Re: Why a contact list?

[Bosk]

well, i've been thinking on this a little, and will think some more, and will come back and write some more. but here is what i have for now.

1. the list is logical.
most people wish to keep track of dozens of contacts at once. the simplest format to display any large array of information without getting lost is a list. done. that's why we have it and that's why it works.

2. but it could be more modular.
i know in the past people have clamored to be able to spawn off their groups as separate windows. how about something more along the lines of technology apple has been migrating out of itunes and into other apps (e.g. mail and the finder in 10.4): smart groups. that way your master contact list is like your contact "library" and you can create views based upon whatever criteria you want, spawn them as individual windows or dock them together and organize your IM life how you want. or, if you're an old school type, just use the "library" as is. the original list is still there.

[carlj7]

Both smart groups and modular windows have been talked about before, but I agree that they're definitely features to try to add to .9 or 1.0, challenging or not. Bear in mind that using Tiger's CoreData, it should be a lot easier to build the kind of dynamic database need for smart lists. If I recall correctly, the difficulty of implementing such a DB was one of the objections to adding smart buddy lists before.

[The_Tick]

Both smart groups and modular windows have been talked about before, but I agree that they're definitely features to try to add to .9 or 1.0, challenging or not. Bear in mind that using Tiger's CoreData, it should be a lot easier to build the kind of dynamic database need for smart lists. If I recall correctly, the difficulty of implementing such a DB was one of the objections to adding smart buddy lists before.

Bear in mind we need to keep 10.3 and 10.4 compatibility for a while. Having some features on 10.4 that are not on 10.3 might confuse some users.

[twopeak]

2. but it could be more modular.
i know in the past people have clamored to be able to spawn off their groups as separate windows. how about something more along the lines of technology apple has been migrating out of itunes and into other apps (e.g. mail and the finder in 10.4): smart groups. that way your master contact list is like your contact "library" and you can create views based upon whatever criteria you want, spawn them as individual windows or dock them together and organize your IM life how you want. or, if you're an old school type, just use the "library" as is. the original list is still there.

I like the idea... some school ppl can be friends, work ppl can be in school and so on...

[Son of a Preacher Man]

Interestingly this issue never occurred to me, because the contact list is *not* my primary window. It's borderless, tiny, and hidden (0.9svn), while my single (full of tabs) message window is large and almost continuously visible. This has led to confusion on IRC at times when someone would say "main window" and I'd jump to a different conclusion than everyone else.

I'm in the exact same position. Adium is largely faceless to me now, the only evidence that it's even running being the icons in the dock and menubar. I love it. It also neatly solves another problem:

something ive noticed is that my buddy list is often behind some other windows and the way i find out that one of my buddies is online by activating 'display name in dock' and having the alarm noise notify me when to look down at my dock.

I used to have this problem, but no longer! My contact list slides on from the edge of the screen for 3 seconds, in front of everything else, then it buggers off again. <3 0.9svn

How about an interface to the message window that works similar to how spotlight works?

You hit a key combination (or a small button) and start typing the name of the person you want to message and the list will update in real time (like spotlight). hitting enter will select the highlighted contact and open a new tab.

I dunno, maybe I'm trying to hard to think of ways to integrate tiger technology with adium

Maybe you are, but this was my first thought for what "a bit of work" could be.

However.

I'm not really convinced by the idea that not all contacts should be shown. How would you go about designating a type 1 or type 2 contact? Have a checkbox in their info window that says, "this user is important to me"? I just can't imagine it being anywhere accessible, which would be inconvenient, as that would in many cases be fluid information.

I used to be a great advocate of having multiple levels of organisation like this; I'd bury by work in complex, highly-organised folder systems. I don't do that any more, because I realised two things. First, it usually takes longer to find things. Second, it's an absolute nightmare to maintain.

Finally, I think it's a sad thing that those "unimportant" contacts would probably get forgotten forever, just because of an organisational tool. Many a time I've talked to someone for the first time in months, because I happened to notice they were online at a time I was feeling bored. It's not rare for me to keep more regular contact after that, because I realised that they were actually alright after all!

I realise there would be no compulsion upon me to use such a system, and I certainly would not. I'd just like these things to be considered, while this idea is very much in its infancy. I can see why you feel the need to change it; but are there actually any better ways to do this?

