Best Practice: How to synchronize Exchange Server GALs to your Apple iPhones and iPads

The Global Address List in Exchange Server contains the contact data from all mailboxes and contacts in a company. The GAL might be searched online from many devices, but offline synchronization and Caller ID resolution are not available. The address book entries can be fetched by PeopleSync to bring them to your Apple iPhones and iPads or other apps and devices. PeopleSync will retrieve phone numbers, addresses and even the profile pictures, stored in Active Directory. PeopleSync will work with Exchange Server 2010 and 2013 as well as with Office 365 Exchange Online.

To bring contact data from Exchange Server GALs and other data sources to your mobile devices from Apple and other vendors, PeopleSync is the perfect solution. PeopleSync and Apple iOS devices both support the standardized prootocols LDAP and CardDAV:

  • The LDAP protocol allows an online search in the PeopleSync Directory. This protocol can be used to make the Exchange Global Address List available without synchronization. The address books can be searched online, but Caller ID resolution won’t be available with LDAP on the iPhones.
  • The CardDAV protocol is used for offline synchronization of PeopleSync Address Lists to the native iOS Adress Book application. The availability of the data in the iOS Adress Book is a requirement to resolve numbers of incoming calls or in your missed calls lists.

Both protocols can be published via your firewall for availability via 3G. Alternatively a company can decide to grant users access to PeopleSync via VPN or in the corporate WiFi network only.

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