Chapter 8. Sychronizing a Handheld Computer with KPilot

Table of Contents

KPilot Basics
Conduits Used by KPilot
Configuring the Handheld Connection
Configuring the KAddressBook Conduit
Managing To-Do Items and Events
Working with KPilot
Backing up Data from the Handheld
Installing Programs on the Handheld

Abstract

Handheld computers are in widespread use nowadays among users who need to have their schedules, to-do lists, and notes with them everywhere they go. Often users want the same data to be available both on the desktop and on the portable device. This is where KPilot comes in — it is a tool to synchronize data on a handheld with that used by the KDE applications KAddressBook, KOrganizer, and KNotes.

KPilot Basics

The main purpose of KPilot is to allow the sharing of data between the applications of a handheld computer and their KDE counterparts. KPilot does come with its own built-in memo viewer, address viewer, and file installer, but these cannot be used outside the KPilot environment. Independent KDE applications are available for all these functions except the file installer.

For the communication between the handheld and the different desktop programs, KPilot relies on conduits. KPilot itself is the program that oversees any data exchange between the two computer devices. Using a particular function of the handheld on your desktop computer requires that the corresponding conduit is enabled and configured. For the most part, these conduits are designed to interact with specific KDE programs, so in general they cannot be used with other desktop applications.

The time synchronization conduit is special in that there is no user-visible program for it. It is activated in the background with each sync operation, but should only be enabled on computers that use a network time server to correct their own time drift.

When a synchronization is started, the conduits are activated one after another to carry out the data transfer. There are two different sync methods:

  1. A HotSync operation only synchronizes the data for which any conduits have been enabled.

  2. A backup operation performs a full backup of all data stored on the handheld.

Some conduits need to open certain files during a sync operation, which means the corresponding program should not be running at the given time. Specifically, KOrganizer should not be running during a sync operation.