Slapped in the face by PalmOne

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I’m using Windows 7 pro & a 64bit setup. For many years I’ve successfully run Palm and a handheld. About five yrs. ago the handheld died so I tossed it and forgot about syncing. The PalmOne desktop now has resided continuously on several computers and most recently on a new HP high end computer and has served my needs very well. Recently when attempting to install a 3TB external HD and searching for a letter location, my computer quit–not the “blue screen of death,” it just decided to go back mostly to factory settings. Therefore, I was locked out because it wanted a username and password which (in my stupidity) lived on my HD. Finally after an hour or so with a fantastic HP tech, I was able to get logged in without a PW and found that most programs had been wiped clean. I’ve been reinstalling programs which isn’t a big deal except for PalmOne. Now my issue: I’ve reinstalled PalmOne 4.1.4 and am attempting to reinstate my calendar (datebook.dat). I’m not concerned about the addresses, notes, memos, etc. but the calendar is very important to me as it contains doctors’ appointments, house and car repairs, travel dates, records of beginning/ending of medications, many business matters, and important family events to say the least. April/May of 2014 was filled with important dates. Now, also in my stupidity, I’ve got over two-dozen backups of the “datebook.dat” (calendar) files of various sizes and dates of access. I also have archived datebook (dba) files which appear to be useless when attempting to import, because Palm doesn’t seem to recognize or find them. I have searched and clustered all address.dat, datebook.dat, memo pad.dat, etc. files in separate folders for easy access, dates, and sizes. The main frustrating things that now are slapping me in the face when I attempt to import a datebook.dat (Calendar) file into PalmOne 4.1.4, and it gives me only an “open in WordPad” option. So then I have to do a wildcard *.* and find the datebook.dat (calendar) file, click on the “open with” Palm.exe file, and import the latest and largest one (being 3,353KB) after going to the Palm.exe file and telling it to open with Palm, not WordPad. Yes, I’ve tried the largest and most recent imports but they only provide me with birthdays and anniversaries (these do import), but none of my important dates appear. NOTE: I have successfully imported contacts.dat, tasks.dat, and memos.dat easily using the same unsuccessful procedure I’ve attempted with the datebook.dat (calendar) file I’ve imported the same way. I’ve tried other Palm datebook (calendar) files without success (different access dates and sizes). Finally, I’ve installed Palm 6 and tried some mdb files I’ve backed up and all of these just hate me;). No criticism; however, I finally called a Geek Squad tech for a service call last week and there was no solution except to forget the recent and most important dates and import the latest datebook file that provides some two-year-old information; essentially useless to me and our family. My family and I are pretty much wiped out regarding our past four-year history and future responsibilities unless I can reinstate our important dates from some datebook file I’ve backed up since 2010. Many thanks to anyone who can provide solutions, I will be forever grateful. Sorry for the length of this plea for help, but after working successfully with Palm for many years, this has me hitting a brick wall. Thank you.

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You might try Pimlical. The Pimlical desktop replaces the Palm Desktop. And there is an active Yahoo group that may be able to assist if this doesn’t work. I think you should be able to get it on free trial. Note that you’ll need the version that syncs to Palm, at least initially.

Worth a try?

Chris

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I have been able to sync my Palm and open Palm data files on a PC running Ubuntu Linux using J-Pilot. (I think that is the name. I don’t have the Linux machine here at work with me.) You could get VMware Player or VirtualBox and load an image of Ubuntu in a virtual machine. Then go into their software center and search for JPilot or J-Pilot (or something like that) and see if that will open your calendar file.

Pat

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When I moved away from my Palm LifeDrive, I transferred my data out. The challenge was to get it into a standards-based format. For calendar, which is the hardest to export and get it right, that’s iCal. There’s quite a lot of info on doing this but I quite liked the sound of palm2ical http://hepunx.rl.ac.uk/~adye/software/palm/palm2ical/, which is written by Tim Adye at Rutherford Labs in the UK. So, I followed his advice on getting the database file off my LifeDrive successfully and ran his program to get an iCal file.

Perhaps this program will be useful to you.

For the record, I now have my data (contacts and calendar) in Google’s cloud and sync it very successfully with a variety of Android devices, Windows Phone and with Thunderbird (plus the Lightning calendar extension) running under both Windows and Linux.

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You don’t mention clearly but it really sounds like you need an automated backup on an external drive. Such drives are cheap now. Even NAS is becoming very reasonable.

Windows has a built in imaging app which is very useful but if you’re up for a bit of sophistication, I recommend imaging the OS and programs but using a distinct system for backing up your files and data. With low cost large drives, making a direct copy is easily automated with free tools like Cobain Gravity.

Then if something goes south, those files are immediately accessible on your external drive. No special software needed to access them. You want backup that works.

I discuss backup options and locations here:
http://fornow.wordpress.com/2014/01/25/backup-that-counts/

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When my Palm died, I decided to go more open source rather than keep my important personal data in proprietary formats that would also have end dates.

Like Leila, I use Thunderbird and Lightning which can be synced to online services like Google and thus to phones, etc. You can also sync the profile to other devices such as when you travel.

At the time, I used different techniques for each Palm component. I outlined the steps I took here:
http://fornow.wordpress.com/2009/01/08/palm-to-open-source/

Later in comments, the maker of palm2ical mentioned that option as he had a number of recurring events and such (something I use heavily now).

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