Jul 30 2012

Duplicate Events and Contacts in Android

Update: The below solution does not correct the problem and only addresses the symptoms. Please leave a comment if this bug is affecting you and when it first started happening.

Update 2: I recall receiving an update for my Samsung Galaxy S III on 11/07/2012 weighing in at 22.6MB which was listed as a performance update. Not sure if that has triggered this issue.

Since getting my Samsung Galaxy S III I didn’t quite like the layout of the “S Planner” calendar app after coming from a Samsung Omnia 7 and the incredibly clean and simple calendar app offered by Windows Phone 7. While I wait for Windows Phone 8 devices to hit the market (which will more than likely be next year). Anyway, I was keen to put the ICS stock calendar app on the phone to see if that suited my needs however that introduced an unexpected problem.

I noticed that both calendar apps on the phone started filling up with duplicate events and some of my recurring appointments had been replicated at least ten times for the one day which made for a very cramped calendar in some situations.

Ultimately, the solution for me was to uninstall the ICS stock calendar app and wipe the calendar data by doing the following:

  1. Unlock the phone,
  2. Tap the menu key and tap  “Settings”,
  3. Scroll down to “Application Manager”,
  4. Tap the “All” tab,
  5. Scroll down to “Calendar” and tap it,
  6. Tap “Force stop” then “Uninstall” and then “OK” and “OK” again,
  7. Scroll down to “Calendar Storage” and tap it,
  8. Tap “Force stop” then “Clear data”,
  9. Tap the back key,
  10. Scroll down to “S Planner” (or whatever your calendar app is called) and tap it,
  11. Tap “Force stop” then “Clear data”,
  12. Open up your calendar app to start resyncing data.

It might take a few minutes for the resync to complete but from that point onwards you should not have any further calendar issues.

Boydo

My name is Boyd and I’m a Service Management Specialist with a knack for operational data gathering, transformation, analysis and reporting.

In 2012, I obtained my Masters of Science in Information Technology through the University of New South Wales @ The Australia Defence Force Academy (UNSW@ADFA).

I was also part of an online community known as the Panasonic Insider Crew in the capacity of “Insider Guru” for Panasonic Australia where I interacted with other tech enthusiasts and find out more about Panasonic's latest gadgets.

I love technology, gadgets, and the Internet and maintain a keen interest in these areas locally, nationally, and globally. I hope by sharing my views on these topics that people will receive an honest point of view from someone with a genuine interest in these topics.

I have also written and edited articles for Neowin - you can check out my articles over @ https://www.neowin.net/news/poster/boyd_chan

I hope you enjoy reading my blog!

8 comments

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    • Ducklings on July 31, 2012 at 00:12
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    Hey, I came across your blog today since I have the exact same issue. I have a Galaxy Note on ICS, and recently (past few days), the contacts and calendar entries have been replicating itself. I did the exact same steps as you, clearing the cache data, only to find that it comes back again. I even did a phone reset and it is still coming back. Interesting fact: I have been googling this issue online and most of the reports are from July 27-July 30th. Strange huh? There must be something going on with an update that causes that. Perhaps a microsoft exchange patch. I’m still stuck with multiple entries in my phone, very frustrating.

    1. I’d be reluctant to say it is a Microsoft Exchange patch but I couldn’t rule that out categorically. I have an iPad and a Windows Phone hooked up to my Exchange account and they both do not have any issues handling the calendar over Exchange ActiveSync.

      The problem does seem to be isolated to recurring appointments as one off appointments are unaffected. Perhaps this is a bug introduced in ICS?

    • Martin Balin on August 3, 2012 at 22:34
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    To me it looks like a bug introduced in Galaxy S3 SW 4.0.4 update I’ve got last week, around 7/26. After this update the problems appeared in S Planner. My Exchange calendar on Galaxy was working perfectly before applying the update.
    I googled a workaround to this which is to simply clear the Calendar storage. This can be done under general Settings | Application manager then go to ‘All’ tab scroll to ‘Calendar Storage’, select ‘Force stop’ and then ‘Clear Data’. Seems like working solution to this bug.

    1. Please keep an idea on this over the week and let me know how it goes. If it does manage to stick (clearing just the cache for Calendar Storage instead of Calendar Storage and the Calendar app) then that could be some good news!

    • Andrea on August 10, 2012 at 19:49
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    A full wipe has worked for me but with an SD card format using CWM.
    A wipe without SD card format is not enough !

    • elvandy on January 26, 2013 at 00:02
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    Dear Google-Android- and Samsung-S3-developers!!

    Here is a list of some very annoying facts:

    – I have a Sasmung Galaxy S3 GT-I9300 with the latest Android-Version 4.1.2.
    – if I set up a new Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync account on my S3 and sync it with my corperate Exchange 2010 Server I have duplicated entries in my S-Planner Calendar right from the very first sync.
    – especially birthday entries (untimed entries with yearly repeat) are duplicated.
    – I can reproduce this bug no matter how often I delete the calendar memory, remove and re-instal the Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync account, reset my phone etc.
    – if I google this bug I get thousands of hits where users are reporting the very same bug with their Android phones (like in this thread).
    – some of these duplicate entry bug reports go back for more than 1 year but so far no solution.
    – syncing of contacts, emails and calendar entries with MS Exchange is considerd to be a basic function of a smart phone. That’s why this functions is part of the pre-installed OS.
    – the pre installed Exchange clients on all other devices (Apple iPhone, Nokia Symbian or Windows phones etc.) do NOT have this bug. Thus this is an Android bug and not MS Exchange.

    SO WOULD YOU PLEASE FINALLY FIX THIS ANNOYING BUG IMMEDIATELY!!!!!!!!!!

    1. It is indeed an annoying bug. Interestingly, Google is pushing CalDAV and CardDAV protocols instead of EAS for its own product offerings – would a conspiracy theory of a buggy Exchange client be too far fetched?

      I agree though that every other major smartphones manages to handle Exchange properly – this is just embarrassing for Samsung and Google.

    • Brian on March 5, 2013 at 12:28
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    Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 7. Same issue that started when updated to Jellybean. Except it also is missing appointments as well. So bad I have to use Moxier Mail. Wish there was a fix.

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