Whenever I plan to use GPS software to help me navigate to a new destination, I’ll add the address to Outlook so I can select the address from my Windows Phone contacts instead of by manually entering the address into the GPS software.  I consider integration with the Windows Phone contacts application a fundamental requirement for any windows mobile GPS software.

Navigon MobileNavigator 7 includes an option to import addresses from Outlook or some other data source (tap My Destinations > Imported addresses). 

Unfortunately, the imported addresses option doesn’t work as expected.  Selecting Imported addresses opens up the Contacts application, but then there’s no way to copy a selected address into MobileNavigator. 

I discovered this issue several weeks ago and emailed my contact at Navigon, requesting clarification and direction about how to use this option.  I never received a response to my email.  As far as I’m concerned, the Imported Addresses option is useless.

Since the Imported addresses option doesn’t work, destination addresses have to be manually entered into MobileNavigator by selecting New Destination > Enter an Address and then manually inputting the destination information into the fields provided (City or Zip Code, then Street, then Street No). 

This lack of true integration with the Contacts application is a significant limitation of MobileNavigator.

The easiest way to watch YouTube on a WM5.0 or WM6.x device is to input m.youtube.com into the Windows Mobile Standard or Professional phone’s mobile browser.

Then click the Link, “Download the YouTube application,” to download and install a YouTube client to your phone.

If you have a Windows Mobile Classic device that runs WM5.0 or WM6.1 (the classic devices are not phones), you can download the software directly to your device by entering this link address into your device’s mobile browser.

After you’ve installed the YouTube application, select/tap Start > Programs > YouTube

I’ve installed the YouTube application to two WM5.0 devices (IPAQ rx1950 & IPAQ hw6925) as well as to my WM6.1 Standard phone (IPAQ Voice Messenger) and my WM6.5 Professional phone (HP IPAQ Glisten).

My Phone makes it easier than ever to share your pictures with your social networks (Windows Live, Flickr, Facebook or My Space).

All you need to do is log into your web-based My Phone account from your computer and add a social networking account to your My Phone account:

• Select “Social networks” from the dashboard that runs down the left hand side of the screen. 
• Then select “Add a social networking account” from the top row on the ensuing screen. 
• Select “Add” for the account you want to use (choices include Windows Live, Flickr, Facebook, and MySpace) and you’ll be prompted through the steps of allowing My Phone access to the account.

Now any pictures that you sync to My Phone will be shared with your social networks.

If you don’t want to sync all your pictures to My Phone . . .

I don’t sync pictures or other media to My Phone because I don’t want to use up My Phone’s 200 MB space limitation with pictures and other media.  However, I do enjoy posting select pictures that I take with my windows phone camera to my Flickr account, and My Phone makes sharing select pictures with Flickr (or Windows Live, Facebook, or My Space) very easy.

Open up the Pictures & Videos application on your Windows phone (select/tap Start > Pictures & Videos)

Find and highlight the picture you want to post to your social network account, then select/tap Menu > Share…

Highlight and “Select” the network you want to use from your list of social networks (I’ve activated Flickr and Windows Live).  Input a caption in the space provided and select/tap “Share.”

You’ll see the screen below (unless you place a checkmark in the box next to “Don’t show me this message again”).  Afterwards you can find your picture on your My Phone web portal and your Flickr/Windows Live account.

Sometimes you may want to clean up the data on your phone and on the My Phone service.  Stopping the My Phone service is advisable to avoid potential problems, such as permanently deleting data on the phone AND on the My Phone web portal or duplicating data on the phone AND/OR the My Phone web portal, you should stop the My Phone service.

Stop My Phone service for a clean start

Open up My Phone software on the device:  Tap Start > My Phone

Select Menu > Account > Stop Using Service

Select "Yes" to stop using the My Phone service on the phone.  You will receive verification that the My Phone Service has been stopped on the phone.

You can go out to the My Phone web portal to verify that the phone has been removed from the list of Connected phones

After you stop the My Phone service, you can go out to your My Phone web portal and confirm that the phone is no longer shown as a connected device there.

