All Phones Data Suite PRO v. 4.31

(below only APDS)

Help




1. Requirements

All Phones Data Suite is very unassuming software. You can use it on the most currently used PCs.

1.1 Hardware requirements

1.1.1 Requirements to your computer

As you can see above, requirements are really unassuming and you can use APDS on most actual PCs.

1.1.2 Requirements to your phone and accessories

APDS PRO 4.31 supports: (*) - NOTES:

1.2 Operating system requirements

APDS requires some of 32bit Microsoft operating systems: Windows 95/98/ME, Windows NT/2000/XP.

2. Installation/upgrade/remove

The installation is very easy. Run file APDS43ENGPRO.EXE and in the installation procedure choose directory (folder) where to install APDS. You can of course use default directory x:\Program Files. The installation procedure will create a link to program in the Start menu. Upgrade to higher version is very simple: extract APDS43ENGPRO_U.zip and copy these new files to the existing APDS PRO directory. If you want to remove APDS PRO from your computer go to Control Panel and in Add/remove programs choose APDS PRO to remove it.

2.1 Registration

Run any APDS part (PhoneServ.exe, PBooks.exe or SMSs.exe) - PhoneServ is the best choice in this case. Now follow big red numbers. For first set your connection and then enter your 7-characters password. Send segistration SMS. Program must display a message about a successfull sending. After several seconds you can await a status report about delivery to the registration server (but only when using a phone supporting native status reports). In next several tenths of seconds you can await your registration key. Now you can finish the registration process and can start working with the program. In the case of any technical problems on our server we guarantee key delivery in 24 hours. In this case run PhoneServ again and click to "Find in incoming SMS" button. This button you must use in the case of working with a phone that cannot report an incoming SMS to the program.

3. Using APDS

APDS is very easy to use but we recommend at least short look to next notes and advices. It may be very useful for you.

3.1 APDS components

The APDS is a set of several components. The user will work with three of them: PhoneServ.exe, PBooks.exe and SMSs.exe (these names will be named without extensions below).
PhoneServ is a part communicating with the phone. While running it doesn't display any window but only icon on the system bar (mostly by the system time indicator).
PBooks is a program for phone books which it can edit, back up and synchronize (see chapter 3.1.2.5 Synchronisation of SIM cards/phones).
SMSs works with short messages. It looks like most e-mail clients. It can read, send (to more recipients at the same time) and archive messages to folders.
PhoneServ is communicating with your phone and PBooks and SMSs are "higher layer parts" communicating with PhoneServ. This configuration allows the run of PBooks and SMSs at the same time. In the time when one part is communicating with a phone are all requests from other part refused. We recommend to wait for a finish of this operation and continue with the other operation.
If you have more than one phone (supported by APDS of course) and enough connections (serial or infrared ports) there is no problem to run PhoneServ several times and connect it to every connected phone. When you will run some SMSs and PBooks then you must by beware of belonging these instances to phones.

3.1.1 PhoneServ

This part is communicating with your phone and accumulates requests to it. Start menu has link to this program. When you run it you can see small phone icon on the system bar (mostly by the system time indicator) and the PhoneServ popup menu. This menu you can display by the left or right mouse button click on PhoneServ icon.

3.1.1.1 How to connect PhoneServ to the phone

For first you must set up type of connection by clicking Settings in the PhoneServ menu. This menu you can display by the left or right mouse button click on PhoneServ icon. Here you choose the serial port where you have your cable connected or the infrared port where runs communication (you can find here only ports available for communication - not used by other applications). Next you must choose your phone's manufacturer and type of your phone. If you cannot find your type here try to choose any similar type but we don't guarantee correct work of APDS.
If you have your phone connected for long times you can check Reconnect at startup check box. In this case we highly recommend to have your phone always connected before you run PhoneServ especially if you have Nokia phone or Ericsson 6xx/7xx/A1018.