[The_Tick]

Interestingly this issue never occurred to me, because the contact list is *not* my primary window. It's borderless, tiny, and hidden (0.9svn), while my single (full of tabs) message window is large and almost continuously visible. This has led to confusion on IRC at times when someone would say "main window" and I'd jump to a different conclusion than everyone else.

I'm in the exact same position. Adium is largely faceless to me now, the only evidence that it's even running being the icons in the dock and menubar. I love it. It also neatly solves another problem:

something ive noticed is that my buddy list is often behind some other windows and the way i find out that one of my buddies is online by activating 'display name in dock' and having the alarm noise notify me when to look down at my dock.

I used to have this problem, but no longer! My contact list slides on from the edge of the screen for 3 seconds, in front of everything else, then it buggers off again. <3 0.9svn

How about an interface to the message window that works similar to how spotlight works?

You hit a key combination (or a small button) and start typing the name of the person you want to message and the list will update in real time (like spotlight). hitting enter will select the highlighted contact and open a new tab.

I dunno, maybe I'm trying to hard to think of ways to integrate tiger technology with adium

Maybe you are, but this was my first thought for what "a bit of work" could be.

However.

I'm not really convinced by the idea that not all contacts should be shown. How would you go about designating a type 1 or type 2 contact? Have a checkbox in their info window that says, "this user is important to me"? I just can't imagine it being anywhere accessible, which would be inconvenient, as that would in many cases be fluid information.

I used to be a great advocate of having multiple levels of organisation like this; I'd bury by work in complex, highly-organised folder systems. I don't do that any more, because I realised two things. First, it usually takes longer to find things. Second, it's an absolute nightmare to maintain.

Finally, I think it's a sad thing that those "unimportant" contacts would probably get forgotten forever, just because of an organisational tool. Many a time I've talked to someone for the first time in months, because I happened to notice they were online at a time I was feeling bored. It's not rare for me to keep more regular contact after that, because I realised that they were actually alright after all!

I realise there would be no compulsion upon me to use such a system, and I certainly would not. I'd just like these things to be considered, while this idea is very much in its infancy. I can see why you feel the need to change it; but are there actually any better ways to do this?

Personally I really need to know the status RIGHT HERE RIGHT NOW of like 4 people. One of those being the wife, and 3 being good friends. That about sums it up.

I have 250+ people on my contact list. Why do I need this list here all the time for those 4 people?

[Son of a Preacher Man]

Personally I really need to know the status RIGHT HERE RIGHT NOW of like 4 people. One of those being the wife, and 3 being good friends. That about sums it up.

I have 250+ people on my contact list. Why do I need this list here all the time for those 4 people?

So, don't you have them in a separate group, with the others hidden?

[The_Tick]

Personally I really need to know the status RIGHT HERE RIGHT NOW of like 4 people. One of those being the wife, and 3 being good friends. That about sums it up.

I have 250+ people on my contact list. Why do I need this list here all the time for those 4 people?

So, don't you have them in a separate group, with the others hidden?

No.

[Damienoneill]

Why not put in contact list in the actual messaging window? I.E A little tray to the right/left of the window that opens to display a searchable list of contacts? The contacts can be arranged like they are now with groups, online first etc etc.

So adium is simply a Messaging window?

[twopeak]

Why not put in contact list in the actual messaging window? I.E A little tray to the right/left of the window that opens to display a searchable list of contacts? The contacts can be arranged like they are now with groups, online first etc etc.

For me and my 20 contacts, that's great. (I remove ppl who I don't talk to; my contact list is for people I talk to)
But ppl with +200 contacts will go crazy...

I think this discussion is mostly aimed at people with insane amounts of contacts.
If you have a small contact list, you use your IM in a different way than in you have a big one.

The original question was probably aimed at the question how to keep your +200 contacts in a understandable way. The contact list is not really great anymore, but is still used...
What creative idea can someone invent to make it usable again?

[ofri]

Why not put in contact list in the actual messaging window? I.E A little tray to the right/left of the window that opens to display a searchable list of contacts? The contacts can be arranged like they are now with groups, online first etc etc.

For me and my 20 contacts, that's great. (I remove ppl who I don't talk to; my contact list is for people I talk to)
But ppl with +200 contacts will go crazy...

I think this discussion is mostly aimed at people with insane amounts of contacts.
If you have a small contact list, you use your IM in a different way than in you have a big one.

