Hey everyone,
Like most of us, I have contacts in lots of places, and I would be happier if I could have them in one place. Google Contacts I think is the most appropriate tool for syncing contacts (not just with phone / Gmail) but with other places too.
It is rather straightforward how to sync Google Contacts with a TD2, but I really hate that when it does sync, it puts contacts in as Lastname,Firstname.
I was suggested that I use Contacts Changer (a Marketplace available app), but because contacts sync with ActiveSync, it keeps re-syncing and putting them back to the Lastname,Firstname format.
Does anyone know a solution to this? Anyone know how to make it show up in the contacts list as Firstname,Lastname? Permanently??
(Note: I considered putting contacts in using only the 'First Name:' field, but then that has downsides too. Sorry if I'm being fussy now )
Mate...I had to edit my 200contacts one by one on Google Contacts...and write them like:
PHIL_JONES
ROBERT_MILES
...
That was the only way so that they would be properly shown in mu HTC D2...
Hope it helps...
Hello, I'm a new owner (less than a week) of the Captivate and a newbie for android except for messing with the Backflip for a couple weeks. All of your guides have been great and I've been tweaking the heck of my captivate. I've even recovered from a near-bricking... scary but satisfying when I breathed life back into the phone. Currently I've got it rooted, OCed, new interface, etc.
However there's one aspect I'd really like to change that's bothering me. As you can guess from my subject it's the contact handling. I haven't seen any threads addressing it and hope someone can either help or point me towards a solution.
In a nutshell, contact handling is horrible. It makes me appreciate motoblur on the backflip... and I hate going backwards. I can't sync my google contact groups and the current implementation is acting strangely. I have it set up to only sync and ONLY display google contacts yet I'm getting an abbreviated list on the contacts tab. There's a lot of contacts that will only display if I click Groups->google. I have no idea why.
Are there any mods that will improve the display of contacts and handle the managing and syncing of google contact groups? Also, what folders will it sync if I enable contact sync with my exchange server? Will disabling sync remove the contacts if I don't like how they're being displayed?
Thanks.
I agree. The stock Contact app on this phone is garbage. The google groups are completely hosed on this app. No individual ringtones can be assigned unless you also create duplicates as phone contacts and then link them together. That is completely brain dead. Even if you do that, you still can't view the google group assigments. They are there, you just can't see them. Try to create a new group with the same name as one of your google groups that doesn't show. It will say it can't create it because it already exists. I'll say it again, the Contacts app on the Captivate is garbage. I haven't been able to find a replacement for it either. Anybody have some suggestions?
The closest thing I can find is an app called GroupU. It presents all of your google groups and changes made through it sync back to your google contacts. However it not integrated into he OS so it's a bit awkward to use.
Still looking for other options. Are there any phones out there that have better contact/google integration? If so, would it be possible to, say, backup that phones contacts.apk and restore it to the captivate? I don't think this would be possible (though I'd definitely try it if I had a different android phone) but I'm still knew to this and haven't gotten down to code level yet.
Anybody else have other options?
Raleran said:
In a nutshell, contact handling is horrible. It makes me appreciate motoblur on the backflip... and I hate going backwards. I can't sync my google contact groups and the current implementation is acting strangely. I have it set up to only sync and ONLY display google contacts yet I'm getting an abbreviated list on the contacts tab. There's a lot of contacts that will only display if I click Groups->google. I have no idea why.
Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Two things I can think of in response that might answer some of your questions/issues.
You are obviously aware that you can display contacts from a specific location as you described like "google contacts." For some reason the contacts app has default settings for certain apps. For example; only display contacts with phone number when you are in the dialer or only display contacts with email addresses when in the email app. I have noticed that this weird auto filtering has a tendency to block the contacts I want at the wrong time. I would try checking the filters and make sure its not just hiding what you want to see.
Secondly, I was annoyed with the poor handling of contact groups by the captivate. It seems that the phone will not sync the group placement of the contacts with gmail. From the reading I did, it seems this is a known issue and is being addressed. Google recently made changes to the contacts section online and I am assuming that we will see a change on next months update.
I hope this answers some questions. I have not tried any 3rd party contacts managers so I don't have a replacement suggestion. I got my filters straight and I don't mind waiting for a "groups" fix.
This is my wife's biggest gripe with her phone as well. The groups come through weird, and when she links two contacts together we can't seem to figure out how to set one as the default, so several contacts are showing up in her list as their Twitter username instead of their actual name.
Also, no assigning personalized ringtones for Google contacts? Seriously? Vanilla 2.1 and 2.2 don't have this problem.
I can't wait for somebody to write a vanilla ROM for the Captivate and get completely rid of touchwiz.
Another brain-dead feature of contact groups: if you do "send message" to a group, you're presented with a list of all the contacts in the group. None of the contacts in the group are selected, and there's no "select all" option; you have to go through and tap every member of the group.
Shovelhead84 said:
You are obviously aware that you can display contacts from a specific location as you described like "google contacts." For some reason the contacts app has default settings for certain apps. For example; only display contacts with phone number when you are in the dialer or only display contacts with email addresses when in the email app. I have noticed that this weird auto filtering has a tendency to block the contacts I want at the wrong time. I would try checking the filters and make sure its not just hiding what you want to see.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm having this trouble with the default contact app. If I go to the "desktop" and start contacts I get a different listing on the contact tab then the groups->google tab. I've made sure that only google contacts are displaying (unselected google and made sure the contacts tab was blank). I don't see any filters except for the "only display contacts with phone numbers". Are there any others hidden somewhere?
