So how’s iOS 4 Active Sync working for you? iOS 4 allows multiple ActiveSync accounts, meaning iPhone users can finally have their work Exchange setup alongside Google Sync, for example.

I’ve got both Exchange (2003) and Google Sync (Google Accounts) set up on both an iPhone 4 and an iPhone 3GS, and both mail and calendar are working fine (I don’t sync Exchange contacts, never mind the mess that is Google contacts — I use MobileMe for that).

Some users over on the Apple Support forums aren’t having as much luck. Calendars in particular seem to be giving them problems where they weren’t under iOS 3.x.

I did notice that, on my iPhone 3GS, the first time I added the second ActiveSync account the phone got hot and the battery started to drain so I deleted it, rebooted, and added it back and it hasn’t happened again — battery life has been surprisingly good.

What’s your experience with ActiveSync under iOS 4?

[discussions.apple.com, thanks Sagar!]

How’s iOS 4 ActiveSync (Exchange/Google Sync) working for you? is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TiPb - The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog

When you add an IMAP-based email account (including MobileMe and Gmail) to iPhone 4, in addition to the previous options you now get a toggle for “Sync Notes”.

Notes syncing was famously listed as an iPhone 1.0 feature but then mysteriously vanished only to return in iPhone 3.0 as an iTunes-limited option (i.e., not push or over-the-air).

Apple’s desktop Mail client includes special folders that serve as repositories for notes, so perhaps this is now (finally) being echoed on the iPhone.

Whether or not this gets tied in to the actual Notes app remains unknown (it doesn’t seem to right now, but it may just not be working yet). It also doesn’t seem to be an option for Exchange accounts (yet?).

If you discover anything else about iPhone 4 Notes sync, let us know!

[Thanks anon for the tip!]

iPhone 4: Notes Sync for IMAP is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TiPb - The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog

Google continues to lead the pack when it comes to web apps, so we’re not surprised to see them announce an experimental Gmail site up and optimized in time for the iPad release.

We’re releasing an experimental user interface for the iPad built on the Gmail for mobile HTML5 web app that we launched last year for the iPhone and Android devices. Those devices have large screens compared to other phones, and tablets like the iPad give us even more room to innovate. To take advantage of the iPad’s large display, we’ve created a two-pane view with your list of conversations on the left and messages to the right.

Some other Google web apps will present iPad-optimized versions, while a few will retain their desktop look. Google fired up their iPhone 3.2 SDK for iPad simulator, checked things out, and decided what worked best.

When you get your iPad give it a shot and let us know how they did!

[Google via MacRumors]

Gmail web app goes iPad optimized! is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TiPb - The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog

Gmail may only be the 3rd most popular email service on the planet (behind Yahoo! and Hotmail) but it ranks first in the hearts of geeks everywhere and can be used in a variety of ways on the iPhone:

• IMAP (or POP if you’re really old school) right from the iPhone Mail app. With its prominent place, and huge button, on the Account Setup page, it’s a default for many users. While it (still!) doesn’t support IMAP-IDLE push, plain old IMAP will keep all your accounts in sync, even if Google’s implementation is eccentric to say the least. (Labels mapping to multiple folders, simultaneous connection limitations, etc.)
• GoogleSync right from the iPhone Mail app. It licenses ActiveSync from Microsoft and fills up your lone Exchange slot on the iPhone but it does provide push if that’s what you need (even if it’s been a tad error prone).
• Gmail Web App from Mobile Safari. It supports all the Gmail goodness like labels and stars and threads and thanks to HTML5 it even has local storage and an almost native app-like feeling to it, even if it’s not a snappy as the real thing.
• As a spam-filter for another email account. May sound strange, but some people merely forward their Gmail to a different IMAP or webmail account, using Google’s excellent spam filtration but wanting a different service or front end for the actual mail.

Of course, some no doubt wish there was better built-in support for the unique Gmail attributes within iPhone mail, or a separate Gmail app like on Android, but given Apple’s App Store policies we don’t see that coming any time soon. So, given the choices above, how are you using Gmail on your iPhone? And if you have any pro-level or ninja tips for iPhone Gmail, let us know!

How Do You Use Gmail on Your iPhone? is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TiPb - The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog

It’s been a month since the debut of Google Buzz. By now, the service should be available to all Google users. If you have not yet heard about Google Buzz, it is the latest social product offered by Google. The new Buzz app allows you, through your Gmail account; to share your thoughts, multimedia and social media feeds, as well as, to follow folks that you’re interested. Essentially, Google Buzz is Google’s definitive intertwined social media product.

Along with the Buzz release, Google has also made Buzz available for the iPhone by running a mobile Safari web app. This is similar to other rollouts like Google Voice where instead of going through the app store, Google just takes advantage of Safari’s HTML 5.0 capability to deliver a feature-rich web application.

