Re: Contacts - A Command-line AddressBook API utility

[Björn Giesler]

Hi,

On 2003-09-12 21:41:31 +0000 Alex Perez <aperez@student.santarosa.edu> 
wrote:
> I found a little GPLed command-line utility (written for OS X) which 
> can
> search/add/view address book contact information from the command 
> line. If
> you're interested, please see http://gnufoo.org/contacts/

Good. I'll use that to test the address book framework I'm working on.

> I know some people here are working on implimenting some sort of
> AddressBook API. Can the folks doing so (if there are multiple) all 
> please
> raise their hands and write the gnustep community a brief little email
> detailing what you're banging on?

*raise hand*

I'm writing an address book application called Contacts.app, available 
at http://giesler.biz/bjoern/English/Software.html#Contacts (actually, 
try also 
http://giesler.no-ip.org/bjoern/English/Software.html#Contacts, 
because giesler.biz's nameserver seems to have some problems which I 
can't fix right now).

The purpose is mainly to write a personal address book app that looks 
nice and is efficient and elegant to use, and will sync over Bluetooth 
with mobile devices. Since I'm writing an address book API anyway, and 
to aid GNUMail and other cross-platform apps, I'll make the API 
available as a framework, conforming to Apple's AddressBook API plus a 
few backward-combatable extensions.

> AddressBook API? If not, why not? Is it a bad API?

No, it's quite OK. Misses a couple things, but overall it's good. It's 
also easy to implement with property lists.