.FLYINGHEAD ESSENTIAL PALM OS
.TITLE How to start clean with a new Palm handheld
.AUTHOR David Gewirtz
.SUMMARY There are some simple ways to install a new Palm Desktop and handheld. Usually you do a HotSync operation with the old handheld, install the new desktop (often right over the old one) and then do another sync. Unfortunately, this often brings some old carry-overs, ghost files from the old machine to the new machine. If you want a fresh install, with just your old data and no "ghosts," read this important article.
.FEATURE
My friend Steve and I have often wondered just how much of our lives we’ve wasted waiting for Windows to reboot, and just how many days, cumulatively, we’ve given up to reinstalling Windows. Sometimes, I think that compared to getting a Palm OS handheld to reinstall properly, a basic Windows install is a cakewalk.
Most Palm users will disagree with me. To them, installing the Palm OS software is a one, two, three, you’re done process. Not for me.
You see, I review stuff. Lots of stuff. And the dregs, droppings, and drippings of the stuff I review linger on my handheld long after I’ve uninstalled the program in question. After three or four years, my personal Palm OS device (which, until recently, was a Visor Prism), was more full of gunk than the sewers in Ghostbusters II.
Since the Palm OS has changed pretty measurably since the days of the Visor Prism, I decided it’s probably time to upgrade my handheld. After all, we’ve got Palm OS devices and Pocket PCs (especially Pocket PCs) coming in here by the truckload. It might be nice if I actually used one of those for a change.
But every time I’ve ever attempted a handheld switch, because of all the gunk in the sytem, it’s always been something of a nightmare process. This time was no different. However, this time I had some very specific goals. I wanted to move over the contents of my Date Book (now called Calendar), To Do list (now called Tasks), Address Book (now called Contacts), and Memo Pad (now called Memos) to the new device.
I didn’t want to move anything else. I wanted as clean an install as possible, with just my new data.
There are some simple ways to install a new Palm Desktop and handheld. Usually you do a HotSync operation with the old handheld, install the new desktop (often right over the old one) and then do another sync. Unfortunately, this often brings some old carry-overs, ghost files from the old machine to the new machine. I wanted it to be fresh.
Four and a half hours, seven Windows reboots, and five cold resets of the new handheld later, I’ve gotten my wish. Along the way, I learned a few lessons (and relearned some important things I’d forgotten). The rest of this article will show you how you can accomplish the same thing, but, hopefully, with less pain.
.BREAK_EMAIL Save yourself some pain. Click here to read the full article.
.H1 Stage 1: Backing up the old device
Whenever I try one of these little transfer processes, I like to back up everything, redundantly. First, of course, I did a final HotSync between the Visor and the older, Handspring version of Palm Desktop.
Now, if you recall those old Visors, they had something called Springboard modules. These were plug-in cartridges slightly bigger than a Compact Flash card, specifically designed for extending the Visor functionality. One such Springboard module was a backup module, which wrote the contents of your Visor to the flash memory of the module. So, next up, I plugged that flash module into the Visor and backed up from the Visor to the module.
At this point, I had three copies of my data: one in the Visor itself, one on the flash module, and one in the install directory of the Palm Desktop. I removed the Visor from the cradle for the final time, and moved it away from my computer work area. If everything went to crap, I’d restore from the Visor or the backup module.
You should follow a similar set of steps. When you’re done, put your old handheld in a nice, safe place. Disconnect the cradle from your computer and put it away as well.
.H1 Stage 2: Backing up the Palm Desktop
Next up, I backed up the Palm Desktop. This is where the bulk of your conversion work will go on, so you want to do this part pretty carefully. The very first step (and this is something I tend to do a lot) is create a ZIP file backup of your Palm directory.
Your Palm directory is usually located in C:\Program Files\Palm, although it’s also been located in the C:\ root directory, and Handspring even decided to call it Handspring rather than Palm. In nearly all cases, it’ll be in one of the following items:
.BEGIN_LIST
.BULLET C:\Palm
.BULLET C:\Program Files\Palm
.BULLET C:\Program Files\Handspring
.BULLET and, possibly C:\PILOT if you’ve got an ancient device
.END_LIST
And, as you no doubt figured out by now, these instructions are for Windows users only.
Once you’ve located your Palm directory, you’ll want to make a ZIP copy of it. I like using WinZIP because, as shown in Figure A, I can just right click on the directory and choose the Add to Palm.zip submenu, and I’ve got my backup.
.FIGPAIR A Use WinZIP to make a full backup of your Palm directory.
The Palm.zip file was created at the bottom of my C:\Program Files directory, so I just moved it onto my Windows desktop for the duration of this project. I’ll eventually burn it onto a CD for safekeeping.
After backing up the full Palm directory, you’re going to want to grab a copy of your "user folder" and copy it to your desktop. This is a key step. Take a careful look at Figure B, below, and notice the highlighted folder "GewirtD".
.FIGPAIR B Back up your user folderby copying your "user folder" to the desktop.
Obviously, your user folder will have a different name than mine. My name is David Gewirtz, so my user folder takes seven letters from my last name "Gewirtz" and one letter from my first name "David" and smashes them together into a folder name "GewirtD". You’ll want to look for a folder within your Palm folder that looks like your name. When you locate your user folder, drag a copy of it onto your desktop. Remember, this is the critical step, so be sure you have a copy on your desktop before you move on.
