Any way to add all my phone's "linked contact" data to my Gmail contacts list data?

[Garnett]

I spent ages linking contacts between my phonebook, gmail and facebook, and now my phone is a damn good repository of names, birthdays, phone numbers and email addresses.

Is there any way of backing this combined data to Gmail?

My Gmail contacts list is a mess, and I need to clear a lot of garbage, but I'd love the gmail contacts I do use to have the facebook profile pic, the birthday details from facebook, and the telephone number from my phonebook, just as a backup for my phone.

 

[DBNissan]

I'm also interested in a solution for this

 

[Garnett]

I think I must be missing something - I can't think what terms to Google, but I'm sure DBNissan and me can't be the only people who have wondered about this.

 

[aarrowgant]

I too am interested! I linked everything up, then redeployed to google, and now I have a gazillion duplicates in gmail....

 

[amlothi]

The best way to do this is to add everything to Google Contacts through the Gmail interface, that's what I did. If you are exporting from another place (Outlook) you can import into Gmail, and then combine contacts that way.

I don't believe FB allows export of data for use in another system. That's FB's issue, and Google isn't very pleased with it either. So, if you are pissed off that your FB info can't be properly exported, complain to them.

See: Google Renews Battle Over Facebook Contacts, Removes Phone Directory Sync On Nexus S

 

[omgitsnickels]

I wanted to back up my contacts to gmail, so I just synced the contacts... I think I'm misreading the topic? **edit** never mind.. I know what you're talking about. but I no longer have a solution, lol.


as for facebook... to import FROM facebook TO gmail, download Google Chrome.

then, clicky and get that extension. https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ficlccidpkaiepnnboobcmafnnfoomga#

go to your home page, and there will be a new thing by account settings that says something along the lines of export.

 

[DBNissan]

I'll try using Chrome. Thanks for the replies.

 

[Garnett]

I'll try using Chrome. Thanks for the replies.

The Chrome extension didn't work for me - I clicked on "export friends" and a new page opened but then nothing else.

I don't believe FB allows export of data for use in another system. That's FB's issue, and Google isn't very pleased with it either. So, if you are pissed off that your FB info can't be properly exported, complain to them.

Thanks Amlothi. I don't understand though. My android phone displays all the linked data - for each person in my phone book I have their picture and birthday from Facebook, their email from the entry for them in my gmail contacts list, and their telephone number from my old phone's sim phone book.

All I want to do is "flatten" all this info into a single address book, ideally overwriting my messy gmail contacts list where appropriate.

Since all the info's already in my phone's address database, I'm surprised it can't be exported.

 

[DBNissan]

The Chrome extension didn't work for me - I clicked on "export friends" and a new page opened but then nothing else.

[...]

Same here. It pulls about 90% of my friends list then stops. Left it sitting for the past hour and still nothing

 

[amlothi]

Thanks Amlothi. I don't understand though. My android phone displays all the linked data - for each person in my phone book I have their picture and birthday from Facebook, their email from the entry for them in my gmail contacts list, and their telephone number from my old phone's sim phone book.

It displays it all in one place, but it isn't actually stored that way behind the scenes. It is actually separate accounts, and your phone just links it together to display it nicely for you.

In the contacts app, there is a way to export contacts, but it asks for which account you want to export. Since I don't actually have FB contacts on my phone I can't try this, but are you able to export your FB contact data to the SD card? If you are, perhaps you can then re-import that data into your google account. I'm not sure.

The last I heard, Facebook was "locking in" the data that people add to their service, and exporting it was difficult or impossible.

[rant]IMO, if you read the user agreements for that site, I really wouldn't give them any of my data because they will basically keep it forever and use it for their own purposes. [/rant]

Edit: found this thread on google's help forum, maybe this will help?
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/gmail/thread?tid=058dc912c433f1b8

 

[Garnett]

Thanks Amlothi.

I've seen that google help thread before - when I tried it last time it didn't work for some reason. Now Facebook has been removed from the options of sources from which to import.

Similarly, in the People App on my phone the export option doesn't list Facebook as one of the accounts to export.

Presumably this is because of the antisocial policies the "social network" seems to revel in. I completely agree with you about that.

What I don't understand though, is that if the People app can present the combined data to be displayed in one shot on my phone display, why can't it present all that combined data to an export function?

I could go through all my contacts and take that data page by page and imput it manually. It's not an issue of protected data. It seems odd there is not batch process.

 

[amlothi]

I'm not a programmer, so I can't explain the technical reasons. However, this more recent article has some info which might be interesting to you. It looks like FB integration into contacts is being removed in the future updates.

Google kills Android contact feature in Facebook data spat | VentureBeat

Facebook contacts will no longer appear to be integrated with the Android Contacts app. Since Facebook contacts cannot be exported from the device, the appearance of integration created a false sense of data portability.

Facebook is free to use the Android contacts API to truly integrate contacts on the device, which would allow users to have more control over their data. We are removing the special-case handling of Facebook contacts

So, it sounds like FB is purposely not using the standard Android API for contact information, and that Google somehow made a special exception to have FB contact info appear to be integrated with all of the other contact data.