Latest Entourage Update Fixes Sync-Related Problems

We're pleased to report that Entourage users can at long last use Spanning Sync!

Due to user reports of corrupted Entourage databases, we've always recommended that people who sync Entourage with iCal not use Spanning Sync. But we've recently heard from Microsoft that the latest version of Entourage (v12.1.2) includes several fixes for sync-specific issues, and shouldn't exhibit the problematic behavior.

Thanks to Microsoft for the fixes, and for letting us know about them. If you run into any problems syncing Entourage with iCal and using Spanning Sync, please let us know right away so we can work with Microsoft to investigate.

Comments

[abhay]

Well...the spanning sync pane tells me that there is a sync happening between my (Entourage-synced) iCal and my Google calendar...the only problem is, it has been stuck on this screen for the past 30 minutes! Have tried for the third time but the problem continues. :(

[Charlie Wood]

Remember that initial syncs can take a long time, so please let it run to completion. If after a few hours (fi you have thousands of events) it's still not finished, pleasecreate a problem (Advanced > Create report) and email it to us at support@spanningsync.com along with a description of the problem.

Thanks,
Charlie

[abhay]

You were right - it just took a lot of patience! I had to wait for over an hour. A subsequent sync I tried moved much faster.

Thanks!

[Bill Barnett]

Synchronization between Entourage and iCal is currently broken for me since I installed the Spanning Sync trial version. I'm on OS X (10.5.4), Entourage (12.1.2), and iCal (3.0.4). I will be submitting my report to support@spanningsync.com shortly.

Please don't let this be a chicken/egg scenario such that you won't support the trial version, since I won't pay for it until I know it works. It is 2008. Why is shared calendaring still so hard?! (I pose that question to the greater software development community. Personally, I find Spanning Sync to be a major step in the right direction.)

[Charlie Wood]

Bill-

Thanks for the data point--we'll dig into your report as soon as we get it.

No, there's no limitation to the trial version. In fact, there is no trial version--that's the full version of the software you have installed on your machine. It's only your account that's time-limited during your trial.

Thanks,
Charlie

[wweber2268]

My situation is different than I have seen described, and I'd appreciate a little help in deciding if Spanning Sync is right for me.

I am still running an old version of Entourage (11.4.0). I use Entourage because it is the only Mac-based email client that plays well with our corporate Exchange server. Now I'd like to get my Entourage calendar information up onto my Google Calendar. I've turned on syncing with iCal, and that is working perfectly.

I was planning on installing Spanning Sync to do nothing more than communicate my iCal information up to the web, but it appears from this blog that this may not be a good idea. Is installing Spanning Sync going to interfere with the currently-working sync activities between Entourage 11.4.0 and iCal?

If the answer to the previous question is "yes", will upgrading Entourage solve the problem?

[Charlie Wood]

We've recommended against using Spanning Sync when syncing Entourage with iCal in the past because we got multiple reports of Entourage database corruption from users who did so.

Apparently Microsoft has fixed the problem in the latest version of Entourage, but (as you can read here) some people have reported other problems, which we're working with Microsoft to track down.

So unless you upgrade to the latest version of Entourage, we still recommend you don't sync Entourage with iCal when using Spanning Sync.

[Charles Letizia]

Spanning Sync regularly alerts me to delete old or duplicated calendar events, even when I specifically press don't delete, it not only deletes my calendar events, but also all my tasks which is quite a problem since this is how I track my work. I really need your help with this issue.
Please advise,

Charles Letizia

[Charlie Wood]

Hi Charles-

Please contact support@spanningsync.com so they can look into the problem you're experiencing.

Thanks,
Charlie

[Matthew]

Oof. I thought I had syncing with Entourage all worked out, but the latest entries I added to my Google calendar didn't make it all the way to Entourage. (They did go to iCal, however).

I tried messing with the Spanning Sync preferences, and I think I made a bad decision, because now I have duplicate entries of nearly everything on my calendar.. in all 3 places (Entourage, iCal, and Google Calendar). Ugh.

What is the proper way to sync to avoid this problem, and how difficult will it be to remove the duplicate entries? :\

Matthew

[Charlie Wood]

If the events show up in iCal from Google, that means Spanning Sync is working correctly. If they then fail to show up ion Entourage, that means Entourage isn't successfully getting data from Apple Sync Services.

I'm not sure what the usual debugging steps are for Entourage, but you might try resetting its sync options.

You can clean up duplicate events using Spanning Tools (http://spanningtools.com). Please contact support@spanningsync.com for more info.

Thanks,
Charlie

[Lynxietat]

Quick query: Would Spanning Sync cause a problem if it was selected to never change iCal (that is, only serve iCal's calendar to Google, and not have Google affect iCal's events)? That's how I have it set up with my Entourage at work (v 11.4.0) and haven't had any problems yet... I was careful to set it up this way because I didn't want to cause any issues/changes with Entourage's calendar - just let my gCal (and thus, my phone) see my work calendar.

[Charlie Wood]

Yep, that should work great.

Thanks,
Charlie

[Rakel Fairfull]

Is it possible to assign multiple google calendars to the Entourage calendar in iCal? It appears Entourage will only sync with that one Calendar in iCal... so am I stuck with only being able to use 1 calendar?

[Jo-Anne Redwood]

I downloaded the trial but it only shows iCal. When I clicked on the entourage logo, I got this message "We are sorry, the page you requested cannot be found."

how can I select Entourage?

Thanks!