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TICKET ARCHIVE -> Accessing Address Book with another application
mirabilis - Jan 27, 2006 - 4:05 pm
I am a longtime Mac user and was very pleased that OSX includes a universal Address Book that can be accessed via other applications (iCal and Mail).
I would like to use this capability when working with a third-party database.
Is it possible to access the contacts in the Address Book with a database application like the one found in AppleWorks 6 or with FileMaker Pro?
What about with other applications such as QuickBooks?
I would like to use this capability when working with a third-party database.
Is it possible to access the contacts in the Address Book with a database application like the one found in AppleWorks 6 or with FileMaker Pro?
What about with other applications such as QuickBooks?
stottm - Jan 28, 2006 - 9:47 am
OS X Address Book can export to vCard files so you can drag and drop the vCards into applications that support it. i.e. Outlook on a PC, etc.
The AB also has a full programmers API (Application Program Interface) in Carbon/Cocoa Objective-C (ObjC) since the OS X Jaguar release. http://www.macdevcenter.com/lpt/a/2669
So there are third party utilities such as:
http://homepage.mac.com/kenferry/Sof...SV/ReadMe.html
http://homepage.mac.com/kenferry/Sof...kToCSV-1.1.dmg
The AddressBookToCSV only dumps the names, company name, and the email address. But it useful to get the data into another email application.
Another way to get to the AB data is with AppleScript. If you have OS X Tiger, you get Automator which makes it extremely easy to build drag and drop AppleScripts. I built a simple export using Automator while writing this response.
Automator workflow:
- "Get Selected Address Book Items" (whatever items are selected in AddressBook)
- "Get Contact Information" (define which fields, name, address, phone, etc. and spreadsheet output - tab delimited)
- "New Text File" (output into a Text file)
I then was able to import the tab delimited file into Excel with very little trouble. FileMaker Pro should be just as easy.
Automator is really slick, prior to this you had to learn AppleScript which is easy to learn but what Automator does is bring AppleScript to the masses in an extremely friendly way. You can do more just coding an AppleScript but Automator makes it as simple as drag and drop and you can save the scripts to run from the Scripts menu or you can even attach them to a folder so when you drag and drop files on a folder it will run the script on the files.
The AB also has a full programmers API (Application Program Interface) in Carbon/Cocoa Objective-C (ObjC) since the OS X Jaguar release. http://www.macdevcenter.com/lpt/a/2669
So there are third party utilities such as:
http://homepage.mac.com/kenferry/Sof...SV/ReadMe.html
http://homepage.mac.com/kenferry/Sof...kToCSV-1.1.dmg
The AddressBookToCSV only dumps the names, company name, and the email address. But it useful to get the data into another email application.
Another way to get to the AB data is with AppleScript. If you have OS X Tiger, you get Automator which makes it extremely easy to build drag and drop AppleScripts. I built a simple export using Automator while writing this response.
Automator workflow:
- "Get Selected Address Book Items" (whatever items are selected in AddressBook)
- "Get Contact Information" (define which fields, name, address, phone, etc. and spreadsheet output - tab delimited)
- "New Text File" (output into a Text file)
I then was able to import the tab delimited file into Excel with very little trouble. FileMaker Pro should be just as easy.
Automator is really slick, prior to this you had to learn AppleScript which is easy to learn but what Automator does is bring AppleScript to the masses in an extremely friendly way. You can do more just coding an AppleScript but Automator makes it as simple as drag and drop and you can save the scripts to run from the Scripts menu or you can even attach them to a folder so when you drag and drop files on a folder it will run the script on the files.
mirabilis - Jan 28, 2006 - 11:25 am
Excellent. Thank you for such a detailed reply. I'll give it a shot.
mirabilis - Feb 7, 2006 - 1:34 pm
Sorry to trouble you again. Currently I don't own Jaguar so I think I'm going to try this by writing an Applescript on my own. I've been wanting to learn how to use Applescript anyway.
I do have one question before giving this a serious attempt. I am not particularly fond of uploading or dumping or syncing. What I want is a single location for all of my contact info.
So, will this process allow me to actually "access" the Address Book contact info from a "field" in my database in the same way that Mail accesses the email addresses from Address Book?
I just want to be sure before I go to all of the trouble of learning Applescript and/or upgrading my computer and OS.
Thanks again
I do have one question before giving this a serious attempt. I am not particularly fond of uploading or dumping or syncing. What I want is a single location for all of my contact info.
So, will this process allow me to actually "access" the Address Book contact info from a "field" in my database in the same way that Mail accesses the email addresses from Address Book?
