vCard Problems

[IanG]

Hi all

I've got a new C class with the COMAND APS system. I'm having a lot of problems getting contact details into it and I'm hoping someone on this forum might be able to help me.

I've paired up an HTC P4550 with the car and that works fine. I can beam across contacts one at a time or all at once using some shareware software.

The contact telephone numbers transferred across OK but the address information was missing or poor or truncated.

So then I tried exporting my contact information directly from Outlook into vCard (VCF) files so I could import them using the PCMCIA card.

Importing this way gets the address information into the contacts properly.

At this stage I have 3 problems I'm hoping someone can help me with:
1) Is it possible to delete the entire address book without resetting the COMAND system? It's a real pain to re-pair the phone, set all my preferences again, etc.

2) The addresses added to a contact look fine to me (they have house number, town, county, country and postcode) but the "Navigate" option is always greyed out. What address information does COMAND need?

3) The telephone numbers in Outlook are categorised as Home, Business, Mobile, etc. This translates in COMAND as Landline or Mobile. However, when I try to use Linguatronic to call a contact it insists on knowing whether I want a home or work number then mobile, landline or car. The trouble is all the telephone numbers for a contact don't have the home or work categorisation so Linguatronic then gives up telling there is no number stored. How can I tweak the vCards so that they import in a usable format?

Thanks for any help you can provide me with.

 

[whitenemesis]

In my COMAND-APS (from the old 203 C class) the phone book is seperate from the COMAND address book that the NAV and Linguatronic systems use.

You have to import the contacts into the COMAND address book, they then become available to the other systems, although you will need to create voice tags for Linguatronic

 

[IanG]

Hi whitenemesis

The COMAND APS in my car seems to be a lot more integrated. After doing an import either via bluetooth or PCMCIA contacts appear in the telephone and address book. The Lingunatronic recognises the names I'm speaking (without setting voice tags) but it won't dial a number because although it knows whether it's a mobile or landline it doesn't know if it's home or work.

I don't mind having to say "Home Mobile" or "Work Mobile" but I don't know how to get the import to categorise a number as Home and Mobile rather than just Mobile.

 

[whitenemesis]

Mmm, better integrated for sure. Not sure how to get round your problem.

Is the COMAND manual any help? It took quite a few reads of mine before things fell into place

 

[IanG]

I picked the car up yesterday and I've been fiddling for hours trying to get things working. I think I've read the COMAND manual about 5 times already

I've got to the bottom of problem #2 - COMAND won't navigate to an address unless it's been entered via Navigation. If I enter an address into Navigation and save it with a contact the Navigate option in the address book is available and works. If I change the house number from 63 to 6 the Navigate option is suddenly unavailabe. So if you want to use the "Navigate" option you have to enter the address via Navigation - not fun or practical with lots of contacts. Can anyone else confirm this behaviour?

That just leaves me wanting to be able to delete the address book without resetting COMAND and getting Linguatronic to dial a number that isn't "Home" or "Work".

I'll post when I get any closer to a solution.

 

[veb]

Comand Address Book

I'm having exactly the same problem and am trying to get assistance from MB here in Brisbane. Did you ever manage to solve the problem of phone number categorisation so it works with Linguatronic?

I've also tested and found the same probelm with addresses and the Nav.

 

[JDR]

Hi
I have the same problems it doesn't work. I have been trying for the last eight months to get a fix. My Mercedes dealership has been trying everything to no avail. Every time I was told you will have to wait for command software update nobody else has reported the problem. Finally "lost the plot on" Monday when had a loan B150 car and phone worked perfectly !!!! Dealer was told to tell me to buy a phone that was capable of multi number transfer by tech support!!! told them in no uncertain terms. Case was then re escalated to Mercedes UK Tech Department. They tried uploading address book on standard command no problems. Then C63 linguatroinic and guess what the address book loaded (standard outlook format Office 2007) from Iphone all names & symbols work/ home/ mobile populated but it failed with the customary questions Home or Work and answer NO NUMBER STORED CANCEL.

