PalmPilot: The Ultimate Guide, Second Edition

Chapter 8. Palm Desktop: Windows

Chapter 6, describes how data gets from your PalmPilot to your desktop computer. In this chapter, you’ll find out what happens to the data when it reaches your PC. Its home there is a program called Palm Desktop. (This book assumes that you’re using version 3.0 or later; if not, you can download the latest version for free from http://www.palm.com.)

Palm Desktop duplicates the functions of the PalmPilot on your computer—calendar, phone book, to do list, memo pad, and all. Make a change in Palm Desktop, and it’s automatically updated on your PalmPilot at your next HotSync, and vice versa.

Once you begin exploring Palm Desktop, you may wonder what the fuss is about. Its calendar and address book features are adequate, but not nearly as fancy as, say, Microsoft Outlook, ACT, or Eudora Planner. Why would you use Palm Desktop to run your life?

In many cases, you wouldn’t. Think of Palm Desktop as your backup program for the PalmPilot, or as the loading dock for your PalmPilot—not necessarily as your calendar/address book software. For example, Palm Desktop is especially handy if you want to:

• Import addresses from another program, ready to upload into the PalmPilot

• Change the options for a HotSync—for example, although HotSyncing generally updates both your PalmPilot and your PC, there may be times when you want your PC’s data to completely replace what’s on the PalmPilot, or vice versa

• Retrieve data you deleted long ago from the PalmPilot

• Manage the backing ...