WHAT?

Many smart-phone users want to enjoy the convenience of accessing and maintaining their E-mail accounts and one of the most convenient ways to do that is with a Microsoft Exchange Server or Google Apps account (Currently $50 per user per year, 2-26-11) that includes Google's G-mail.  Whether the account is on a company's internal 'Exchange Server', set-up using a vendor that offers Exchange account services, or using Google's GMail and Apps, the objective is to allow your PC with Microsoft Outlook, handheld smart-phone, and/or web-based E-mail tool to access a single 'Exchange Server' or 'Google Apps' account that makes available all your messages, contacts, to-do's, etc. 

WHY?

The 'BIG' benefit is that the all the above data is kept in-sync continuously and automatically.

HOW?

Set up an 'Exchange Server' or 'Google Apps' account that can manage the basic E-mail messages, contacts, etc. mentioned above.  Then: 

• Test the new account, including your user name and password, by accessing it with a Web-Based E-mail tool.  Companies with Exchange Servers generally have a web-based E-mail tool named 'Outlook Web Access' and Exchange account vendors will have that software or something very similar while Google has it's well knows GMail tool.  Once you insure that the account is up and running 'OK', a logical next step is to...
  
• Set-up access to the new account using Microsoft Outlook on your PC.  Like Google, most exchange vendors will have online documentation and even phone-based technical support to assist you.  The new accoutn setup is generally simple, in exhcagne you'll need to enter a server name and a user name, although your Exchange vendor may also require some special settings under the [More Settings] button in the set-up process.
  
• Setting-up a smart-phone can be a bit more complex, but happily it's a one-time effort and you can often get help form technical support folks who have done it numerous times.  In the case of an Apple iPhone or Android phone you can find documentation online (Try searching "iphone exchange server setup", etc.).  Likewise for BlackBerry (Try 'blackberry exchange server setup'). 
  Note: For Blackberry it's possible to set up E-mail-only service by itself, or using (e.g. subscribing to) 'extra' server software called 'Blackberry Enterprise Server' you can also synchronize contacts, to-do's, and calendars as well.  For other smart-phones (e.g. 'Android') try the same search with the appropriately named phone.

These steps may take some effort, but the reward will likely be a new sense of productivity that's  literally available, in the palm of your hand!

Want it quicker and cheaper?

A very workable, and 'FREE', short-cut for outlook 2003/2007/2010 users with an Android phone is to:

• Continue to use Outlook's Email, Contact and calendar tools
• Set up a free Google GMail account (Outlook can access it directly via it's IMAP protocol)
• Install the 'FREE' Google calendar sync tool to keep Outlook's calendar synchronized with Google's
• Set up your E-Mail to preview new E-mail (but not make all your Outlook E-mail folders available)
• Synchronize contacts initially by exporting a 'CSV' file from Outlook and importing it into GMail contacts.   Thereafter person-by-person you can enter data in Outlook, create a 'Vcf' file for each new or updated Outlook contact, and then import that '.Vcf' file inside GMail contacts.

This alternative is a bit more work but we find it very satisfactory.  Once set up a calendar appointment set anywhere ends up being displayed on your handheld's calendar, in the Google calendar and in Outlook's calendar too!  Contacts can be entered once and then imported into GMail contacts where they are automatically synchronized with your hand-held.  That leaves you with current appointments all the time, a usable contacts list, and a preview of your most current E-Mail.  And if that's not 'OK' for you, a $50 Google Apps account can synchronize it all more automatically!

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