Shovelhead84 said:
Secondly, I was annoyed with the poor handling of contact groups by the captivate. It seems that the phone will not sync the group placement of the contacts with gmail. From the reading I did, it seems this is a known issue and is being addressed. Google recently made changes to the contacts section online and I am assuming that we will see a change on next months update.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think that the groups are carried to the phone and they're synced in the background. I think that Touchwiz contacts just doesn't display them. Here's why I believe this... GroupU says in their description "Contacts GroupU integrates with built-in phonebook seamlessly." When I loaded it, it knew my labels I had set up in google contacts AND when I changed the assignment it synced back to my desktop.
I haven't seen anything on next months update... do you mean 2.2 will be released then?
Kiserai said:
Also, no assigning personalized ringtones for Google contacts? Seriously? Vanilla 2.1 and 2.2 don't have this problem.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Here's the strange thing... I know someone with the original droid and they can't access groups either. Go figure.
I've never seen a vanilla ROM for android... so I have absolutely no clue what it looks like.
Raleran said:
I'm having this trouble with the default contact app. If I go to the "desktop" and start contacts I get a different listing on the contact tab then the groups->google tab. I've made sure that only google contacts are displaying (unselected google and made sure the contacts tab was blank). I don't see any filters except for the "only display contacts with phone numbers". Are there any others hidden somewhere?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would double check this but I just picked up my phone and it is dead. Not sure why but my battery is completely drained...I think you will see different filter options base on contact application launch. IE...dialer, email, messaging
Raleran said:
I haven't seen anything on next months update... do you mean 2.2 will be released then?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We can only hope... here is one post on it.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=754678
EX Dialer seems great
Kiserai said:
This is my wife's biggest gripe with her phone as well. The groups come through weird, and when she links two contacts together we can't seem to figure out how to set one as the default, so several contacts are showing up in her list as their Twitter username instead of their actual name.
Also, no assigning personalized ringtones for Google contacts? Seriously? Vanilla 2.1 and 2.2 don't have this problem.
I can't wait for somebody to write a vanilla ROM for the Captivate and get completely rid of touchwiz.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
First off try EX Dialer, it seems fine, and I think it addresses your complaints.
Sendly any JB 4.2 release for your Cappy will astound you, most CM 10.1 based ROMs are really fine.
I like Captivating, though slim bean looks well supported.
Dosolutions
hey. was just wondering if there's anyway to sync selected groups of contacts instead of every damned one on my list.
reason is that i don't want hundreds of e-mails clogging up my contacts list.
sure, i can show only contacts with numbers. but there are some contacts which i only have their e-mails.
thanks!
i'm looking for something similar myself
i got several email accounts (more than 15) that i sync with and you can imagine the huge mess of contacts i have in my phone when i pull up the list to search for an email or phone number
i'm trying to find a way or something to organize all that
also to sync it all across all the accounts
or something along the line
just to clean them up and make it easy to the eyes
i have no problem finding the number or email of the person i need to contact
it just eye soring to see over a 1000+ contacts when you bring up the list to pick from the list.
good lord Android came with an awesome search build in, else it would have been a major pain in the arsenal as it was with Windows Mobile and PalmOS and every other smartphone i've ever had before, even Blackberry sucked at contacts handling
ah well. looks like for now i have to show only contacts with phone numbers. and add some random numbers for the important contacts that i only somehow have their e-mail addresses. bummer.
Hi guys,
I have moved from HTC to Samsung S10 and I have problems with managing my contacts effectively. My setup is that I have contact from Google, our company exchange, linkedin, skype, viber, ... and want to merge them in my phone.
I am using default Samsung Contacts app, my default contacts account is Google and have following issues:
1 - merging by phone number doesnt "normalize" numbers - numbers with and without spaces are treated as different ones
2 - if contact doesnt have photo in google and have on linkedin/viber app doesnt take photo from the source that have it
3 - its not possible to show in contacts/phone app only contacts with phone numbers and hide others.
Could you advice how to solve that issues please? Maybe I am missing something, or there is alternative app that works well.
Thanks a lot.
Hello - dual SIM Note 8 user here.
I've recently updated my device from Oreo to Pie and I seem to have lost a feature within contacts and wanted to check whether it was removed from the app or perhaps I'm just not getting my head around the correct way of now replicating what I previously had.
I have a dual SIM and use two separate Google accounts to separate contacts between the Sims. Furthermore one of my Google accounts has hundreds of contacts which I have further segregated using groups (such as starred and others).
Previously in Oreo, I had quite granular control within the contacts app as to which particular contacts I wanted to see and in my particular use case, I had selected to show all contacts from one account and in addition only those contacts starred in another account. This was a one time activity which left my phone book in the state I wanted.
However in Pie, it appears I can now only select one particular contact account at a time or all contact accounts (not multiple accounts in between 1 and all). This is frustrating as I have some mail accounts that I do not wish to display contacts for. Additionally it seems I can only view one sub group at a time, so while I can display only starred contacts, it means I can't show contacts from the other account at the same time and instead have to constantly switch between different 'filters' instead.
Am I missing something or has this filtering ability of the contacts app now been severely crippled. Assuming it has, is there anyway to use the old contacts app or should I just look for a 3rd party app to do this now.
Thanks for reading!
Hello! I think there's an option to see the groups in the menu on the left.
Though, the granular option is gone yes. Sadly.