The original question was probably aimed at the question how to keep your +200 contacts in a understandable way. The contact list is not really great anymore, but is still used...
What creative idea can someone invent to make it usable again?

I thought about it for a while and the only thing that i can think of is the ability to have "smart groups" together with the ability to "tear off" groups from the list and display each one separately. This way you'll have small groups which are actually small contact lists that are organized by your personal organization method.
We don't even need smart groups like iTunes or the Finder have. I think that what is actually needed here is the ability to create "virtual groups" that are not server side and that a contact will be able to be in many groups while ignoring the server groups. That way you can organize your contacts in the way you like and to have only the ones you are interested in visible.
There can be a "groups" section in the info panel where you can select in which group the specific contact is a "member" and groups can be created in the prefs or something.

Hope you understand what i mean because i'm not a native english speaker.
- Ofri

[ofri]

I used to have this problem, but no longer! My contact list slides on from the edge of the screen for 3 seconds, in front of everything else, then it buggers off again. <3 0.9svn

How do you activate this? I select the "Hide automatically on screen edges" but it does nothing...

[Son of a Preacher Man]

It has to be docked at the screen edges, and be a borderless style.

[Catfish_Man]

We're still trying to figure out how to get it to work with non-borderless windows... the OSX windowserver is a bit of a control freak, but it totally ignores borderless windows (which is both a good and bad thing).

[ofri]

Thanks now it works and i like it a LOT . I think that it will be better to call [window makeKeyAndOrderFront:nil] instead of [window oerderFront:nil] which is called now (in -slideWindowOnScreen of AIListWindowController). That way you can scroll the list without the need to click on it. The problem is that this works only while adium is the front app and it will be nice it it can be "global".
Excellent work on this!!

Ofri

[wunderwood]

Ok if your guys pay attention to my posting styles their are two types of posts I post. One is a reply to something said. The other is ideas. I'll jut post ideas that come into my head. 1 out of 10 ideas people like so feel free to throw these out.

First off: on the subject of type 1, 2, and 3 contacts her is one idea. This can be combined with whatever other idea. What about an expanding contact list. When you mouse is not over it or adium is not the active app (most of the time) you only see particular groups (you can organize your groups and put important people in groups that are open all the time). But when your mouse hovers over the contact list expands to show you all your online contacts. The groups that open and close would need to be at the bottom so when you go to slick on an always active contact he douse not go flying away from you. Ok this idea has more flaws. But it's out their maybe their are other idea that can come out of it.

Also it seems to me if we are trashing the idea of the purpose of the contact list, the status of your contacts would be best displayed as a palette. As in you can only see it when adium is active and is has that tiny little title bar.

Sorry didn't mean for the post to be this long.

[getalife03]

I really like the idea to put your mouse over the list and have it expand. If you could have an option to always see the buddies that are "available" and then mouse over the list to see the "away', "idle" or whatever buddies, that would be awesome. It would be like the status sort except it would be more of a "show status". Just my 2 cents. If nothing else, it would surely shrink the size of the list. But regardless, more can be done with view by status options.

While I'm on the topic of ideas, I had another one about the contact list. You may hate it, but I figured I'd throw it out there...what if the list was similar to a Stock Ticker? It would be the size of the menubar and dockable (horizontal) with a shockwave style arrow that when you place your mouse over the arrow, the list would scroll faster...it may not show as many names at one time, but you could quickly find a name and it would take up nearly no screen space...whatcha think of that?


~Steven

[jstamos]

Why not have our contact list in Binary!? YEAH! BINARY!!!!! WOOOOOT!

[zaudragon]

Why not have our contact list in Binary!? YEAH! BINARY!!!!! WOOOOOT!

Can you understand binary? I won't be able to. And it'll multiply the number of characters in an alias by at least 16.

Imagine having to look at 160 1's and 0's for 10-character aliases.

"I am Maria" is an example.

[Catfish_Man]

Why not have our contact list in Binary!? YEAH! BINARY!!!!! WOOOOOT!

Can you understand binary? I won't be able to. And it'll multiply the number of characters in an alias by at least 16.

Imagine having to look at 160 1's and 0's for 10-character aliases.

"I am Maria" is an example.

We'd drop name support, of course; sometimes features must be sacrificed for the greater good. Instead, we'd have a line of 1s and 0s, with 1 representing online and 0 representing off/away. This would be much more space efficient and add to our appeal with the geek market segment (*cough*irssi*cough*).