Local sync

[Lyn2012]

Can anyone confirm that local sync for Contacts and Calendars in iTunes is back in Yosemite? I would love to move on from ML but this is a deal breaker for me.

 

[Roadside]

Yes, local sync is possible iTunes/Yosemite/iPhone.

Hi, I joined MacRumors to answer this question, since I struggled with it. Long story short: Once you go to iCloud, getting your contacts and calendars "out of the cloud" is difficult--I basically had to "trick" iCloud out of my data. But it can be done, and you can once again sync your iPhone with your Mac over a USB cable securely. So yes, it is possible to sync locally in Yosemite via iTunes. See the discussion of de-clouding here:

https://discussions.apple.com/message/27769760

There is also the SyncMate option.

If you have NOT moved your contacts/calendars to iCloud, then local sync is straightforward; it works as it used to in previous OS'es (not counting the Mavericks OS where local sync was abolished, temporarily). But beware turning on anything iCloud, and MAKE BACKUPS OF YOUR CONTACTS/CALENDAR DATA BEFORE you mess with iCloud. Somehow iCloud changes your data so that even restored backups "want" to be in the cloud. It's difficult getting cloud data to be "at home" on your local mac again. See the thread referenced which explains how to do it.