Contacts - Views

You can display contacts from your personal contact folders as well as from other users' public or shared contact folders in three different ways described below, using the functions under the View panel section.

In the Phone list and Card view the overview's title bar displays the current path to the folder you selected in the folder tree. You can navigate in the path by clicking on the underlined parts of the path.

Phone list View

In the Phone list view, you see the contacts from the selected folder in a tabular display. The icons in the first column represent the type of contact - the icons in the second column indicate whether contacts were marked as private. In addition the name, company and location, business and mobile phone number and the associated flags are displayed. In the case of distribution lists, you will see only the names as well as the flags.

Flags are colorful markers that you can use to better differentiate your contacts, e.g., to separate customers from suppliers. You can find further information about flags under the section called “Marking contacts with flags” in this chapter.

Filtering contacts

If you need to manage many contacts, you can use the quick filter bar shown in the image above to filter the displayed contacts and thus limit the number of displayed contacts and search for specific contacts. You can find further information about the quick filter bar under the section called “Cards view” in this chapter.

Sorting contacts

You can also sort the contacts by the fields Name, Company, City, Phone (business), Mobile or Flag - in either ascending or descending alphabetical order. The arrow next to the column title shows according to which of these fields the contacts are sorted and whether they are currently displayed in ascending or descending order.

If you would like to change the sort order, for instance to display your contacts sorted by Company in descending order, first click on the appropriate column title to select this field as a sort criterion. Another click on the column title or on the arrow next to the column title toggles the sort order of the displayed contacts to descending.

Defining the default view

You can define the default view in which the Contacts module should open after logging in Open-Xchange Server - either showing the Phone list view or the Cards view discussed below.

You can find further information about defining the default view of the Contacts module under the section called “Contacts Module Options” in the Settings chapter.

Cards view

In the Cards view, you see the contacts from the selected folder in a tabular display. You will see the first and last name, the type of contact, the associated flags and the marking as private contact (in the title of the card), as well as the business address, the business phone number and the business E-Mail address; for distribution lists you will only see the name and the associated flags.

Filtering contacts

In this view you can again use the quick filter bar to filter the displayed contacts and limit your search for specific contacts.

Quick filter bar

In the Phone list and Cards views, quick filter bars allow to filter the displayed contacts via the first letter of the contacts' last names or the names of the distribution lists: either according to the first letter (A to Z filters), according to numbers (123 filter) or according to special characters (# filter).

You can turn a filter off again by clicking on the function All in the quick filter bar.

Details view (Contacts)

In the Detail view you can see a two-tab display of all data as well as attachments of a contact previously selected in the Phone list or Cards view - detail views of distribution lists differ from detail views of individual contacts and are described under the section called “Details view (distribution lists)” in this chapter.

Overview tab

The Overview tab contains all personal data (search as first and last name) of the selected contact, the business and private addresses as well as all accompanying contact data - telephone and fax numbers, E-Mail addresses, etc.

In addition to the predefined fields you can use dynamic fields to capture additional data in contacts for which Open-Xchange Server does not offer default fields. If dynamic fields are used for this purpose, the relevant contents are also displayed in this tab.

For all entries in this tab with a downward-pointing arrow next to the name, you can access alternative information to this data field: For example, if you would like to display the private address of the contact instead of the business address, click on the arrow and then select the desired address from the list.

The alternative data are only displayed temporarily. When you leave the Detail view, the display in this tab returns to the predefined fields.

Attachments tab

Attachments are external documents (for example, text documents with driving directions, spreadsheets with price quotes, images, etc.) that can be saved with the contact data and thus directly associated with the contact. The section the section called “Adding attachments to contacts” in this chapter describes how you can associate attachments with contacts.

The Attachments tab shows all available attachments associated with the selected contact. The tabular display of the attachments shows the filenames of the associated documents, their mime type as well as the file size in KB.

Opening or saving attachments from Contacts

You can open an attachment of the displayed contact or save it to a file via the functions Open or Save as under the Attachments panel section. Select the desired attachment from the list and then click on the appropriate function in the Panel. The following figure shows a relevant example.

Figure 3.5. Contacts in the Details view - Attachments tab

Contacts in the Details view - Attachments tab

An attachment is opened using the appropriate application: Spreadsheets are opened with your spreadsheet program, while text documents open in your word processing application. The same is true for other file types, of course.

If you save an attachment, a copy of this file is downloaded from the server to your local hard drive or whatever other disk drive you specify as the download destination.

Saving Contact Attachments to InfoStore

Saving an attachment into InfoStore generates a new object which is managed via Open-Xchange Server. This method has the advantage of giving you and other users access to this Info Item via the InfoStore module. You can find more information about InfoStore and Info Items in the InfoStore chapter.

In order to save an attachment from a contact in one of your personal InfoStore folders or another user's public or shared InfoStore folder (provided you have the right to create objects), select the desired attachment from the list and click on the function Save in InfoStore in the Attachments panel section.

This opens the InfoStore item window, where you can enter a description as well as further data (such as, for instance, an Internet address or notes) for the newly created Info Item, and select the destination folder. When you have entered all the data, click on the Save icon in the Save panel section to store the Info Item in the selected folder.

Saving attachments as Items in InfoStore

In order to be able to save attachments from contacts in the InfoStore, you must have enough free storage space on the server. If you have filled up the storage space assigned to you, you cannot save any other attachments from contacts into the InfoStore. The InfoBox on the Start page of Open-Xchange Server provides information about your currently available storage space.

Details view (distribution lists)

For distribution lists, the Detail view only contains the Overviewtabs, since distribution lists can have no attachments.

Overview tab

The Overview tab shows all members of a distribution list that were previously selected from a Phone list or Cards view, and it displays their E-Mail addresses.

Active view after changing the module

If you switch from the Contacts module to another module of Open-Xchange Server and then return to the Contacts module, you will always see the multi-panel view that was active when you left the Contacts module - either the Phone list or the Cards view. This is also the case if you have left the Contacts module from the Detail view.