Managing Contacts

[Robert Winkler]

Hi, I already got extensive contact lists (>1,000) in various formats and run a manually maintained list on an LDAP server for the really important contacts.

How can I easily use or import contacts for the To: CC: and BCC: fields?

Best regards, 

Robert 

[Iain Parris]

Hi Robert,

Excerpts from Robert Winkler's message of 2020-07-16 08:15:56 -0700:

General contacts usage is:

- Global keybinding "C" - list contacts.

- To specify a recipient (To/Cc/Bcc): when prompted to enter the
recipient (e.g., after pressing "c" for "compose"), start typing,
then press "tab" for suggestions.

- In thread-view-mode, press "i" to be prompted to add to Sup's
contacts list, with an optional alias.

The contacts are sourced from file ~/.sup/contacts.txt, and from calling
the "extra-contact-addresses" hook.

So you have two main options.

(1) ~/.sup/contacts.txt

- Sup's built-in contacts file is ~/.sup/contacts.txt

- This is written/read when Sup stops/starts, so make sure to quit
Sup before editing it manually.

- File format is one contact per line, with an optional alias.

- Each line is in format like:

alias: Person Name <person...@example.com>

- "alias" is optional, and if omitted, then the line will look like:

: Another Person <per...@example.com>

- If you converted your contacts into this style, then you could
create your own contacts.txt file, and Sup would use it.

(2) extra-contact-addresses hook

- This hook takes no input, and returns an array of email address
strings that Sup is then aware of for tab-completion.

- So you could alternatively write this hook to call any external
program, and return in the format expected by Sup.

- Two examples with "goobook" (for Google Account contacts) and
"abook" (a general contact manager program that runs in the
terminal) are here:
<https://github.com/sup-heliotrope/sup/wiki/External-contacts-search>.

- So if (for example) you chose "abook", then you could use any
method to import your contacts into "abook", and then use the Sup
hook to make Sup aware of abook's contacts.

- abook is able to import ldif, so may be a natural choice. Further
reading on abook:
<https://hund0b1.gitlab.io/2018/06/25/abook-a-ncurses-adress-book-program.html>.

For other general information about Sup's contact lists, see also:
<https://sup-heliotrope.github.io/community/sup-talk/msg00965.html>.

Kind regards,
Iain

[Robert Winkler]

Dear Iain,

thanks a lot indeed again! I tried the different versions:

- Integrating Google Contacts works after some trouble with the OAuth authorization. Although using Google Contacts is comfortable, I have a love-hate relationship with Google. Most of Googles products work great, but I am also concerned about privacy and monopolies. Additional problems: The formatting of names is not uniform (e.g. "Dr. Duck (Ducktales)", vs. "Dra Minnie Mouse") and one needs to be online for using the Contacts.
- Abook is a really neat and simple ncurses program. I exported the contacts of my LDAP server in LDIF format an importing it into Abook was a one-liner. The TAB completion works fine, just in the 'C' menu, not the name, but the shortened email address is displayed. Maybe a little bug? The only real disadvantage: The address book is not synced with the LDAP server. Nevertheless, I can use my manually maintained 100+ contacts.
- Unfortunately, it seems that you cannot use both, Google Contacts and Abook at the same time (when using both configurations, only the second was displayed).
- The sup contacts.txt seems practical, but I don't want to start an additional contacts database.

Conclusions: For now, I use the Abook address book. For the future, I need to invent a practical solution to keep Abook and the LDAP server synchronized.

Best regards,

Robert

Excerpts from Iain Parris's message of 2020-07-16 20:46:00 +0100:

[Robert Winkler]

Hi Iain,

it seems that there is no auto-completion of addresses in reply mode?

Best regards,

Robert

[Iain Parris]

Hi Robert,

Excerpts from Robert Winkler's message of 2020-09-03 06:50:18 -0700:

> it seems that there is no auto-completion of addresses in reply mode?

The trick is to use the following keybindings while in reply-mode.
(These are general to any edit-message-mode, so also can be used in
compose-mode.)

- "t" - Edit To:
- "c" - Edit Cc:
- Or alternatively, highlight the correct field (with "j"/"k"), then
press "e" to edit the selected field

Any of these will allow editing the appropriate header, with
auto-completion of addresses.

Note that these keybindings won't work in your text editor, which is
external to Sup.

Kind regards,
Iain

[Robert Winkler]

Hi Iain,

This is exactly what I needed!

In general, a central configuration of keybindings would be awesome.

Best regards, Robert

Excerpts from Iain Parris's message of 2020-09-03 21:01:38 +0100:

[Iain Parris]

Hi Robert,

Excerpts from Robert Winkler's message of 2020-09-07 08:18:02 -0500:

> This is exactly what I needed!

That's great - I'm glad that I could help.

> In general, a central configuration of keybindings would be awesome.

One hidden-away feature of Sup is that, from any screen, you can press
"?" to see the list of keybindings available for that particular screen.
(And return with "x".)

Is this of any help?

Kind regards,
Iain

[Robert Winkler]

Definitely!

The '?' helps to discover keybindings in any mode.

Best, R

Excerpts from Iain Parris's message of 2020-09-08 22:20:20 +0100: