After listening to #687: Revisiting Contacts and Calendars I decided to try contact lists again.
Why?? Because I hear an idea and think that it might work for me.
I was trying to delete some old lists and I immediately realized on just how bad the contact application is on the macOS.
You can delete a list on iCloud but not on Contacts application. I can’t…I just can’t say anymore about how bad it is, so I will talk about who is responsible.
Eddy Cue is the executive that heads up all of the productivity apps and just look at how much he has under him:
Apple Music, Apple News, Apple Podcasts, the Apple TV app, and Apple TV+, as well as Apple Pay, Apple Card, Maps, Apple Ads, Apple’s iCloud services, and Apple’s productivity and creativity apps.
This company needs a MASSIVE shakeup at the top to get some developers make some developers actually feel good about working on an application like Contacts.
On Contacts for the Macintosh (Mac OS Sequoia) Click on the name of the contact list. Hit the delete key. Confirm.
The functionality is there, but it’s not what I’d expect. My expectations are that this would be on a menu item, and/or be a button at the bottom of the sidebar marked “-”.
I remember the beauty of the original Macintosh human interface guidelines. Not just that they were so clear, but the mere fact that they existed. The only interface guideline that existed in the DOS world was “Use the same keyboard shortcuts as WordStar.”
I wholeheartedly agree! I went on an organizing crusade recently, and it’s still in progress. One part was cleaning up contacts by adding, updating, and deleting contacts and lists.
I don’t know if it’s that I have bad data, but I can only add a contact to one list and then I have to safe restart Contacts (shift + click on app) before I can add them to another list!
That wasn’t practical, so I keep and manage my contact in Fastmail. Their Web interface is zippy and I don’t have to restart anything.
I’m 100% onboard with this! I’m trying to revisit all of the main stock apps on macOS for ScreenCastsONLINE to bring the videos up to date but the Contacts app I’m giving a massive swerve because it really isn’t anything great at all. BusyContacts is a nice alternative but it doesn’t do for Contacts what BusyCal does for the Calendar
I am a massive fan of Cardhop. I probably should have avoided listening to the episodes dedicated to contacts bc it planted some seeds in my head about using Contacts application.
I just discovered today that when you add a siri suggested email or phone number the data is added without a label. Therefore you have a phone number or email that doesn’t contain the label work, home or other. Another Apple Intelligent feature that should be highlighted on the dumpster fire sizzle reel.
