Why do some contacts' name = 'Unknown'?

[Guest Dave Foster]

The other day I noticed that a bunch of my contacts were duplicated on

my device and in Outlook. I was syncing via USB cable at the time. I

deleted the duplicates in Outlook and resynced. Now I sync my contacts

via Exchange.

Yesterday I did a hard reset to try to fix a problem with my headset jack.

Today, I was going to call my family members to wish them a happy

Thanksgiving today and I couldn't find any of them in my Contacts! I

scrolled to the bottom of my contacts list and there were a ton of

contacts with a name that is displayed as 'Unknown'. This is also what

is displayed in the call history.

Interestingly, when I open up one of these contacts, I can see the

actual full name.

Are these contacts corrupted somehow by the duplication event?

Have I been neglecting my friends and family and now Exchange is

sending me a Freudian message that they are now 'Unknown' to me? ;-)

Anyone ever have some of their contacts sudenly become 'Unknown' after

a duplication event.

I wonder if I can fix the contacts in my Outlook client.

Thanks,

Dave

[Guest Confucious]

Welcome to the forum.

Check the format of the phone numbers - in particular do they have the international code and the + in front?

I seem to remember that phones used to have a problem of the numbers were in the wrong format but I haven't heard of it for a while.

Let us know if that is the problem and if do, which format works and which doesn't. I seem to remember there is some s/ware to correct the format if that is the prob.

Good luck.

[Guest Jack pocket PC]

I encountered that pro too, but i checked on my phone book, I found I actually have input twice, same number but different name.

Hope It will help

[Guest Dave Foster]

>fix the contacts in my Outlook client.

This is how I fixed the problem. There was something wrong with the "File As" field in Outlook 2003. I just had to open 100 or so contacts and edit the File As value, save, re-edit back to the original value that I wanted [last, first] and then re-save.

No more 'Unknown' values in the display name of the contacts in Pocket Outlook.