Sync Google Home AND Bigsby to third party To-Do

[AsherSamuel]

When I ask Google home and Bigsby to remind me of sonething, I want the reminder to go to appear on a widget on my home screen so I can see my day's to do list right away.

I am new to android, but I feel like there are three or four competing ways to use my phone. Either I use Samsung or Google or Microsoft or another third party app and none of them sync..

Right now this is my phone:

Jarvis: Bigsby, Google Assistant, and Cortana
Calendar: Google Calendar
SMS: Mood Texting
Browser: Via
Email: Email (by Edison)
Reminders: To-Do by Microsoft


If I ask bigsby to set a reminder, it doesn't go to the reminder app I use. My Google Assist can't read my texts. It's really annoying. How to Iink my reminders or should I just choose a system and role with it (use all Google stuff or use all Samsung stuff, etc)

 

[Hadron]

The problem with Google Assistant and your texts is nothing to do with your SMS app: all SMS apps are just front ends, and the messages are stored in the same system database whichever app you use. It may be something to do with the permissions you have given Assistant (I have it very thoroughly turned-off so can't test or advise on that).

ToDo integration is a particular headache for Android. There are many apps that can sync with Google Tasks, but it's generally just basic features that sync. So for example if I add or delete a task in Business Calendar 2 it appears or disappears in the Google Tasks app, but any additional information that BC2 might support, such as priorities, won't be transferred to any other app because Google's own task sync doesn't support it. And I don't know of any tasks app that integrates multiple accounts (Google, Microsoft, Samsung for example), whereas there are many calendar apps that can do this to at least some extent.

I don't own any device with Bixby, so can't really comment on that. But as that is completely Samsung--specific I'd not be surprised if it doesn't talk to anything else. And even if Samsung let others sync with their services, the fact that only Samsung devices can access them will make it less worthwhile for other developers to develop for this.

 

[AsherSamuel]

Are there any apps that you reccomend to help Declutter my phone experience?

 

[Hadron]

Well one thing you can do is what you suggest: pick one "ecosystem" and just use that. If you do that it's a matter of personal taste, and what you use on other devices, which one you choose. Personally I do not want to lock myself in to any manufacturer or provider, so I quite deliberately do not do this, but it is a solution many adopt. For the same reason I don't use manufacturer-specific solutions: I do have a Samsung tablet, but I have never created a Samsung account and never used the Samsung app store. And I generally use third-party apps rather than those that come with the device, partly because you can almost always find something better anyway, and partly because it allows me to use the same apps on all of my devices (and as noted I'm not a brand loyalist).

So I think we can ignore SMS for this purpose: SMS is SMS whatever app you use, so that's purely a matter of personal taste. Likewise email apps are just a matter of what works with the accounts you use, provides the features you want, and what you are comfortable with privacy-wise. They've no implications for anything else. The same with browsers.

Calendar: pretty much any Android calendar app works with Google calendars, so if you use Google calendars you can just choose whichever you like best. I actually have several calendar apps, which I use for different things, since there isn't a single one I find best for everything.

Most will also work with Microsoft calendars (Outlook or Exchange) provided you can add the Microsoft calendar account to your list of accounts. The old Outlook.com app used to do that (allowing you to view and edit Microsoft calendars in other apps if you preferred), but the current Outlook app does not: it keeps everything internal to itself. But these days I use Nine to handle my Microsoft accounts, and that also allows me to view those calendars in my other calendar apps. Nine isn't free, but if you use Microsoft accounts it's worth trying out.

ToDo, as I've said before, is a weakness. I've never met any app that syncs with tasks from different systems. There are a few apps that allow you to manage both calendar and tasks from the same app: Business Calendar 2 does calendars but can also sync tasks with Google (as well as offering unsynced tasks if you want). Nine can do both Microsoft calendars and Microsoft tasks (but doesn't sync calendars or tasks from GMail imap accounts, though it will do email from them). For these, as far as I know, the only thing you can do is pick one system and use that (unless you really want to use multiple ToDo apps).

I don't use voice assistants at all, so can't really advise here. It's either pick the one that does the best job for the things that matter most to you, or remember to use different ones for different tasks. This does seem to be the area where you have the biggest "fragmentation" problem though - possibly the only one where it's a real issue.

 

[AsherSamuel]

Well one thing you can do is what you suggest: pick one 'ecosystem' and just use that. If you do that it's a matter of personal taste, and what you use on other devices, which one you choose. Personally I do not want to lock myself in to any manufacturer or provider, so I quite deliberately do not do this, but it is a solution many adopt. For the same reason I don't use manufacturer-specific solutions: I do have a Samsung tablet, but I have never created a Samsung account and never used the Samsung app store. And I generally use third-party apps rather than those that come with the device, partly because you can almost always find something better anyway, and partly because it allows me to use the same apps on all of my devices (and as noted I'm not a brand loyalist).

So I think we can ignore SMS for this purpose: SMS is SMS whatever app you use, so that's purely a matter of personal taste. Likewise email apps are just a matter of what works with the accounts you use, provides the features you want, and what you are comfortable with privacy-wise. They've no implications for anything else. The same with browsers.

Calendar: pretty much any Android calendar app works with Google calendars, so if you use Google calendars you can just choose whichever you like best. I actually have several calendar apps, which I use for different things, since there isn't a single one I find best for everything.

Most will also work with Microsoft calendars (Outlook or Exchange) provided you can add the Microsoft calendar account to your list of accounts. The old Outlook.com app used to do that (allowing you to view and edit Microsoft calendars in other apps if you preferred), but the current Outlook app does not: it keeps everything internal to itself. But these days I use Nine to handle my Microsoft accounts, and that also allows me to view those calendars in my other calendar apps. Nine isn't free, but if you use Microsoft accounts it's worth trying out.

ToDo, as I've said before, is a weakness. I've never met any app that syncs with tasks from different systems. There are a few apps that allow you to manage both calendar and tasks from the same app: Business Calendar 2 does calendars but can also sync tasks with Google (as well as offering unsynced tasks if you want). Nine can do both Microsoft calendars and Microsoft tasks (but doesn't sync calendars or tasks from GMail imap accounts, though it will do email from them). For these, as far as I know, the only thing you can do is pick one system and use that (unless you really want to use multiple ToDo apps).

I don't use voice assistants at all, so can't really advise here. It's either pick the one that does the best job for the things that matter most to you, or remember to use different ones for different tasks. This does seem to be the area where you have the biggest 'fragmentation' problem though - possibly the only one where it's a real issue.

Wow.. Thank you