They then tried direct pcmcia VCard upload SAME RESULT.

They escalated case to MB RD team Germany who replied to UK today.

They have found the same problem and will now commence to rectify the software fault !!!! All my car data has been sent and I have been told to expect a result in two to three weeks.

Hope this helps

 

[IanG]

Workaround

I'm sorry it's taken me so long to reply. I did create a workaround and I've been searching ever since the post from "veb" for the code I wrote.

At the bottom of this message is a file that you can copy and paste into Outlook and then run. The code will export your contacts in the "Mercedes" category from Outlook and then edit them so that mobile numbers work with voice commands. If don't have a "Mercedes" category or any contacts in the "Mercedes" category the code won't work. I added this because I didn't want all of my Outlook contacts in my car!

To begin, open Outlook, then open the VB editor by pressing ALT-F11, Insert a module, and paste in the contents of the text file attached to this message.

Edit "strOutputTo" to the path of an SD card. Insert the SD card into Comand and you can then Import Contacts.

When using Comand you can then call contacts using voice commands; simple say "Home Mobile" or "Work Mobile" to call their mobile.

If when you press F5 you get an error message saying that macros are disabled, you'll need to lower your security settings, quit Outlook and have another go.

The downside of this approach is that if you run the code again, and re-import your contacts you'll end up with two lots of contacts. Why this happens is yet another reason why Comand isn't worth what MB charge for it...

Any questions, please let me know.

Sub ExportContactsToVCF()


'Cheap and nasty way to export All Contacts to VCF files.
'By Dale Maggee, antisol (at) earthling (dot) net
'Updated by Ian Goodwin, Clarity IT Advisors Ltd http://www.clarityitadvisors.com
'Email ian (at) clarityitadvisors (dot) com
'To work with Mercedes Comand system 2009

Dim CN As ContactItem
Dim NS As NameSpace
Dim Fld As MAPIFolder

Dim strOutputTo As String
strOutputTo = "d:\"

Set NS = Application.GetNamespace("MAPI")
Set Fld = NS.GetDefaultFolder(olFolderContacts)

For Each CN In Fld.Items
CN.BusinessFaxNumber = vbNullChar
CN.HomeFaxNumber = vbNullChar

If InStr(1, CN.Categories, "Mercedes") > 0 Then
    CN.SaveAs strOutputTo & CN.FullName & ".vcf", olVCard
    EditFile strOutputTo & CN.FullName & ".vcf"

End If
Next CN

MsgBox "Done!"

End Sub

Sub EditFile(strFilePath As String)

Dim intInput As Integer
Dim intOutput As Integer
Dim strFile() As String
ReDim strFile(0)
Dim n As Integer

intInput = FreeFile
intOutput = FreeFile
Open strFilePath For Input As intInput

Do While Not EOF(intInput)
    If UBound(strFile) = 0 Then
        ReDim strFile(1)
    Else
        ReDim Preserve strFile(UBound(strFile) + 1)
    End If

    Line Input #intInput, strFile(UBound(strFile))
    
    If InStr(1, strFile(UBound(strFile)), "TEL;CELL;VOICE") Then
        strFile(UBound(strFile)) = Replace(strFile(UBound(strFile)), "TEL;CELL;VOICE", "TEL;CELL;WORK;VOICE")
        ReDim Preserve strFile(UBound(strFile) + 1)
        strFile(UBound(strFile)) = Replace(strFile(UBound(strFile) - 1), "TEL;CELL;WORK;VOICE", "TEL;CELL;HOME;VOICE")
    End If
Loop

Close intInput

Open strFilePath For Output As intOutput

For n = 1 To UBound(strFile)
    Print #intOutput, strFile(n)
Next

Close intOutput
End Sub

 

[urenajorge]

Transfer Outlook Contacts to Command

Found your macro to transfer outlook contacts to Command but seems this is not working with Outlook 2010; do you have any suggestions? I have a 2011 C350 and I'm trying to transfer all my contacts to Command using a Sony Xperia Arc, so far no luck. Any help will be appreciated.