Filed under: How-tos, Troubleshooting, iPhone, iPod touch
Notes in iPhone OS 3.0: getting rid of that syncing feeling
When I heard that OS 3.0 was going to enable syncing of notes between the iPhone and the Mac, I was overjoyed. I use the notes app on my iPhone all the time for everything: reminders, grocery lists, and figuring out the monthly budget while I'm away from home. Having those notes sync back and forth with the Mac was something I very much looked forward to, because it made the notes app far more useful.The first few times I synced notes between my iPhone and Mac, however, I'd get a message like this one:
Since I don't have many notes on my iPhone to begin with, this alert would come up every time I changed, deleted, or added a note on the iPhone. This would also hold up completing the iPhone's sync with my Mac until I confirmed that syncing notes was okay.
After a few days of this, it was starting to get irritating. I racked my brain trying to figure out how to stop it.
Then I remembered: iSync is still its own program (though one largely restricted to the background these days), so there ought to be a preference in it to stop this behavior.
And there was. In iSync's preferences, you can set the threshold for the alert message that appears on syncing with your iPhone:
You can disable the alert entirely, or you can set it to go off if 50%, 25%, 5%, or any data on your Mac will be modified by syncing with the iPhone.
I'm not sure if this was set to 5% by default, or if years ago I'd set it that low out of paranoia and just forgot about it. Now I have it set at 50%, and the irritating alerts have gone away.
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
mentalsticks said 10:07AM on 6-22-2009
Then again, I *do* appreciate a warning when sync gets botched and changes 45% of my calendar appointments...
Reply
George said 10:09AM on 6-22-2009
Hmmm… annoying for Notes sync? Yes. But for all those times when MobileMe wants to overwrite my Mail account settings in the wrong direction? I need that '5% changed' warning on just for that.
That's the problem with the MobileMe sync process—it's an all-or-nothing approach that is lame to begin with, but coupled with the intermittent unreliability of MobileMe sync it's sorely lacking.
Reply
leuchtetgruen said 12:38PM on 6-22-2009
You could as well use an online notepad - this way you wouldnt need syncing at all.
http://notepad.leuchtetgruen.de/ also works with the iPhone and iPod touch.
Reply
Caitlin said 10:17AM on 6-22-2009
I love the Don Hertzfeldt reference.
Reply
Larry Pan said 11:58AM on 6-22-2009
I was just gonna comment on it, but you beat me to it
-L (king of france)
L3 said 12:19PM on 6-22-2009
That was satisfying, if challenging. tHanks.
Curtis said 2:12PM on 6-22-2009
I second that. Gave me a chuckle when I recognized it.
Brian Allen said 10:18AM on 6-22-2009
You would like the percentage to be by data type. Contacts should be around 5% and others. But, some data types could be higher.
Syncing can put its foot down wrong and this is your only flag.
Reply
oboewan said 10:26AM on 6-22-2009
FYI: On Windows, this setting is on the Devices tab in the Edit:Preferences window in iTunes.
Reply
HazyCloud said 10:55AM on 6-22-2009
Thank you for that.
Karan Varindani said 9:14PM on 7-24-2009
Thanks Alot Man
Mike said 10:27AM on 6-22-2009
The bigger question is: can Notes be synced from iPhone to OS X Mail via MobileMe?
Reply
Ries said 10:36AM on 6-22-2009
that's what i would like to know too... I was disappointed to find out that syncing my notes means connecting my iPhone everytime i want to update my notes...
superdude said 10:38AM on 6-22-2009
Great tip. Can anyone tell me where i can FIND my synced notes on my mac?
Reply
losty. said 10:45AM on 6-22-2009
In Mail, go to the reminders tab: open it up and it drops down into Notes and To Do. The sync notes will be in the "On My Mac" section.
Ethan said 10:58AM on 6-22-2009
I've put syncing on and can't sind my notes in Mail. I can see the change alerts when I've made a new note and I sync though, so they're somewhere.
Sam said 1:27PM on 6-22-2009
I had to create a new note in Mail before it would show the Reminders > Notes section in the sidebar. Try File -> New Note, or click the Note button in the toolbar.
Ethan said 7:33PM on 6-22-2009
I've got notes up under reminders, heard they should show up under 'on my mac' bit. No luck.
m4tti said 8:05PM on 6-22-2009
Ethan, I've got the same problem like you. When I sync I get the 5% warning msg, but then the note don't appear at Mail. I already tried to reinstall and arrived to get them sync to mail but not to the iPhone. But then Mail begins to hang up and I had to restore it...
You may add me to your iChat: m4tti@mac.com o gTalk: m4tti.pwner,
Greetings!
daniel.obee said 10:39AM on 6-22-2009
Mike has the right question, but the answer unfortunately is 'NO!'. It's so disappointing, it's so embarrassing - and it's so not Apple... Syncing notes (and we haven't touched the ToDo topic now) would be so natural that it's unbelievable we have to rely on third party software. I've been waiting since the very beginning and still... I'd be happy to spend c/p functionality if that would be implemented!
Reply