N900 - Contacts - Groupable?

[Helmuth]

Hello Maemo Comunity! :-)

I installed Maemo on VM to get more familar with my posibble new Device. Just a litte bit playing around I wonderes that there could be no posibility to group the Contacts?

Is it possible or not?

At my N95 I've got Groups for Friendy, Collegs, Doctors and Family.

A Tag Clound like at the Images would be great. But I could'nt find it! :-(

cu
Helmuth

[edgar2]

Just a litte bit playing around I wonderes that there could be no posibility to group the Contacts?


i don't know about the final product, but on the pre-production device given at the maemo summit, it's not possible.

[drm]

Hello Maemo Comunity! :-)

I installed Maemo on VM to get more familar with my posibble new Device. Just a litte bit playing around I wonderes that there could be no posibility to group the Contacts?

Is it possible or not?

At my N95 I've got Groups for Friendy, Collegs, Doctors and Family.

A Tag Clound like at the Images would be great. But I could'nt find it! :-(

cu
Helmuth

What is Maemo on VM? Did you install it on the PC?

[vvaz]

There is no possibility to assign categories/tags to PIM elements (contacts, events, todos).

[Texrat]

There's been a lot of discussion about this and related organizational/filtering needs. Due to time and resource constraints they did not get implemented in time for release, as I understand it.

I will soon be creating a Brainstorm proposal to address this and related issues. Keep an eye on that subforum-- everyone is invited to vote on proposed Solutions and add their own!

[Helmuth]

What is Maemo on VM? Did you install it on the PC?

I've installed Ubuntu at VirtualPC and running there Scratchbox and Xeyphr. Link (http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=31141)
There is a GREAT VirtualPC Image by Nathan (http://talk.maemo.org/member.php?u=10880) containing everything you need.

I will soon be creating a Brainstorm proposal to address this and related issues. Keep an eye on that subforum-- everyone is invited to vote on proposed Solutions and add their own!
You mean the N900 subforum?

[Saturn]

You mean the N900 subforum?

no, Texrat means the brainstorm. Check his signature.

[Texrat]

Thanks Saturn.

Here's the new Brainstorm thread for phone functionality: http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=33830

Feel free to submit Solutions to the Brainstorm proposal referenced. I will be adding some soon.

Thanks!

[qhorse]

Grouping would be nice indeed.

Even nicer would be to be able to block calls from group you don't want to hear at certain times.

[nwhitfield]

Grouping would be nice indeed.

Even nicer would be to be able to block calls from group you don't want to hear at certain times.

That, for me, is the deal breaker that presently stops me from buying an N900.

I played with one in the Regent Street store earlier today, and was impressed - the keyboard was much better than I expected.

But, I use my phone for both business, and personal, with contact groups that give me different ring tones, so I know what sort of caller it is before looking at the screen. And I use profiles (with handy profile on the N95) to control who can reach me - during the night, the phone is always on, but the profile allows only callers in the VIP and Family group to reach me.

I don't want to have to go back to switching the phone off at night, or to have a separate phone for different people.

For me, profiles with grouped contacts and selectable alerts are one of the most important telephony features - essential for the way I work.

[bretti_kivi]

agree with that one 100%. Stupid that this is not part of the default setup. Is this a Nokia or not?

I think it would be great to see grouping visually, too, in the contacts view.

But I also have a second group. SIM card contacts....

Bret

[etuoyo]

agree with that one 100%. Stupid that this is not part of the default setup. Is this a Nokia or not?



lol. Hard to believe but it is a Nokia even the phone aspect has less features than 10 year old Nokias.

[jjmart]

Hello Maemo Comunity! :-)

I installed Maemo on VM to get more familar with my posibble new Device. Just a litte bit playing around I wonderes that there could be no posibility to group the Contacts?

Is it possible or not?

At my N95 I've got Groups for Friendy, Collegs, Doctors and Family.

A Tag Clound like at the Images would be great. But I could'nt find it! :-(

cu
Helmuth

I agree it is a major ommission from a great device. I got around it by typing numbers separated by semi-colon of particular groups into a note and saving it. When I wanted to contact a group I just opened the applicable note copied and pasted numbers into the "To" section on a new sms.

[chrisart]

That, for me, is the deal breaker that presently stops me from buying an N900.

I played with one in the Regent Street store earlier today, and was impressed - the keyboard was much better than I expected.