I just want to be sure before I go to all of the trouble of learning Applescript and/or upgrading my computer and OS.
Thanks again
stottm - Feb 8, 2006 - 7:34 am
In order to have a direct link from one application to another, the originating application must provide an API - Application Programming Interface and the utilizing application must be written to take advantage of that API. For example, all the iLife apps on OS X (iPhoto, iMovie, iTunes, iDVD, etc.) all use the same API's in the same way that Microsoft Office works together (Word, Excel, and PowerPoint).
I don't believe you will get direct functionality from a third-party application directly into AddressBook unless you write that application yourself using Objective-C and the OS X Cocoa Libraries (API). That would be an advanced topic and would require at least the 10.2 Jaguar version of Mac OS X, which is when the Cocoa AddressBook library (API) became available. Here is an article at O'Reily's MacDevCenter detailing how it works.
http://www.macdevcenter.com/pub/a/ma.../27/cocoa.html as you can see the ObjC and Cocoa API is not what I would call simple. There is a rather steep learning curve to the Cocoa API. Learning the C programming language and the minor changes that Objective-C makes to it is fairly easy. But learning the Cocoa API takes some serious effort. It is extremely powerful but it takes awhile until you finally see the light. However, once you climb that steep hill of knowledge you suddenly realize just how much better it is then C++ or Java. But this is probably much more then you wish to pursue. The good thing is that all the tools to do this are completely free, you just need to buy a bunch of books and invest time and effort to learning it. To do the same on MS Windows will cost you thousands of dollars.
What AppleScript does is give a non-developer an easier way to interact and automate an application. Providing that the third-party application you wish to use with AddressBook also supports AppleScript then you can do quite a bit. There are limitations. AppleScript also has to be explicitly enabled within an application. For example, I don't know if the pre-Jaguar AddressBook has an AppleScript ability. If it does, it may be a bit limited in available features.
You say you don't have Jaguar? What version of Mac OS X do you have? 10.0, 10.1? Jaguar = 10.2, Panther = 10.3, and Tiger = 10.4. There have been significant changes and improvements. I am not even sure if AppleScript is fully available in AddressBook prior to Jaguar... It may have some AppleScript support but I believe it was improved considerably in later releases of the operating system. Version 10.0 was really a developers BETA release and 10.1 was the very first public retail release of Mac OS X. Each subsequent release made great strides. Jaguar was released in 2002, Panther in 2003, and Tiger in 2005.
As far as linking a FileMaker Pro field directly to the AddressBook?
There is a FileMaker plugin product here http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/15289 but it requires at least Mac OS X 10.3.2 and FileMaker 5.5 - 7.0.
https://www.productive.cc/pci_cart/F...ID_No=39&-Find
Unfortunately, you are looking at a need to upgrade to Tiger 10.4 - You can't buy Jaguar nor Panther from Apple, only Tiger and that goes for $129. You might be able to find an old Jaguar or Panther disc for sale on eBay or find a friend with a copy. The other problem is you may have an old Mac that can't run Tiger.
Mac OS X Version 10.4 requires a Macintosh with:
PowerPC G3, G4, or G5 processor
Built-in FireWire
At least 256MB of physical RAM
A built-in display or a display connected to an Apple-supplied video card supported by your computer
At least 3.0 GB of available space on your hard drive; 4GB of disk space if you install XCode 2 developer tools
DVD drive for installation (you can special order CD media for an additional $9.95)
I don't believe you will get direct functionality from a third-party application directly into AddressBook unless you write that application yourself using Objective-C and the OS X Cocoa Libraries (API). That would be an advanced topic and would require at least the 10.2 Jaguar version of Mac OS X, which is when the Cocoa AddressBook library (API) became available. Here is an article at O'Reily's MacDevCenter detailing how it works.
http://www.macdevcenter.com/pub/a/ma.../27/cocoa.html as you can see the ObjC and Cocoa API is not what I would call simple. There is a rather steep learning curve to the Cocoa API. Learning the C programming language and the minor changes that Objective-C makes to it is fairly easy. But learning the Cocoa API takes some serious effort. It is extremely powerful but it takes awhile until you finally see the light. However, once you climb that steep hill of knowledge you suddenly realize just how much better it is then C++ or Java. But this is probably much more then you wish to pursue. The good thing is that all the tools to do this are completely free, you just need to buy a bunch of books and invest time and effort to learning it. To do the same on MS Windows will cost you thousands of dollars.
