendar Folder at the same level of your exisitng Fastmail server Inbox folder, but Fastmail Cyrus server does not allow you to do that. Bynary will ask you to create the folder as a sub-folder of your Fastamil server Inbox folder - you must click YES. 5. Repeat step 4 for all of your folders in Outlook until they all become a sub-folder of your Fastmail server Inbox folder. 6. The Calendar folder will appear not to migrate a copy remaining in its original position. do not worry. Close Outlook, re-start the OS, re-start Outlook, and all your original folders should now be a sub-folder of Inbox. 7. Only now import your data (excluding the one already on the Fastmail server), into your Outlook/Bynari .pst set-up. the imported data will appear as new folders outside of your Inbox. Do not panic, just repeat Step 4 above and all you data will now be imported in the Outlook/Bynari .pst. 8. Here comes the trick. Bynari is impossibly slow to deal with syncing folders, and you do not want to be hanging and waiting possibly hours (depending on the size of your data in the folders) for the syncing to complete before before you can read your fresh e-mail in the Inbox. So, create a new IMAP e-mail account in Outllok, and use this one as you would normally use it. take care not to subscribe to the special non-e-mail folders (Calendar, contacts, Notes..) created by Bynari, as these can only be properly synced through Bynari (and to sync download/upload them with the IMAP e-mail account is just a waste of bandwith). 9. Finally, set Bynary to sync only the non-email folders individually as often as you wish, but do set Bynari to sync the Sent folder frequently (I set it to 1 minute) otherwise the e-mail you send will not upload to the Fastmail IMAP folder and reside only locally. I have also set Bynari to sync the Draft folder frequently, but that is my preference. The above works works because at the moment Bynari allows you to create sub-folders of Inbox. The new 3.0 Beta of Bynari does not. So, be warned. If you get hooked on sharing your folders, and Bynari 3.0 does not let you create sub-folders of Inbox, then you can no longer do the trick. So, do not forget to e-mail Bynariand remind them to modify 3.0 to work like the prior versions with respect to sub-folders of Inbox! Alternatively, Fastmail could change its Cyrus server to let us crete folders at the same level of the Inbox folder, and we would not have to work with sub-folders of Inbox to share our Calendar, Contacts, Notes...!!!

8 Nov 2004, 04:18 AM	#2
watchdis Senior Member Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Manchester, UK Posts: 152	thanks for posting your experiences alfazulu. it looks all a bit too fiddly for me though. i'd love for fastmail to focus a bit more on the outlook synchronising thing. i think full outlook synchronising would put fastmail head and shoulders above the competition and attract alot of new interest. using 3rd party software, which frankly doesn't sound too user friendly seems a bit much for me to make the shift. couldn't fastmail do the same thing that lycos and yahoo have doen and develop their own little synchronising programme?

8 Nov 2004, 07:01 AM	#3
alfazulu Junior Member Join Date: Apr 2004 Posts: 11	I am not familiar with Yahoo and Lycos. I had a look, but basically I understand it would involve downoading/uploading and importing/exporting the data file and this is limited to the Address book (in addition to the e-mail). All this would add to fastmail is a better Address book and a more friendly manual way to upload/download Address entries. What I have done above gives you near Exchange Server 2003 Functionality at a fraction of the cost which is really what Fastmail should aim for as mission. Hosted Exchange Server 2003 accounts are very expensive ($10 - $ 15 / month per account with only 100 - 200 MB space and you often have to sign-up for a minimum of 2 or 3 users).