Sync 2013 calendar between 2 devices -Surface 2 and Desktop using Outlook.com

[parryjm]

Came across Diane Poremsky's document "Sync calendar and contacts using Outlook.com".

My ultimate goal is to be able to sync my 2013 Calendar/Contacts between my Windows 8.1 Desktop and Windows RT 8.1 Surface 2 Tablet.

I followed Diane's directions.

I wanted to first sync my Outlook 2013 Calendar residing in my Personal Folders (Outlook.pst) with an Outlook.com calendar, but not having much success.

From an e-mail perspective, my Outlook 2013 is show...

1. “Parry@gmail.com” – Gmail Account - where I send/receive all my g-mail messages (this is my default).
   
2. “Parry@gmail.com (1)” – Outlook.com Account
   
3. “Personal Folders” – Outlook.pst (keep all my e-mail folders that I can access while off-line).
   

From a Calendar perspective, my Outlook 2013 is show...

1. "Calendar" [2353] - in my Personal Folders (Outlook.pst) - where all my appointments are maintained (this is my default).
   
2. "Calendar1 (This computer only)
   
3. "Calendar" - Parry@gmail.com (1)" - calendar associated with the Outlook.com account I established.
   

After I established my Outlook.com account, I created a single calendar entry in the "Calendar" residing within my Personal Folder and I expected that entry to get replicated to the "Calendar" on my Outlook.com, but that did not occur.

I also dragged over 10 calendar items from the "Calendar" that resides within my Personal Folder to the Outlook.com Calendar and they got "moved" instead of copied, which surprised me. If these two calendars are supposed to be in sync, then why am I not seeing the entries on both calendars? Am I doing something wrong?

In Diane's directions, she says to make the Outlook.com "Calendar" the default Data File. I have not done this. Is that what I need to do? The reason I didn't do that is because I thought the calendar in the "Personal Folders" was to be my primary calendar, that I could access locally when I didn't have Internet access to connect to my Outlook.com account. Is my thinking flawed?

Is what I am trying to do even possible?

 

[Diane Poremsky]

Re: Sync 2013 calendar between 2 devices -Surface 2 and Desktop using Outlook.

Outlook.com is a separate email, just like gmail is a separate email account, and as such, it has its own calendar (and contacts), it doesn't sync with the local personal folder, it only syncs the outlook.com folder with the online calendar.

The outlook.com calendar should be available in outlook when you are offline - nothing will sync, but the last items that synced will be available. If the data file is set as default, the appointments will be on outlook today or the to-do bar.

 

[parryjm]

Re: Sync 2013 calendar between 2 devices -Surface 2 and Desktop using Outlook.

Outlook.com is a separate email, just like gmail is a separate email account, and as such, it has its own calendar (and contacts), it doesn't sync with the local personal folder, it only syncs the outlook.com folder with the online calendar.

The outlook.com calendar should be available in outlook when you are offline - nothing will sync, but the last items that synced will be available. If the data file is set as default, the appointments will be on outlook today or the to-do bar.

Diane,

Thanks for getting back to me.

Let me make sure I understand. Currently on my Desktop computer I see 4 calendar listed in my Outlook 2013…

1. [√] “Calendar [2354] – Personal Folders” (contains all my e-mail folders/messages) – check box checked]
   
2. [ ] “Calendar1 (This computer only)” (empty and not being used)
   
3. [ ] “Calendar – Parry@gmail.com (1)” (this is my calendar that is associated with the Outlook.com account)
   
4. [ ] “Birthday calendar” (empty and not used)
   

If I were to…

• Move all my calendar entries from “Calendar [2354] – Personal Folders” to “Calendar – Parry@gmail.com (1)”, then all my calendar entries would get replicated/synced to my Outlook.com Calendar – Do I have this correct?
  
