I hate Palm. Outlook too. Oh yeah, also Microsoft.

Another fight lost in the HotSync wars.

Today Outlook/Palm/Exchange/BeyondContacts (OPEB) duplicated all of my tasks. I'm so used to cleaning up this nonsense I have special Outlook views defined to help the cleanup.

Why did it do this? Beats me. Every so often OPEB decides to punish me.

I hate sync. I hate Palm. I hate Outlook. Exchange too for that matter. Oh, yeah, Microsoft too.

Sync is hard enough when a single vendor has complete control of both transaction partners. When sync crosses vendors (bilateral messaging, reconciling disparate data models, lack of well managed identifiers), and when sync is three-way (PDA to Outlook to Exchange) it's like juggling antimatter. Every so often, it explodes.

BTW, most healthcare environments do the equivalent of "sync" across vendor systems every day. It's ugly there too.

PS. When I first tried to post this I got a "blogger has gone splat" message (ok, they said "down for planned maintenance -- at 6pm CT). I hate Blogger too. Also Google.