Check box Dicsonnect from port when incoming call detected is usable in the case of using a short cable or infrared connection. When checked PhoneServ automatically disconnects from port if you have an incoming call and you can then disconnect a cable or move your phone from the range of infrared port.
Connection of PhoneServ to your phone you can do by the clicking to Connect now button in the Settings dialog or clicking to item Connect in the PhoneServ menu. After a successfull connect is the text of this item changed to Dicsonnect. If you need to free a serial port for other application you must choose this item (the text will change to Connect back).
While connecting to the port you can see the information window. By some phones (for example Bosch) is the connection to the port very fast and this window is not visible in this case. By ohter phones the connection doesn't exceed several seconds. If the PhoneServ doesn't display any error message it means that opening the port is without any errors but communication with the phone is not running yet - so you can connect to any free serial port without any error message. But this is not the case of Nokia and Ericssons 6xx, 7xx and A1018. With these phones must PhoneServ initialize communication by special sequence of commands.

3.1.2 PBooks

This part is designed for the work with phone books located on SIM or in your phone's memory or in the file. For every phone book (or its logical group) is created separated window. The window with actual phone books downloaded from SIM and/or from your phone's memory can be opened only one times at a time to prevent from data unconsistency.
When you run PBooks as first running APDS part (it means without running PhoneServ before) the message about waiting for PhoneServ to connect to your phone will be displayed. In this time will be started PhoneServ (see its icon in system tray) and it displays its menu. Here you can set all settings needed and than click to Connect menu item. After a successfull connection to your phone starts PBooks with a downloading phone book(s) from your phone.

3.1.2.1 Read phone books

You can run PBooks using two ways: If you have not selected an automatic phone books downloading after starting PBooks you can select Phonebooks - Download (or shortcut Ctrl+D or click to a button with a red arrow pointed from a phone on the toolbar) to download phone books from SIM card and/or from your phone. You can enable and disable downloading phone book locations in Settings menu.

3.1.2.2 Edit existing entry

The Edit dialog box for given phone book entry you can open by double clicking on this entry or selecting this entry (left mouse button click) and choose Entry - Edit from the menu. Here you can edit name and/or phone number. Editation procedure confirm by clicking to OK. Changed entry will be drawn by italics text (and all other changed entries) till then you upload them back to SIM and/or your phone's memory by selecting Phonebooks - Upload (or by shortcut Ctrl+U or by clicking to button with a phone and an arrow pointing to it).

3.1.2.3 Delete entry

You are not able to delete one or more entries without selecting them. One entry you can select by left mouse button click to it. Continuous group of entries you can select by left mouse button click to the first of them and while you are holding the Shift key and left mouse button click to the last of them. You can also select uncontinuous group of entries: if you have selected a continuous group of entries and want to select other entry (without deselecting this group of entries) you must left mouse button click to this entry while holding the Ctrl key. If you want to select two or more continuous groups you must select first continuous group (as described above) and while holding the Ctrl key click to the first entry of other continuous group and then while holding Ctrl and Shift keys left mouse click to the last entry of the other group.
You can move on the current phone book using arrow keys (up and down) and Home and End keys too. If you want move the focus without selection change you must hold the Ctrl key while moving by up and down arroy keys. The currently focused entry you can select by pressing Space key.
So if you have selected one entry or a group of entries you can delete it by pressing the Del key or clicking to button from toolbar (it looks like big red X) or selecting Entry - Delete menu item. Selected entry (entries) is deleted from the phone book but if you want to delete it in SIM or your phone's memory you must save changes to it for example by the shortcut Ctrl+U (see above in the chapter 3.1.2.2 Edit existing entry).

3.1.2.4 Create new entry

You can create new entry by selecting Entry - New menu item and next selecting of location (mostly SIM or Phone) where to create a new entry. Now will be displayed the well known dialog box for editation an entry. The difference is that the edit boxes for name and number are empty. These edit boxes have reduced number of characters given by the concrete SIM card or concrete phone (in the case of the phone memory).
After clicking to OK button you can see the newly created entry drawn by italics in the phone book (same as changed entry). Now you may upload it to the phone for example by the shortcut Ctrl+U or clicking to the button on the tool bar.

