Getting Google Apps to work properly on a BlackBerry smartphone has never been the easiest process. Take Gmail, for example: you could use POP or IMAP, but it won’t sync the read status of each message. That’s no big deal, until you go absolutely insane from a status light that never, ever stops blinking. Now you’re stuck using the Gmail for BlackBerry app. Want your BlackBerry to automatically sync your Google Calendar? You’ll need Google Sync.
These standalone applications may be reasonable solutions for individuals and small businesses, but installing, configuring, and managing it all just isn’t feasible for those companies with hundreds or thousands of employees all expecting their IT department to just make things work. Fortunately, the whole process is about to get a lot easier. This evening Google is announcing the upcoming availability of the Google Apps Connector for BlackBerry Enterprise Server, which allows for proper access to Gmail, Calendar, and Contacts through the default, built-in BlackBerry applications.
Once installed into any BlackBerry Enterprise Server for Microsoft Exchange box, IT managers can add users and apply policies just as they would for any other account. Google Apps Connector handles the Gmail, Calendar, and Contact syncing, and BES handles the data exactly as if it were talking to Exchange. No more going handset by handset installing and configuring all of these standalone apps.
Of course, you probably don’t care about what this means for the IT guys. Those guys are smug, smell sort of strange, and haven’t fixed that printer that’s been jammed up for two weeks. What’s in mean to you?
- Gmail with push support, offline access, read/delete sync, spam filtering, and support for archiving/stars right.
- One-way sync (GCal > BlackBerry) with Google Calendar, with support for recurring meetings and meeting notification alerts.
- Two-way sync for contacts.
All of it will roll right into the BlackBerry apps you’re already used to using, without installing and configuring a bunch of standalone apps.
Alas, this solution doesn’t come without its limitations. There are certain things that the built-in apps just can’t do, such as Gmail conversations, labels, and full search. For those, you’ll still have to turn to the Gmail application.
Google is currently beta testing Apps Connector with “select companies and universities”, with free availability to all Premier/Education customers come July.
Are there really >100 employee companies using GApps as their main business platform? Seems to me that fixing the plain old BIS for consumers – which is probably 95%+ of their Google/BB userbase if I had to guess – would be the much more worthwhile move. There are all sorts of headaches with IMAP not working properly and duped messages.
Don’t get me wrong, I see what they’re trying to do here – make GApps ready for the enterprise. But lets be real, it’s main use is in the SMB world (and typically much more on the ‘S’ side of that acronym) where it was used in lieu of things like BES and Exhange – not in addition to.
Yup. We’ve deployed Google Apps in our company.
Several thousand mailboxes.
Only one reply to this story? Doesn’t anyone care? http://iamned.com/blog/ no recession. keep buying stocks.
A good idea but I wonder how many people who use one blackberry device both for personal/office purpose and has configured the outlook calendar, contacts for both purpose – would require a sync up to google calendar or any other calendar.
Unless privacy is of utmost priority I dont mind sharing putting my friends b’day on outlook calendar.
So now Android and BlackBerry have official Gmail push support; how long until you enable push for us Exchange users Google? I’d love some push Gmail on my iPhone!
Greg — thanks for posting this. With all the talk about how Apple is going here, or Google is going there, etc… it’s nice to see that there are teams within the Google Apps side quietly pushing the bounds of what you can get for a solid pricing model.
I still cannot fathom why shops don’t use Google Apps -more- than is discussed openly. I think it’s one of those secrets like Linux but DNS doesn’t lie when you look up MX records ;-)
Perhaps you could also cover the entry of hosted options and pay by the drink Exchange are the current race for a great many managed service providers that fear their only competitive differentiators are the ability to incur the costs of a live help desk and semi-local support — both of which are being addressed by the general Google Apps reseller program.
Also interesting would how Zimbra and other options to the MSP community stack up in this play of them vs. the Google, Rackspace, and emerging side of the Microsoft model for hosted platforms.
“Of course, you probably don’t care about what this means for the IT guys. Those guys are smug, smell sort of strange, and haven’t fixed that printer that’s been jammed up for two weeks. What’s in [sic] mean to you?”
No, this IT guy is:
1.) SMART,
2.) CLEAN, and
3.) PROMPT.
Now, let’s talk about smug, smelly, moneygrubbing CEOs, such as yours, Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer, Larry Ellison, etc. — and the Hitler Youth accomplices, like the author, who kowtow to them.
4.) MISSING THE POINT.
Greg is an IT guy. It was a joke. Welcome to the Internet.
Thank you for the information , Giant Google, go