How to access Gmail Address Book

[Avi]

Hi All,

Is there any API provied by Google to access the Gmail Address
book ?


Thanks
Avi

[Jeff Fisher (Google)]

Hi Avi,

A "Contacts API" has been a long standing request:

http://code.google.com/p/gdata-issues/issues/detail?id=25

Cheers,
-Jeff

[Timothy Parez]

Hi,

What I don't understand is that
while nobody seems to know about a data API,
sites such as LinkedIn and Facebook have the ability
to search friends through your GMail account.

How does that work?

Timothy.

[Avinash]

Thanks  a lot Jeff for clarification  on the issue.

I too have the same question as of Timothy Parez.

How do Plaxo and other sites are able to get the Gmail Address book.


Thanks
Avi

[Naomi Butterfield]

I have the same question: how do sites like Facebook access a user's
gmail contacts given their username and password? Does the site need
to register with google? How would one do this?

- Naomi

[Jeff Fisher (Google)]

Hi all,

It's a valid question, but I can only say that there is no supported
way to access GMail contacts at this time.

Cheers,
-Jeff

[devdave]

Aaaoooowwwhh... Jeff,

We know that already. Come on, just a hint?



On Feb 12, 5:21 pm, "Jeff Fisher (Google)" <api.jfis...@google.com>
wrote:

> > > >> Avi- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

[glenn.k...@gmail.com]

My bet is that Google has a deal (as in, lots of $$) with those
sites. If that's the case, then the API exists; but it's not open to
the public. I'd have to say that that's a good thing -- since not all
of us are happy-go-lucky people out there to make the world a better
place. I'm actually working on a demo for a service that would be
made awesome with access to the Gmail Inbox. It's just not secure
from Google's perspective to let the general public (us) DO such
things.

[Timothy Parez]

Don't see why it wouldn't be secure.
All we can do is speculate at this time, but perhaps it's because there's no
central contact storage yet either. GMail en Google Talk contacts aren't the same (and probably shouldn't be)
perhaps that has got something to do with it.

[oscarcito]

Mi cuestion is ... I need my gmail contacts in my phone ... google
speaks about open content ... why they don't give for free (plaxo yes,
and others no, dabadabaduuu??) all the data he knows from my self. I
don't understand the Jeff response...

"...It's a valid question, but I can only say that there is no
supported way to access GMail contacts at this time..."

When, plaxo and facebook and others can. ... I CAN ONLY SAY .... is
very rare from Google open mind perspective, or perhaps the open
perspective is only avaiable when the google technology wins with
other competitors!

Thanks and sorry for my English from Spain!

[Timothy Parez]

I blogged about this yesterday or so :)
http://www.itcrowd.be/entry/Why+doesn't+Google+have+a+contact+API%5e.aspx

Timothy.

[johntynan]

My question regarding this thread comes from conjeccture, not
experience, but tell me, would contacts be available through the Open
Social API, through a person's list of friends within Orkut? Could it
be that a contact list in email implies some degree of privacy, but a
list of friends on a social networking site implies an implicit
understanding of openness?

http://code.google.com/apis/opensocial/docs/0.7/spec.html#people


On Feb 13, 3:44 pm, "Timothy Parez" <timothypa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I blogged about this yesterday or so :)http://www.itcrowd.be/entry/Why+doesn't+Google+have+a+contact+API%5e....

[glenn.k...@gmail.com]

in response to johntynan's question:

"Could it be that a contact list in email implies some degree of
privacy, but a list of friends on a social networking site implies an
implicit understanding of openness?"

It seems like OpenSocial indeed says that "friends" on all social
websites are fair game but Google's own "contacts" are not. To be
honest I really don't think that there should be a distinction. If
one is open, the other should be by logical extension, since the
information risks are the same.

The flipside to this argument however, is that you are generally open
about whom you call a "friend" and you'll share that information with
everyone. Contacts aren't necessarily the same. For example, someone
might not want all their contacts to know that they regularly e-mail a
therapist, or let their boss know that they have an addiction to
buying anime.

I think a happy medium would be to make an API that only gives
"contact" info for the person that's logged in. That way, we
developers can make programs that see their contacts -- but NOT see
their contacts' contacts. To do that there would need to be the
caveat that developers MUST NOT save contact-info for future use (a
site/gadget/whatever that saves this info could eventually assemble a
complete social-map, which is what we're trying to avoid).

Things get difficult, which must be why Google makes those deals.

Does anyone know a way around this?

[oscarcito]

Ok, Jeff says:

" It's a valid question, but I can only say that there is no supported
way to access GMail contacts at this time. "

Then, what about for gmail mobile to have an option to sync contacts
between mobile and gmail? ANd about to put these contacts in the
correct place in my gmail contacts?

Thanks and sorry for my English from Spain!

On 14 feb, 22:12, "glenn.kitch...@gmail.com"