[Captivate Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] fatbas202:
Many of us have found that SMS/MMS does not work on (xxx) xxx-xxxx phone number formats. mmorman12 has a fix if you use gmail exclusively for contacts.

This is related to mmoorman12's post for changing all phone numbers in gmail to xxx-xxx-xxxx: http://xdaforums.com/showpost.php?p=8830645&postcount=4081

I know many of you, like myself, use at least one Exchange account with Android. What makes me mad to no end is that Outlook automatically formats phone numbers in a way that it THINKS you want it, regardless of how you give it a formatted file. Here are the essential steps that I took in order to change my 500+ Exchange contact phone numbers from (xxx) xxx-xxxx to xxx-xxx-xxxx for Android's (Cognition 2.x) MMS/SMS little quirk - it should take about 15 minutes.

Read this whole post before you do anything. Make a backup of your Contacts folder before you screw it up. On Outlook 2k10, click the folder view (look for the little folder at the very bottom of the left panel. It goes Mail, Calendar, Contacts, Tasks, Notes, Folder List, Shortcuts). Make a new folder anywhere (like Inbox) and right-click drag the Contacts folder to the new folder and COPY it there.

0) In Outlook (or any other mail/contact manager that connects to Exchange), export your contacts to a Windows CSV. In Outlook 2k10, this is under File > Open > Import (yes, click Import to Export to a file. Yay MS.)

1) Use the wizard to export to a Windows CSV. I'm sure other formats will work just fine - this is what I can say worked for me. Export it to your Desktop.

2) Using Excel (or any other free spreadsheet), open the file. I found that for 5 years Outlook has been putting the last name in the first name column and vice versa, and WinMo never had a problem with it:rolleyes:. So check to make sure all of the correct data is in the right field. Make any changes to names, etc. now. Save.

3) Close Excel - it locks the file so it must be closed. Using a good text editor (Notepad++ (Free!) or UltraEdit), do a search and replace on the most common area codes you have. For example, I live in central Missouri, so I did a find on "(573) "(note trailing space) and replaced it with "573-". Repeat with all numerous area codes. Don't forget 888, 800, & 866. Save. Catch the one-offs in the next step.

4) Open the CSV back in the spreadsheet program and fix the one-offs. There will like be only a handful. Save and close.

5) This is the most important step because without it, when you import to Outlook, it will just convert xxx-xxx-xxxx back to (xxx) xxx-xxxx:mad:. On Win7 (other versions are basically the same), open Control Panel > Phone and Modem > Dialing Rules tab. If you have something there (like "My Location", click edit. Otherwise create a new one.) Change from "United States" or whatever is there to "International Freephone Service". Click OK out of that dialog box. Outlook uses this to determine how to format phone numbers.

6) Import the CSV (File > Open > Import in Outlook 2k10). Click Contacts and you want to overwrite them, unless you really want duplicates.

Warning:

0) Doing this will give you the opportunity to see that Outlook/Exchange may have added a substantial amount of data to the Notes field. If you are like me, this will piss you off.

1) This will delete any photos you have embedded in to your contacts. I recommend saving your contact photos before you do this.

2) You stand the chance of royally jacking up your contact list. Good thing you made a backup (and a second backup to a totally separate PST file :)).

I know this is a bit labor intensive, but I literally looked for several hours for a way to do this and only came up with partial solutions. It would have been far quicker to manually change every phone number than all of the research I've done, so I really hope this helps someone else!