• Make “Calendar – Parry@gmail.com (1)” my default Data File, so that it appears as the first folder in mail
  
• Uncheck the box “Calendar [2354] – Personal Folders”, this calendar would not be shown
  
• Uncheck the box for “Calendar – Parry@gmail.com (1)”, this calendar would not be shown
  
• Uncheck the box for “Birthday Calendar”, this calendar would not be shown
  

In going forward, I would only use the “Calendar – Parry@gmail.com (1)” calendar. Any change that I made to this calendar would be replicated/synced to the Outlook.com Calendar. Do I have this correct?

If I add my Outlook.com account to Outlook 2013 on my Surface 2 Tablet, then all the calendar entries on my Outlook.com Calendar will get replicated/synced to my Outlook 2013 Calendar “Calendar – Parry@gmail.com (1)” on my Surface 2 Tablet. Do I have this correct?

What you are also telling me is that when I have no internet access on my Surface 2 Tablet, then I can still access all the calendar entries locally in “Calendar – Parry@gmail.com (1)” and if I were to add an calendar entry locally, the next time I have Internet access, my local calendar will sync up to my Outlook.com Calendar, which in turn will sync to my Outlook 2013 Calendar on my Desktop Computer. Do I have this correct?

I assume this same process works for my Contacts and Tasks.

Finally, is there a way to delete or get rid of these other 3 calendars listed in my Outlook 2013? I will not be using so they don’t show up…

1. [ ] “Calendar – Personal Folders” (contains all my e-mail folders/messages) – checkbox checked
   

This calendar resides within my “Outlook.pst” file, so I just want to get rid of the calendar and still keep all my e-mail folder/messages.

1. [ ] “Calendar1 (This computer only)” (empty and not being used)
   
2. [ ] “Birthday calendar” (empty and not used)
   

 

[parryjm]

Re: Sync 2013 calendar between 2 devices -Surface 2 and Desktop using Outlook.

Diane,

I created an account within Outlook 2013 on both my Desktop computer and Surface 2 Tablet that is associated with my Outlook.com account. I made the “Data File” associated with this account as the default. On my desktop computer, I dragged all my calendar entries from the calendar in my Personal Folders to the calendar associated with my Outlook.com account.

I was expecting all the calendar entries to show up on my Outlook.com Calendar, as well as on the calendar on my Tablet computer, but nothing appeared.

However, I was able to manually add 3 new entries to the calendar on my Desktop computer and all 3 appeared on my Outlook.com Calendar, as well as on the calendar on my Tablet, so apparently the sync process works. Just don’t know why all the calendar entries that I moved to the calendar on my Desktop have not been replicated. Any thoughts?

BTW - I was able to run the “Google Calendar Sync” program on my Desktop computer and all my calendar entries on my Desktop Calendar got replicated to my Google Calendar.

 

[Diane Poremsky]

Re: Sync 2013 calendar between 2 devices -Surface 2 and Desktop using Outlook.

However, I was able to manually add 3 new entries to the calendar on my Desktop computer and all 3 appeared on my Outlook.com Calendar, as well as on the calendar on my Tablet, so apparently the sync process works. Just don’t know why all the calendar entries that I moved to the calendar on my Desktop have not been replicated. Any thoughts?

Which calendar? If you added them to the calendar in the outlook.com data file, they will sync.

Let me make sure I understand. Currently on my Desktop computer I see 4 calendar listed in my Outlook 2013…

1.[√] “Calendar [2354] – Personal Folders” (contains all my e-mail folders/messages) – check box checked]

2.[ ] “Calendar1 (This computer only)” (empty and not being used)

3.[ ] “Calendar – Parry@gmail.com (1)” (this is my calendar that is associated with the Outlook.com account)

4.[ ] “Birthday calendar” (empty and not used)

#2 is the calendar in the gmail data files. I don't recommend using folders marked 'this computer only', although it might be ok if you are syncing it using the google sync tool as it will be a copy of what is online.