3.1.2.5 Synchronisation of SIM cards/phones

If you use more SIM cards or phones with the memory for contacts this function will be very useful for you. So how to to this: for first you must download the source phone book from SIM and/or the phone (see chapter 3.1.2.1 Read phone books). Now you must save these entries to the file for a later use by selecting File - Save as where you must enter only a valid file name and choose some folder for it - this is the standard saving procedure.
Now you must end PBooks, in the PhoneServ menu disconnect from phone (in the case of Nokia phone you must end PhoneServ), change SIM card or phones, connect again in the PhoneServ, run Contacts from PhoneServ menu and download phone books from SIM and/or phone (for example by shortcut Ctrl+D. Now you must open previously saved phone book(s) by selecting File - Open menu item (or Ctrl+O shortcut). Switch back to the window with actual phone books and select Phonebooks - Synchronize with file menu item. In the displayed dialog box select a source file for synchronisation (you can find only one here in this case) and confirm by clicking OK. If there is all in right you will have all source entries transfered to target phone book(s).
If you want to synchronise phone book of any Siemens model with a multipart phone book with other producer's phone you will probably have a problem. The main contacts location by Siemens is called Address book while by others is called Phone. Data will not be synchronised between two different locations and so you have to use the Clipboard exactly the same way as in the next capture - Particular synchronisation.

3.1.2.5.1 Particular synchronisation

If you don't want you must not synchronise all entries but only number of needed. You can do this via the Clipboard: select the target group of entries (selecting describes chapter 3.1.2.3 Delete entry) and choose Edit - Copy or hotkeys Ctrl+C or Ctrl+Insert. Now we have target entries in the Clipboard. Next switch to the window where you want to put target entries. You can use function for display empty entries here (by selecting View - Empty entries or by clicking to the button on the tool bar) so you must not put target entries only to existing entries. When you have selected target entries you can put it from Clipboard to their places by Edit - Paste or by shortcuts Ctrl+U or Shift+Insert.

3.1.2.6 Change entry position

You can change the entry position by clicking button Change... while editing entry. You can enter new position number and new location. If you change location the first free entry in this location will be offered to you.
You can drag entries by mouse too.

3.1.2.7 Change sorting criteria

You can sort phone books by any criteria (column). There is possible to assign secondary criteria too. You can change it in dialog accessible in Settings - Columns settings... where you can assign primary sorting key and two secondary keys (used in the case of equality when comparing by primary key). Little bit simplier is to change sorting criteria by mouse. Primary key is assigned by left mouse button click on the column header. Secondary keys you can assign by left mouse button click while holding the Shift key. You can assign any number of secondary keys but two is enough for most purposes.

3.1.2.8 Change columns' positions

You can change column position either by mouse dragging of headers or by left mouse button clicking on the column header while holding the Ctrl key. For first you have to "mark" column which you want to move and by the second click (while holding the Ctrl key of course) select column prior to you want to move previously selected column.
The justification of texts in column you can change in the dialog Settings - Columns settings....

3.1.2.9 Working with caller groups

Caller groups you can edit, delete and create new in the dialog Phonebooks - Caller groups.... If you try to delete a group to which are assigned any contacts(s) you will have a chance to move them to any other group.
Caller groups dialog you can display from entry editting dialog by clicking to Caller groups... button.

3.1.2.10 Add international prefix

Numbers in a national format you can easily convert to international format using Entry - Add international prefix... In the dialog enter leading character which will be changed to prefix entered to Change with national prefix edit box.

3.1.3 SMSs

This part of APDS works with short messages (below only SMS). It looks like most e-mail clients.
When you run SMSs as a first running APDS part (it means without running PhoneServ before) the message about waiting for PhoneServ to connect to your phone will be displayed. In this time will be started PhoneServ (see its icon in system tray) and it displays its menu. Here you can set all settings needed and than click to Connect menu item. After a successfull connection to your phone starts SMSs with a messages from your phone. Closing SMSs started by this way will be automatically closed PhoneServ too (if PBooks is not running) in the opposite to SMSs started from a PhoneServ menu.
The window is devided to three parts. In the left part you can work with folders, in the top right part you will see the list of messages in current folder and in the right bottom part is a space for displaying text of selected message.
Messages from SIM and phone (if it has a memory for saving SMSs) are loaded just after running SMSs. But you may disable it in the Settings dialog box.

3.1.3.1 Read messages

If you have enabled loading messages at start up you can read messages just after running SMSs (by clicking to SMS menu item in the PhoneServ menu). While you don't move SMS to other folder or you don't delete it this SMS remains on SIM or in the memory of your phone respectively.
Loaded messages are distributed to four folders: Incoming, Delivery reports (this is the "child" folder of Incoming), Sent and Unsent. These two last folders are child folders of Outgoing folder. When you run SMSs the active folder will be Incoming and its messages you'll see in the top right part of the window.
You can read a message very easily: click to it or move to it using keys Home, End or arrow (up and down) keys. If you have some selected message you can see its text in the bottom right part of the program window. When you select more than one message the text disappears.

