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4 Replies Last post: Mar 23, 2007 11:16 PM by Ventzi_Zhechev

Macworld.com

1,900 posts since
Feb 6, 2004

Mar 23, 2007 9:30 AM

Mac OS X Hints Weblog: Find all ungrouped Address Book contacts

Use AppleScript to identify any contacts in your Address Book who are not yet in a group. more

Ventzi_Zhechev

36 posts since
Nov 13, 2006

1. Mar 23, 2007 1:55 PM

in response to: Macworld.com

Re: Mac OS X Hints Weblog: Find all ungrouped Address Book contacts

It only seems to exclude contacts that are in normal groups for me. And I keep most of my contacts in smart groups.
I wonder if the reason might be some problem with using a non-US version of the system.

randombob

98 posts since
Dec 30, 2004

2. Mar 23, 2007 7:40 PM

in response to: Macworld.com

Re: Mac OS X Hints Weblog: Find all ungrouped Address Book contacts

why isn't this an option for a Smart Group? I tried to set up a similar thing with a Smart group, that way I could have a live-updating version of this.

Seems common-sense to me that this should be a selectable option on the smart groups. I can accomplish this in iphoto, aperture, itunes..... not address book, though. weird.

Dan Frakes

3,341 posts since
Apr 14, 2003

3. Mar 23, 2007 7:58 PM

in response to: randombob

Re: Mac OS X Hints Weblog: Find all ungrouped Addr

Quote:<hr />
why isn't this an option for a Smart Group? I tried to set up a similar thing with a Smart group, that way I could have a live-updating version of this.

Seems common-sense to me that this should be a selectable option on the smart groups. I can accomplish this in iphoto, aperture, itunes..... not address book, though. weird.

<hr />

I believe it's a technical issue. When you add a contact to a regular group, Address Book keeps track of this and knows that "Record A is part of Group A." However, a Smart Group isn't really a group at all; rather, it's a saved search with live updating. (When a contact is part of a Smart Group, what it means is that the contact has been "found" by the Smart Group's search criteria.)

The upshot of this is that "membership" in a Smart Group doesn't count as being part of a group. So if the only groups a contact belongs to are Smart Groups, that contact's "number of groups" will be 0 and the contact will appear in the "Ungrouped" list created by the script.

At least, that's how I understand it

Dan Frakes | Senior Editor, Macworld

Ventzi_Zhechev

36 posts since
Nov 13, 2006

4. Mar 23, 2007 11:16 PM

in response to: Dan Frakes

Re: Mac OS X Hints Weblog: Find all ungrouped Addr

I guess that you're right there.

The only thing that frustrates me is that you can use membership in a Smart Playlist in iTunes as a criteria. But this might be the only program that works this way, as iPhoto works like Address Book.
I just hope that Apple will someday get around to adding the feature to all their programs. Just like they finally fixed the Universal Access for iTunes with the 7.1 release; and just like they are slowly translating all their programs into Russian and adding Russian in the standard languages pack.

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Mar 23, 2007 9:30 AM

Mac OS X Hints Weblog: Find all ungrouped Address Book contacts

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