Deleting a partnership does not remove any data from the phone or from My Phone.  At this point it is safe to

• Delete all the data from your phone without impacting the data on My Phone
• Delete all the data on your My Phone web portal without impacting the data on your phone

When you create a new My Phone partnership between your phone and the My Phone services, My Phone will view your phone as a new device and sync all the data on the phone to My Phone and all the data on My Phone to the windows phone.

My Phone is Microsoft’s free, beta service that allows you to backup any windows phone that is running WM6.x to a secure web page.  If you perform a factory reset of your windows phone or replace your windows phone with another windows phone, you can restore the data to the same or a different windows phone from your Microsoft My Phone web portal.

All you need in order to use My Phone is a Windows Live ID and a Windows phone that runs the M6.x OS.  If your phone runs an earlier version of Windows Mobile or if you don’t have a Windows phone you won’t be able to use My Phone on your device. 

WM6.5 phones already include the My Phone client software, but if you have a WM6.1 standard or WM6.1 professional phone, you can download the My Phone client:

• from Microsoft Mobile Marketplace
• by entering this address into your phone’s mobile browser: http://myphone.microsoft.com/install
• click this link on your windows phone to download the My Phone cab file directly to your Windows phone

To Create a My Phone Relationship

Open up Microsoft My Phone software on the device by selecting Start > Microsoft My Phone.  Then select Next > Accept 

Input your Windows Live ID (email address & password) in the space provided and select "Sign in."

Scroll down the page and select the data types you want to sync between your phone and the My Phone web portal.  You can sync Contacts, Calendar, Tasks, Text messages, Browser Favorites, Photos, Videos, Music, Documents (you must select this option if you want to sync data that is on the storage card), Sync storage cards (photos, videos, music or documents).

After you've selected everything you want to sync, select “Next” and choose the synchronization method you want to use:

• Automatic:  Choose this method only if you subscribe to an unlimited data plan.  If you choose this option, your selected data types will be synchronized automatically once a day or once a week.
• Manual: Syncs your selected data types only when you manually start synchronization

Select Finish > Sync after configuration is complete to sync your data between your phone and the My Phone portal.

If you’ve already synced data to My Phone from a previous Windows phone or if you are syncing after performing a factory (hard) reset of an existing Windows phone, My Phone will view your phone as a new device and sync the contents from your My Phone web portal to your Windows phone.

If you’ve never synced to My Phone, the data on your Windows phone will be uploaded to your My Phone web page.

You’ll receive verification after the sync is completed. 

You can also select the Menu option (see the lower right hand side of the screen) to view sync details, or change sync options or setup a sync schedule.  You can also set some “share” options.

Limitations of My Phone Service

Microsoft My Phone is a backup and archival option for Windows Phones only.  There are some limitations that you should be aware of:

• There is no way to sync data that is stored on the My Phone web portal directly to Outlook on a computer
• My Phone is only compatible with Windows phones.  There is no way to sync data that is stored on the My Phone web portal to a non-windows phone, like the iPhone, an Android phone, or a Nokia phone, so if you replace your Windows phone with a non-Windows phone, you will not be able to sync the data on My Phone to your new device.
• There is no way to import, export or batch download and upload data directly to or from your My Phone web page.
• My Phone does not share data with and is not connected to any of the Windows Live services, including Windows Live Calendar or Contacts, Windows Live SkyDrive, or Windows Live Mesh.
• You can store up to 200 MB of data on the My Phone web portal.  There is no way to increase the storage size of your My Phone web portal, so be careful when choosing to sync photographs and other media to My Phone.
• You can sync recurring appointments and tasks to My Phone, but they will not display as recurring on the My Phone web portal.
• Email messages cannot be synced to My Phone
• Syncing multiple Windows phones to a single My Phone web page can result in duplicate data on the phones and on the My Phone web page.
• There is no way to restore data that is deleted from the My Phone archive

Questions or Support Issues

If you have any questions or run into any problems when using My Phone, be sure to check out Microsoft’s My Phone user forum.