3.1.3.2 Delete message

When you want to delete any message you must select it firstly. You can do it as you can read it: left mouse button click on it or move to it using keys Home, End or arrow (up and down) keys. If you want to delete more than one message you can do it by the same action(s) as described in the chapter 3.1.2.3 Delete entry. When you have selected some message(s) choose SMS - Delete from SMSs menu or press Del key or click to the button with big red X on the to toolbar. If you confirm your action by clicking to OK the messages will be deleted as described next: You can of course move messages from Trash folder back to other folders (see chapter 3.1.3.4 Move message to other folder) but these messages will be saved only in "PC" location - not on SIM or in your phone's memory.

3.1.3.3 Send message

To send message choose SMS - Send new... menu item or click to the button with the envelop and little yellow star on the toolbar or by hotkey Ctrl+M. In the dialog box now displayed you must enter the text of your message and the recipient(s).
SMSs allow you to send one message to more recipients at a time (you pay for every message sent of course). You must create list of recipients. If you downloaded your phone book at least once you will have LastData.DAT file created in the current directory. This is the file with the actual phone books from your SIM and/or phone memory. These phonebooks entries you can use by clicking to Add from phonebook... button. You can select as many recipients as you need. Selected recipient(s) are added to Recipient list box by clicking to OK button. If you want to send a message to a number not contained in your phone book you must enter it to Number not present in the phonebbok edit box and then click to Add button.
When you start typing the text of your message you'll be informed about number of characters remaining.
Whenewer you have displayed the Send dialog box you can change SMS settings by clicking to button Change... in the part marked Settings. In the Settings dialog box you can change the SMS center number (it depends on your GSM operator), validity period of your message (for this time the SMS center of your GSM operator will be attempting to deliver your message. If the delivery fails the message will be lost) and requesting answer (this choice can display probably only Ericsson phones).
If you have entered the text of your message and its recipient(s) you can click to Send button. In the most cases you will see "Message successfully sent" message box and the message will be saved in Sent folder. If sending of some message(s) failed you will be warn by error message and these messages will be saved in Unsent folder (this is mostly the case when the outgoing message "meets" in your phone with some incoming message). Unsent messages from this folder you can send by choosing SMS - Send unsent or by right mouse button clicking to one unsent message and choosing Send from the its local menu.

3.1.3.4 Move message to other folder

Messages you can move between folders only by mouse by the "Drag & Drop" method: moved message you must drag by moving the mouse cursor over it, clicking and holding the left mouse button. Now while all the time you are holding the left mouse button move the cursor (message) over the target folder icon in the left part of the program window. When the target folder is selected (inverse) you can release the left mouse button and the message will be moved to this folder.
If you are moving messages from SIM or Phone location these messages will be deleted from there and remain only in the target folder (in the disk file)!

3.1.3.5 Using keyboard

You need not use only mouse to work with SMSs. Using keyboard may be faster in lot of cases. You can switch between three basic program panes by key F6 clockwise or by Shift+F6 counterclockwise respectively.
In the pane with the message text you can use copy to clipboard function using Edit - Copy or Ctrl+C or Shift+Ins. If you didn't select any part of the message the whole text will be copied to the clipboard. If you want to copy only a part of the text you can select it by the mouse or by arrow keys with Shift key combination as in any text editor.
In the pane with list of messages you can select any one and then copy or cut them to the clipboard using standard keys or menu items. Warning: when you cut any messages from SIM and/or from your phone memory they'll be erased from there and remain only in the program! Now you can switch to the pane with the folders tree and using the arrow keys select a folder you want and paste messages from the clipboard to it. You can copy or move as many messages you want - that is other advantage using keyboard against mouse.

3.1.3.5 Create new folder

New folder you can create by right mouse button clicking to a folder you want to be a "parent" of newly created folder. In the New folder dialog you have to enter the name of the new folder.

3.1.3.6 Forward message

Currently selected message you can forward to something other choosing SMS - Forward or by Ctrl+F or by right mouse button click to forwarded message and choosing Forward from the local menu.
In all above mentioned procedures you get well known dialog for sending message(s) with the message text. You have only to enter any recipient(s) of this forwarded message.