To try out the service, you can simply point your mobile Safari to buzz.google.com. Once the service is activated in your Google account, you’ll see a new tab named Buzz on the top navigation bar along with other applications such as Calendar, Mail and etc.

Follow to Tap Into Someone’s Thought
Soon after you enter the app, Google Buzz shows who’s already following you and subscribing to your status updates. Don’t like someone to follow your update? You’re allowed to reject their follows. On the other way round, you can also follow them back to get any status update from friends. Just like Twitter, the Buzz service also lets you follow any public contacts and view their public posts.

Sharing Your Thought
Sharing status update shouldn’t be new to you if you’re a regular user of Twitter or Facebook. In basic form, it works nearly the same as the counterparts. The Buzz service puts up a prominent “Share what you’re thinking” textbox. Simply tap on it and you’re free to post anything. While Twitter shares your update with all users, the Buzz service provides finer control of your buzz. You can select to share your thought privately (say, your followers only) or publicly (anyone using Google Buzz).

I have been testing out Google Buzz for a month on both desktop and mobile versions. Using Buzz on iPhone is much more interesting.

So, what makes Google Buzz for iPhone different from the main version?

Buzz Around Your Area
Well first off, you have all of the features with the main (non-mobile) version. On top of that, the mobile version comes with some cool geo-location features. If you have the “use current location” turned on, it tags all of your posts with your current location. However, if you don’t want to give away too much information, you can also control it within Buzz. The really cool feature is the integration of with Google Maps. The “Nearby” feature allows you to see all buzzes around your current location and it possibly opens up a conversation with someone who you never meet before by using the comment feature. Imagine you are watching a football game and send out a buzz, it’s very likely someone who’s watching the same football game will comment your buzz and spawn a conversation. That’s something you can’t do on Twitter yet.

Google Buzz also lets you post message within the map interface. But please take note. Anything that you post through the Google Maps feature is in the public domain and can be viewed by all mobile users on Google Buzz.

Privacy Concern
When Google Buzz was first released a month ago, it aroused lots of privacy concerns. Since then, Google has released a number of major security enhancements such as disable auto-follow, block anyone from following you, etc. That said, if privacy is your top concern, Google Buzz and other social networking products may not be for you.

Where is the native Buzz’s app?
The design of Buzz web app is pretty good and Google already does its best to make the web app look like a real application. In terms of user experience and performance, however, it still can’t compare with a native app. So, does Google Buzz have a native iPhone app? At some point, Google may release a native iPhone app. For now, you can count on Buzzie, an unofficial Google Buzz app developed by Alberto García Hierro. The app is now available on App Store for US$1.99 [iTunes link].

Conclusion
All in all, Google Buzz does offer some cool features but it’s not a revolutionary product. To me, as a regular user of Twitter and Facebook, Google Buzz is just another social networking product. It’s no Twitter killer. Within my one-month testing with Buzz, I still turn Twitter to express my thought publicly or share with my close friends via Facebook. I already get used to the simplicity of these social services. This is very much the same for search. When I need to search something on the web, I turn to Google.

That said, Google Buzz is still a promising product and offers a great way to share information with others. If you’re a fan of Gmail, probably you’ll love the integration of Buzz. Anyhow, give it a shot and let us know if you love Buzz.

To see Google Buzz in action, you can further check out the video (though the demo is on Android rather than iPhone):

Over the weekend, if you are using Google Sync to synchronize your email on iPhone, you probably experienced a synchronization problem with Google and failed to retrieve your email. You may not aware of the problem as there is no error message shown when synchronizing the emails. But when you access your Gmail account on desktop, you probably notice the emails you received are not in-sync with your iPhone.

As explained by Google, the problem is preventing iPhone, Windows Mobile and S60 users from synchronizing contacts, calendar and email with the Google cloud. Here is the response from Google that further explained the issue:

As many of you have noticed, Google Sync is having some difficulties due to an extended problem with one of our datacenters. This has been going on over the weekend, but it’s got significantly worse today, so I’m just letting everyone know what’s happening.

None of your information has been lost, and you will still be able to get your data through Sync, but you will find that Push isn’t working very well. This is because we’re batching up fetch requests to be able to cope with the traffic we’re seeing while this problem is ongoing. As soon as we’ve got the problem fixed, push should seamlessly start working properly again

We’re working flat out to get this fixed, but unfortunately we don’t have an ETA at the moment. We’re doing everything we can to improve the situation in the meantime, and I’ll post here again when I have more news.

Despite there is no official announcement about the status of the fix, it seems like the Google Sync problem is resolved. I have just tested on my iPhone, it just works! Love to see Google Sync is back. If you still experience the problem, remember to leave comment and let us know.

Tip: For those who are still experiencing the sync problem, you may use the mobile version of Gmail at the mean time. Simply point your Safari to m.gmail.com