#4 is a calendar outlook.com creates. You can delete it from outlook.com if you want. (I did.)

In going forward, I would only use the “Calendar – Parry@gmail.com (1)” calendar. Any change that I made to this calendar would be replicated/synced to the Outlook.com Calendar. Do I have this correct?
If I add my Outlook.com account to Outlook 2013 on my Surface 2 Tablet, then all the calendar entries on my Outlook.com Calendar will get replicated/synced to my Outlook 2013 Calendar “Calendar – Parry@gmail.com (1)” on my Surface 2 Tablet. Do I have this correct?

Yes, if you use the calendar in the outlook.com in outlook and on the surface, the calendars will sync.

What you are also telling me is that when I have no internet access on my Surface 2 Tablet, then I can still access all the calendar entries locally in “Calendar – Parry@gmail.com (1)” and if I were to add an calendar entry locally, the next time I have Internet access, my local calendar will sync up to my Outlook.com Calendar, which in turn will sync to my Outlook 2013 Calendar on my Desktop Computer. Do I have this correct?
I assume this same process works for my Contacts and Tasks.

That's how its supposed to work. (One person told me he's having a problem with events not syncing when he creates them offline, but i can't repro.)

Finally, is there a way to delete or get rid of these other 3 calendars listed in my Outlook 2013? I will not be using so they don’t show up…

1.[ ] “Calendar – Personal Folders” (contains all my e-mail folders/messages) – checkbox checked
This calendar resides within my “Outlook.pst” file, so I just want to get rid of the calendar and still keep all my e-mail folder/messages.

1.[ ] “Calendar1 (This computer only)” (empty and not being used)

2.[ ] “Birthday calendar” (empty and not used)

If you are using personal folders for mail, you need to set another data file as default then may be able to delete the calendar folder (after making sure its empty).

Birthday calendar can be deleted from outlook.com - log in, go to calendar, then options (gear icon).

You need to close outlook, delete the imap data file then reopen outlook to delete the this computer only folder. But... this only works if another data file is set as default.

 

[parryjm]

Re: Sync 2013 calendar between 2 devices -Surface 2 and Desktop using Outlook.

Diane,

The calendar that I moved all my appointments from my Personal Folders calendar to and the calendar that I manually added the 3 appointments was the same calendar. Since the 3 appointments that I added got replicated to my Tablet, but none of the others didn't, why would this be?

 

[Diane Poremsky]

Re: Sync 2013 calendar between 2 devices -Surface 2 and Desktop using Outlook.

Sometimes when you move appointments into an outlook.com calendar, they don't sync until you do something to trigger outlook into detecting a change in the appointment - like adding a category. So... switch to a list view, select all and add a category. After they sync you can remove the category.

 

[parryjm]

Re: Sync 2013 calendar between 2 devices -Surface 2 and Desktop using Outlook.

Diane,

I selected a specific month to change the category for all the appointments and it did not force those items to sync. Not sure what it going on. Some of the calendar items that I moved over are prior months (e.g. January 2012 - November 2013). I am seeing certain months get synced (e.g. April 2012; May 2013 - October 2013), while other months have not been synced. Since these are appointments in the past, I'm not going to lose any sleep over it. Many of the 2014 future appointments appeared to have been synced, but not all. It appears that any new calendar appointments that I add seem to get replicated, so that's what's most important. I did notice several appointments got replicated as many as 20 times on my Outlook Calendar. Not sure how that happen, so I simply deleted all but 1 appointment. It might suggest that I might have had some corruption within my Outlook Calendar. Is there any tool that can check the calendar to see if there are any errors and correct them?

 

[Diane Poremsky]

Re: Sync 2013 calendar between 2 devices -Surface 2 and Desktop using Outlook.

For ost files, no, there is no tool to test the data file as it can be deleted and outlook will recreate it and resync. Obviously, if you think something didn't sync up to the server, you'll need to export it or you'll lose it.