3.1.3.7 Reply to message

You can reply to message by similar way as by forwarding: either by SMS - Reply or by Ctrl+E or by right mouse button click to message and choosing Reply from the local menu. In all cases you get well known dialog for sending message(s) with the number of recipient entered. You have only to enter a message text.

3.1.3.8 Change columns' positions

You can easily change columns' positions by mouse dragging their headers. Columns positions and widths are saved and restored in the next program run.

3.1.3.9 How to automatically save messages to folders other than default

If you have a folder reserved for a concrete sender or group of senders you can create a filter for such folder. It causes that all messages from this (these) number(s) will be automatically saved to this folder (and not in default folders). In the SMSs settings (Receaving card) you can specify if filters apply to outgoing messages and status reports received from numbers matching filters. The Filters dialog for adding/removing numbers from a filter you can display by right mouse button clicking to a folder and selecting Filter menu item. You can add numbers either from your phone book or "by hand". We recommend to enter such numbers in the full international format (for ex. +420609123456).

4. Detailed description of APDS components

This chapter describes all menu items of all APDS parts.

4.1 PhoneServ

PhoneServ has only one pop-up menu. This menu you can display by the left or right mouse click to PhoneServ icon in the system bar (mostly by the system time indicator). Here are described items from bottom to up:

4.2 PBooks

This chapter describes all menu items of PBooks which works with phone books.

4.2.1 File menu

The links to files marked by a number (under Exit item) are links to recently used phone books.

4.2.2 Edit menu

This menu is most usable for particular synchronisation. See chapter 3.1.2.5.1 Particular synchronisation.

4.2.3 View menu

4.2.4 Phonebooks menu

4.2.5 Entry menu

4.2.6 Settings menu

This menu item directly displays the Settings dialog when you have no phone books window displayed. Here you can enable or disable downloading of phone book entries from all supported locations. If you are going to edit only SIM entries you cannot wait to download entries from internal phone memory. If you have at least one phone books window displayed then you can click to Download phonebooks (mentioned above) or Columns justification where you can set justification of all columns.

4.2.7 Window menu

Next menu items marked by numbers are links to all child windows. You can switch between them without using your mouse.

4.2.8 Help menu

APDS topics... displays this help. About... item displays the version of PBooks. In the parenthesis there is a version of the whole APDS set.

4.3 SMSs

4.3.1 File menu

4.3.2 Edit menu

4.3.3 View menu

4.3.4 SMS menu

4.3.5 Sort menu

4.3.6 Settings menu

This menu item directly displays the Settings dialog. It contains four pages:

4.3.7 Help menu

APDS topics... displays this help. About... item displays the version of SMSs. In the parenthesis there is a version of the whole APDS set.

6. Known bugs

In this chapter you'll be warn to bugs which we know and which we solve. So it's useless to write us about them.

7. FAQ - Frquently asked questions

Why is not supported my phone?
It may have two reasons:

Why APDS doesn't work with logos and user melodies?
We are currently concentre to support plenty of phone models and these "extras" we will add later.

Why APDS doesn't allow to unlock phones?
Unlocking phones is very difficult and wide domain - we are not able to cover it. We recommend to unlock your phone by specialists who solve these problems for long time. You will be guaranteed that you phone will be OK after the unlock. Unlock is not only connection a phone to PC and pressing Enter!

I worked with APDS and when I try to connect now I get a message Error opening port! What can I do?
You probably run PhoneServ for second time and the first instance of PhoneServ is blocking the serial port. One of PhoneServs you must finish. If you are a newbie in working with APDS don't check "Connect at startup" check box in PhoneServ settings.
You can run as much PhoneServs you need. This is not disabled because you may need to work with two or more phones connected to your PC. You must only be careful when using PBooks and/or SMSs and know what instance works with what phone.

I installed the Siemens driver for phones with the hardware modem but the diagnostics in Control panel doesn't work and when I try to dial any number the system messages No answer from modem.
Basally all phones (excluding Bosch 9xx) has no hardware handshaking signals implemented. So you must in serial port settings disable hardware handshaking and choose software handshaking (XOR/XOFF) or no handshaking. Especially for Siemens there is no wrong to set the communication speed do 19200 b/s. When you set this the diagnostics will not work howewer (this is caused by absence of hardware handshaking signals) but when you try to dial some number it'll be OK now.

8. How to contact the APDS author