Backing up your online calendars and contacts

Online mail services like Hotmail, Gmail and Yahoo! Mail are great for the small business owner and anyone who is often on the road. Having a central website containing all your emails, contacts and appointments makes life a lot easier when you don’t spend your time sitting in an office.

There is a downside though, if your account get hijacked or inadvertently closed down then all of those contacts, appointments and emails may be lost. So it’s a good idea to have some backup in case disaster happens.

Hotmail

The best solution for Hotmail users is to use the synchronisation tools included in Windows Live Mail. Download Windows Live Mail from the Microsoft website, install the program then Sign In to your Hotmail Account using the button in the top right hand corner of the screen then click the Sync menu and select everything. This will save a copy of all your Hotmail details onto your computer.

Yahoo! Mail

If you’re a Yahoo! user, you can backup your contacts by clicking on the Tools button that appears in the top centre of the contact screen above your contact list and select either export or synch. Synch will synchronise your data with devices like iPhones and computers although this varies on what equipment you use, while export will save a file to your computer which you can then import into whichever program you use. If in doubt choose the Comma Separated Value (.CSV) option as most programs can read that.

For your Yahoo! calendar, click Options on the right hand side of the screen and select Synch, the following page will take you through the steps of synchronising your calendar with various programs. That page will also explain how you can subscribe to a calendar from a different account which will then let you save.

Gmail

In Gmail you can export your contacts by opening the Contacts page, clicking on the More Actions button on the centre top of the screen then selecting Export. You’ll then get options for Google, Microsoft and Apple contact lists. If stuck, choose the Google option.

For Gmail calendars, at the bottom of My Calendars on the left hand side of the page click Settings. Under the Calendars setting tab, click the Export button which should appear under your list of calendars. This will then download a backup of your calendars.

A nifty tool for Gmail users is Backupify, a free service if your data weighs in at less than 2Gb, this can automate backing up your Google and Facebook settings.

Mobile phone applications

If you have a mobile phone, you’ll find the software that came with it may have a function to synchronise your emails, contacts and calendar. It’s a good idea to set this up if you have the opportunity.

Data is the most important thing on your computer and things do go wrong with technology so it’s essential you back it up on a regular basis.

Similar posts:

• No Related Posts