What AppleScript does is give a non-developer an easier way to interact and automate an application. Providing that the third-party application you wish to use with AddressBook also supports AppleScript then you can do quite a bit. There are limitations. AppleScript also has to be explicitly enabled within an application. For example, I don't know if the pre-Jaguar AddressBook has an AppleScript ability. If it does, it may be a bit limited in available features.
You say you don't have Jaguar? What version of Mac OS X do you have? 10.0, 10.1? Jaguar = 10.2, Panther = 10.3, and Tiger = 10.4. There have been significant changes and improvements. I am not even sure if AppleScript is fully available in AddressBook prior to Jaguar... It may have some AppleScript support but I believe it was improved considerably in later releases of the operating system. Version 10.0 was really a developers BETA release and 10.1 was the very first public retail release of Mac OS X. Each subsequent release made great strides. Jaguar was released in 2002, Panther in 2003, and Tiger in 2005.
As far as linking a FileMaker Pro field directly to the AddressBook?
There is a FileMaker plugin product here http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/15289 but it requires at least Mac OS X 10.3.2 and FileMaker 5.5 - 7.0.
https://www.productive.cc/pci_cart/F...ID_No=39&-Find
Unfortunately, you are looking at a need to upgrade to Tiger 10.4 - You can't buy Jaguar nor Panther from Apple, only Tiger and that goes for $129. You might be able to find an old Jaguar or Panther disc for sale on eBay or find a friend with a copy. The other problem is you may have an old Mac that can't run Tiger.
Mac OS X Version 10.4 requires a Macintosh with:
PowerPC G3, G4, or G5 processor
Built-in FireWire
At least 256MB of physical RAM
A built-in display or a display connected to an Apple-supplied video card supported by your computer
At least 3.0 GB of available space on your hard drive; 4GB of disk space if you install XCode 2 developer tools
DVD drive for installation (you can special order CD media for an additional $9.95)
mirabilis - Feb 8, 2006 - 8:14 am
Thank you so much for all of the info. I got my OS "animals" confused. I have not yet upgraded to Tiger and am running Panther 10.3.9. My CPU would now be considered quite old by many standards. It's a G4 400. I have noticed that some of my newer applications have seemed to be running slow. Eventually I will upgrade.
But I must say that given the reply that you gave, I am left a bit confused on this. It's truly unbelievable to me that this is not an issue that affects the vast majority of computer users.
If, for example, I want to write a letter in a word processing program why should I re-type the name and address of the person I'm writing when a contact database has this information already. Not only does this require extra work but it also increases the opportunity for mistakes and typos. MS Word I believe has some sort of memory that tries help with envelopes but it's still not drawing from a single contact database.
Anyone using Quickbooks (as I do) has to maintain its contact info if they are using it for billing and/or payroll.
As a musician I also have a "Contracts" database that I made with FileMakerPro. It allows me to keep info on specific gigs (especially weddings). The database itself is great but there is a great deal of duplication of effort since all of the info needs to be in the Address Book for emailing and phone calls.
When I want to make a phone call I generally turn to my address book in my Palm Desktop because it also has my calendar. Obviously I can switch over to Address Book and iCal but there are some features not available in iCal and they are features that I find quite useful (such as the way contact info is actually "attached" to a person's name in the calendar and also the "notes" feature).
So when I send an email I'm using the Address Book because I have to.
Thus I'm stuck with maintaining 4 different contact lists on a single machine all of which have many of the same names and addresses. I use each one for specific purposes on applications that can't talk to one another.
It just leaves me baffled. Programmers have spent countless hours so that we have the ability to blow up virtual people with extraordinary "reality" and yet we don't have a single address book that keeps track of nothing but text. Surely this would be valuable to every computer user out there. Isn't there a huge marketing and monetary incentive here?
It boggles the mind.
Thanks for listening to my venting and many thanks for the detailed answer. I will have to consider my options.
But I must say that given the reply that you gave, I am left a bit confused on this. It's truly unbelievable to me that this is not an issue that affects the vast majority of computer users.
If, for example, I want to write a letter in a word processing program why should I re-type the name and address of the person I'm writing when a contact database has this information already. Not only does this require extra work but it also increases the opportunity for mistakes and typos. MS Word I believe has some sort of memory that tries help with envelopes but it's still not drawing from a single contact database.
Anyone using Quickbooks (as I do) has to maintain its contact info if they are using it for billing and/or payroll.
As a musician I also have a "Contracts" database that I made with FileMakerPro. It allows me to keep info on specific gigs (especially weddings). The database itself is great but there is a great deal of duplication of effort since all of the info needs to be in the Address Book for emailing and phone calls.