But, I use my phone for both business, and personal, with contact groups that give me different ring tones, so I know what sort of caller it is before looking at the screen. And I use profiles (with handy profile on the N95) to control who can reach me - during the night, the phone is always on, but the profile allows only callers in the VIP and Family group to reach me.

I don't want to have to go back to switching the phone off at night, or to have a separate phone for different people.

For me, profiles with grouped contacts and selectable alerts are one of the most important telephony features - essential for the way I work.

Same for me, but unfortunately I already bough it, I couldn't imagine or even have a thought that a phone like this won't have as such a simple but life saving feature. I will try to change it for another model if they agree in the shop tomorrow.

[Spr33]

The n900 is a mobile computer that can make calls. Don't get it confused. If it's not for you, don't gripe about it, just move onto a phone that suits your needs.

If you really cared, that is something someone could easily program into the phone. You just need to find a developer that's willing to put in the time to do it.

[Bingley Joe]

The n900 is a mobile computer that can make calls. Don't get it confused. If it's not for you, don't gripe about it, just move onto a phone that suits your needs.

Of course, that's the standard response whenever someone brings up one of these shortcomings of the device..

.. but it's an utterly foolish response. Any mobile computer that can make calls should be far and away more capable at this kind of fine-grained functionality than any stupid old smartphone; a Nokia mobile computer that can make calls even more so.

[Laughing Man]

Of course, that's the standard response whenever someone brings up one of these shortcomings of the device..

.. but it's an utterly foolish response. Any mobile computer that can make calls should be far and away more capable at this kind of fine-grained functionality than any stupid old smartphone; a Nokia mobile computer that can make calls even more so.

Depends on if the people working on the OS are more interested in the computer side or the phone side. Given the history of maemo, I say it's more on the computer side. And there aren't many instances of grouping contacts (besides email). Though as the maemo (well now meego) team gets more developers and more devices are sold then I imagine they'll start considering the phone side more often.

[shugg]

The n900 is a mobile computer that can make calls. Don't get it confused. If it's not for you, don't gripe about it, just move onto a phone that suits your needs.

If you really cared, that is something someone could easily program into the phone. You just need to find a developer that's willing to put in the time to do it.

What a strange reply, I could understand your logic if this phone was from a small outfit just entering the market, but it's a Nokia.and is generally supplied by mobile phone service providers not tablet pc providers.

So it isn't beyond the realm of reason to expect certain core functions to be present, I've had the phone for 5 weeks and it's good except that the 3G signal is mostly non existent and 2G is all over the place, there are one or two other quirks but they are not sufficient to warrant a gripe

Yet a 3 year old N95 is bullet proof re the signal, so this one is going back, hopefully the replacement N900 will be fit for purpose, if not my 11 year love affair with Nokia may well be over :(

[Laughing Man]

What a strange reply, I could understand your logic if this phone was from a small outfit just entering the market, but it's a Nokia.and is generally supplied by mobile phone service providers not tablet pc providers.

So it isn't beyond the realm of reason to expect certain core functions to be present, I've had the phone for 5 weeks and it's good except that the 3G signal is mostly non existent and 2G is all over the place, there are one or two other quirks but they are not sufficient to warrant a gripe

Yet a 3 year old N95 is bullet proof re the signal, so this one is going back, hopefully the replacement N900 will be fit for purpose, if not my 11 year love affair with Nokia may well be over :(

That would be true if it weren't for the Maemo team working on the 770, N800, N810, and N900. It's roots are historically more computer hence Maemo developers focusing on that aspect, now that Nokia plans on making it more mainstream I expect they'll also pay more attention to aspects most phones are.

[MetalSer]

Has anyone found a way to group contacts in PR1.2?
This is really the last thing I'm missing on my mobile computer with a call function in it.

[kyros]

It's a real pity - this is a standard phone functiuon which should be normal for mobile phones (even more for a smartphone like the N900) !

[modular]

Hey guys,

I'd love to see a solution to this. When you have more than 100 contacts (and some of us have a lot more than that), it helps a lot to give them categories (family, school, etc). Shouldn't it be trivial to implement a group/category function to the integrated contacts program? I took a look at GRE Contacts, but that doesn't seem to integrate with all of the phone's functionality. Is there a bug report filed for this/ are developers working to add this?

[DavidB7237]

Contacts like hotmail as well..

I get all my phone contacts and E-mails listed together and can't just display one list at a time! I had to disable IM to remove all contacts and leave the phone contacts

[Amboss]

Its interesting thou that there are groups displayed, meaning there is some functionality for this purpose somewhere. If there is the built-in possibility of "Contacts on SIM" and contacts from IM there must be some way to mark orginial phone contacts somehow.