.H1 Stage 3: Uninstall your old Palm Desktop
Once you’ve made your two desktop backups: the ZIP file of the entire folder and the copy of your user folder, it’s time to uninstall your Palm Desktop.
Go to Add/Remove Programs, find the Palm Desktop Entry, as shown in Figure C, click Change/Remove and uninstall the Palm Desktop.
.FIGPAIR C Remove your old Palm Desktop.
Once you’ve uninstalled your Palm Desktop, there’s another step you’ll need to do. As you can see in Figure D, even though you may have run the Palm Desktop uninstaller, there’s still going to be a whole lot of residual gunk left in your old Palm folder, including a bunch of DLLs and your user folder.
.FIG D There’s still a Palm folder and it still has gunk in it.
Simply delete this folder completely. Drag it to your trash or hit your delete key. Be sure this folder is gone-gone-gone before you move on.
.H1 Stage 4: Installing your new device
Now that you’ve completely cleared your machine, it’s time to install the new device. When I decided to install the new device, I did a hard reset on the device. This clears absolutely everything off the device that’s not factory fresh. I did this because the new device had been though testing here, and itself might have had gunk on it.
You may not want to do a hard reset, although if it’s a factory fresh device, it probably can’t hurt. That said, some factory-fresh installs come with some add-on software and data, and if you do a hard reset, you may lose that data. Take care to check with the instructions for your device. If you do want to do a hard reset, you can find directions at the Palm Web site.
Other than following the manufacturer’s instructions for setup, here’s the one important tip for our clean reinstall process. At some point, as shown in Figure E, you’re going to be asked for your user name. Be sure to enter the exact same user name you used on your old handheld.
.FIGPAIR E Be sure to enter the exact same user name you used on your old handheld.
Matching the user names is critical because you’re going to want a seemless transfer of your old data, when the time comes. For the record, that time is not now.
Once you’ve completed the install process, you’re likely to have done one or more HotSync operations, according to the installer’s instructions. Ignore the fact that you don’t have your old data on your handheld, and just check to make sure all the applications from the install process are set up correctly. Look at the HotSync log and be sure there were no errors. If there were any errors, fix them, even if you need to call Palm support to get some help.
In short, make sure your new handheld is functioning exactly the way it should be before you try to restore your data.
For the record, it took me three or four tries to get this to work. Each time I tried again, I started at the beginning, removing the failed Palm Desktop install, removing the user folder the installation process had created, and doing a hard reset on the device. You probably won’t have to go through as many iterations. For example, the first time through, I didn’t realize that the uninstall wouldn’t uninstall everything. Eventually I got it right, and moved on the the next stage.
.H1 Stage 5: Restoring your old data
Now we come to the fun part: getting your old data back! If you follow these steps very carefully, you should be pretty happy with the results. Of course, if you lose all your data and your world falls to pieces, remember that I’m a professional and you shouldn’t try this at home. ZATZ Publishing, Computing Unplugged Magazine, and I take no responsibility if it all goes to hell. You’re on your own. You’ve been warned.
But, hey, it should work out just fine.
First, find your new Palm folder. It’s most likely to be C:\Program Files\Palm\. Open that folder and put it on the left side of your screen, leaving room on the right side of the screen for another folder. Within that folder, open your user folder. Now, open your old user folder and put it on the right side of the screen, as shown in Figure F.
.FIGPAIR F You’ll want to have both folders, side by side.
The folder on your left is the new folder. The folder on your right is the old folder. In Figure F, above, you can see that there are some new items in the new user folder, including folders for VersaMail, Photos, and Voice Memo. We, however, are only concerned with four folders:
.BEGIN_LIST
.BULLET address
.BULLET datebook
.BULLET memopad
.BULLET todo
.END_LIST
Notice that although Palm has renamed the applications, their folders in your user folder remain the same. This is a good thing.
Now, simply copy those four folders from your old user folder to your new user folder. Do this with care and be sure you’re copying, not moving. This is the part of the process where you’re moving your precious data back to the Palm Desktop, so pay very careful attention to which folder is which.
WARNING: Whatever you do, do NOT HotSync yet!
At this point, you should open your new Palm Desktop application, and you’ll see that your data is back. You’ll need to reset some categories (Palm adds a few on installation) and you’ll need to set a new security code, but your stuff is back on your Palm Desktop. It is not yet on your handheld.
Before you HotSync, you’ve got one more critical step to take. You need to be sure that the data from your desktop overwrites the data on your handheld. Otherwise, bad things could happen. Here’s how you do it.
On your system tray should be the little HotSync icon. Right click on it and select Custom. You’ll see a screen like that shown in Figure G.
.FIGPAIR G Be sure to set "Desktop overwrites handheld" for the big four.
For each of Calendar, Contacts, Tasks, and Memos, you’re going to want to click the Change button, and then select "Desktop overwrites handheld" for each of these four items. Don’t change any of the other conduits.
.BEGIN_KEEP
OK, once you’ve made sure "Desktop overwrites handheld" for the big four, now you can go ahead and do a HotSync operation.
Whew! There ya go. Your data (and nothing but your data) is now on your new device. Have fun and don’t forget to clear the data off your old handheld if you’re going to sell it or give it to a friend.
See you next week!
.END_KEEP
