Beyond Contacts is easy to use and offers practical PIM functionality with an attractive interface.
To install Beyond Contacts, you use the standard Palm OS HotSync Install tool and then download the desired Outlook data with a second HotSync operation. The program is accessible from a single icon on the PDA home menu, which opens an Outlook-style Today screen—an interface we find more appealing than KeySuites four Home menu buttons. The five Beyond Contacts applications—Calendar, Contacts, Notes, DataViz Mail (off-line e-mail), and Tasks—are integrated with elegant navigation tools, such as a folder directory button at the top of each screen. Mail is further integrated automatically with DataVizs Documents to Go 4.0 or higher for Word, Excel, and image e-mail attachments. You access each application by tapping the icon, the appropriate record type (task, message, or appointment) on the Today screen, or the New button within all but the Mail application, or by pressing the programmable hardware launch keys.
Beyond Contacts supports Outlook synchronization with one PC. Data in Outlooks default folders and subfolders synchronizes for all but the Mail application, which supports only default folder synchronization. You cant synchronize data stored in Outlooks public and personal folders—an unacceptable limitation for some users. Like Outlook and KeySuite, Beyond Contacts supports up to 250 custom record categories per folder with multiple categories allowed per record, such as Business, Ideas, Gifts, and so on. The Mail category, however, supports only six standard record categories, such as Inbox and Outbox.
For the full story, read the complete
PC Magazine article.
Marge Brown, a PC Magazine Contributing Editor, has worked in the technology field for twenty years, as Director of Technology at The Travelers Companies, as an independent Managed Health Care technology consultant, and as owner of Brown Consulting Associates, the family's freelance technology writing business.
Since 1998, Marge has worked on a full-time basis with her husband, Bruce Brown, also a PC Magazine Contributing Editor, writing reviews for PC Magazine and analytical articles for ExtremeTech.com.
Marge is the mother of Rich Brown, freelance writer, Liz Brown, employee of Text100, a technology public relations firm, and Pete Brown, freelance writer and aspiring Web site designer.
In her spare time Marge enjoys reading, swimming, boating, and taking walks with Bruce and their two Giant Schnauzers, Katama and Pepper, who are about to launch their own brand of salsa and hot sauce.
Email
Print