I would love to dig into this but don't know how to start

[ozfarang]

I totally agree...
I have a new N900.. but I am not using it at the moment due to the fact that I can't group contacts and screen them as mentioned about..

I am bouncing between my old N95 and my 5800 .. (the addition of timed profiles like on my 5800 would be an added plus for me)..

I really hope there is an update to sort out grouping of contacts sometime soon...
I'd love to have my N900 step up to my main phone..

ozfarang

[x61]

This is certainly needed. Too bad Nokia has officially given up on the N900.

[kyros]

I am not a programmer, but isn't it only to enable a tagging and creating tags for the contacts (like you can do it for the picts as well)?
And then to adapt the profiles so that they refere to these tags?

Or do I miss a big difficulty in this case?

[Helmuth]

Or do I miss a big difficulty in this case?

The difficult is to sync it with other applications. They are afraid that the groups then are lost. Same problem with the Remarks for different Numbers. (Symbian had it)

[woody14619]

There is a slight way to do this for SMS.... You can group the people using the Nickname field. Just put a group name, like "Friends" or "CoWorkers" into the Nickname area for people in that group. Then when you go to send an SMS, type that tag into the "TO:" area, and hit the TO button. It will filter to just those with that tag in their name or nickname. :)

Haven't tried it in other areas much, but may work elsewhere as well.

[fcrochik]

I just release an application (http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?p=729777#post729777) that allows for some grouping. It does not address this issue globally but for most cases, I believe, can be pretty helpful.

p.s. I also considered saving the group name as the nickname but decided against. One of the reasons is that skype contacts (and other services) use this field.

[silkworm]

Hello friends,

I think N900 has a different perspective of groups.

It groups the contacs automatically, based on some criteria, i.e. the type of communicaton: Yahoo contacts, Google contacts, Skype Contacts, Facebook contacts and so on (and a special group: SIM card contacts).

Don't get me wrong, I also miss the confort of 'real' groups, and yes, I know this is far from what other Nokia phones (N95, N97, E66 etc.) are offering, but it's a start.

If I want to see only friends, I select "YM" contacts. If I want to see only best friends, I select "Facebook". If I want to see business contacts, I select "Skype". If I want to see only family, i select SIM (I keep a backup there for family numbers, in order to use them in another phone when my battery dies).

However, sending SMS to entire groups is not possible with N900, at least not yet.
Also, there is no way of displaying only phone contacts (and not IM/Skype/Facebook contacts) without disabling temporarily IM accounts on the phone.

[fcrochik]

Hello friends,

I think N900 has a different perspective of groups.

It groups the contacs automatically, based on some criteria, i.e. the type of communicaton: Yahoo contacts, Google contacts, Skype Contacts, Facebook contacts and so on (and a special group: SIM card contacts).

Don't get me wrong, I also miss the confort of 'real' groups, and yes, I know this is far from what other Nokia phones (N95, N97, E66 etc.) are offering, but it's a start.

If I want to see only friends, I select "YM" contacts. If I want to see only best friends, I select "Facebook". If I want to see business contacts, I select "Skype". If I want to see only family, i select SIM (I keep a backup there for family numbers, in order to use them in another phone when my battery dies).

However, sending SMS to entire groups is not possible with N900, at least not yet.
Also, there is no way of displaying only phone contacts (and not IM/Skype/Facebook contacts) without disabling temporarily IM accounts on the phone.

Just throwing a little advertisement for my application: I have a view for "just contacts with phone", one for "just contacts with email", and one just for contacts with thumbnails... Also allow for some grouping and even custom ring tones per group... It is far from the "real groups" but it is my attempt to lessen the pain.

The new version with the "phone" view will be out later today... I will post on the announcement thread (http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=57162) when it happens.

p.s. The application does not change the contacts database, it saves the extra layer (group information) to a separate file.

EDIT: I am sorry I didn't remember I had posted here already about my application... Didn't mean to create noise....

[modular]

I seriously don't understand what is so hard about adding a group feature to the address book program... If someone help me get started, then I'll figure out how to write the code.

[bennypr0fane]

So, this is still hardly resolved, is it?
What I'd really love is to select 15-20 contacts (= a group of them) with one click for sending them the same sms.
Is there any app that can do this? If I'm not mistaken, the issue has been out there pretty much since day 1 (see date of first post), surely someone must have started looking into it by now?