When I want to make a phone call I generally turn to my address book in my Palm Desktop because it also has my calendar. Obviously I can switch over to Address Book and iCal but there are some features not available in iCal and they are features that I find quite useful (such as the way contact info is actually "attached" to a person's name in the calendar and also the "notes" feature).
So when I send an email I'm using the Address Book because I have to.
Thus I'm stuck with maintaining 4 different contact lists on a single machine all of which have many of the same names and addresses. I use each one for specific purposes on applications that can't talk to one another.
It just leaves me baffled. Programmers have spent countless hours so that we have the ability to blow up virtual people with extraordinary "reality" and yet we don't have a single address book that keeps track of nothing but text. Surely this would be valuable to every computer user out there. Isn't there a huge marketing and monetary incentive here?
It boggles the mind.
Thanks for listening to my venting and many thanks for the detailed answer. I will have to consider my options.
stottm - Feb 9, 2006 - 8:12 am
I understand your frustration, syncing contact information is a major computer industry wide problem that has yet to be fully resolved. It does not matter what operating system you are using, none solve the problem. Even at work we have some users on Outlook which syncs to Blackberry's, Palms, and WinCE PDA's as well as using the corporate global address book stored in an LDAP directory which needs to sync to 12 other directories including the human resource database.
Well there are constant sync problems, even though all these systems are supposed to share the data. I have problems on Mac OS X with syncing over .Mac between computers. It simply doesn't work very well.
So even if you do build bridges between directories and address books, you end up with duplicate contacts, missing contacts, and things like phone numbers and mailing addresses getting flip flopped.
The latest version of Address Book in Tiger as improved AppleScript support as well as little hidden features like being able to click on the mailing address field name "home" or "work" and getting a menu where you can copy the mailing label to the clipboard. Using keyboard shortcuts like the apple key plus C for copy, X for cut, and V for paste comes in handy. So when working with Word, I will copy the address from Address Book then switch back to Word using Expose' and then paste with Apple + V. Yeah, it's tedious. The alternative is to sync Address Book with Entourage which Word can use for addresses.
On a side note, you might want to look into the wonderful QuickSilver application for OS X. It is hard to explain what it does but it is a keyboard launcher that can search for files too. So if you like keyboard shortcuts you can quickly launch programs and pass options to them all from the keyboard which is faster then using a mouse. There are a ton of plugins like advanced multiple clipboards, etc. It takes some getting used to but those who have used it swear by it. There is even a Panther version. http://quicksilver.blacktree.com/ - Here is a quick glance of how it works http://docs.blacktree.com/quicksilve...is_quicksilver - But that is just scraping the tip of an iceberg! It's a geek programmer favorite. Programmers just love keyboard options, the mouse just slows them down.
Best of luck in trying to find solutions that work for you. Tiger is faster then Panther even on older hardware. But the more RAM you through at it the better. So consider getting some quality RAM upgrades from http://crucial.com/
Well there are constant sync problems, even though all these systems are supposed to share the data. I have problems on Mac OS X with syncing over .Mac between computers. It simply doesn't work very well.
So even if you do build bridges between directories and address books, you end up with duplicate contacts, missing contacts, and things like phone numbers and mailing addresses getting flip flopped.
The latest version of Address Book in Tiger as improved AppleScript support as well as little hidden features like being able to click on the mailing address field name "home" or "work" and getting a menu where you can copy the mailing label to the clipboard. Using keyboard shortcuts like the apple key plus C for copy, X for cut, and V for paste comes in handy. So when working with Word, I will copy the address from Address Book then switch back to Word using Expose' and then paste with Apple + V. Yeah, it's tedious. The alternative is to sync Address Book with Entourage which Word can use for addresses.
On a side note, you might want to look into the wonderful QuickSilver application for OS X. It is hard to explain what it does but it is a keyboard launcher that can search for files too. So if you like keyboard shortcuts you can quickly launch programs and pass options to them all from the keyboard which is faster then using a mouse. There are a ton of plugins like advanced multiple clipboards, etc. It takes some getting used to but those who have used it swear by it. There is even a Panther version. http://quicksilver.blacktree.com/ - Here is a quick glance of how it works http://docs.blacktree.com/quicksilve...is_quicksilver - But that is just scraping the tip of an iceberg! It's a geek programmer favorite. Programmers just love keyboard options, the mouse just slows them down.
Best of luck in trying to find solutions that work for you. Tiger is faster then Panther even on older hardware. But the more RAM you through at it the better. So consider getting some quality RAM upgrades from http://crucial.com/
mirabilis - Feb 9, 2006 - 9:14 am
Matthew--You've been a great help. Thank you for your time. I'll take a look at the QuickSilver site.
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