Chapter5.Contacts

Chapter 5. Contacts

In this chapter

Replace your paper address book
Create new contacts quickly
Assign custom fields and unique categories
Attach a note to a contact

Contacts is the best address book you've ever had. But it's not just for keeping in touch. Use Contacts to build your network, introduce like-minded people to each other, and remind yourself of birthdays and other big events. Contacts works smoothly with other applications to make sure the things you do stay connected to the people you do them with.

Identify yourself in Contacts

In case you ever lose your handheld, make it easier for the person who finds it to find you. Create a contact with the following note as the last name: "+If found, contact [your name and phone number]." The + symbol causes the contact to rise to the top of the contact list.

Share contact info fast

At conferences, get-togethers, and other events, beam and receive contact information whenever you can. It's faster and more accurate than entering the info manually. To beam contact info, tap the contact's name, tap the Menu icon, and select Record > Beam Contact ( ).

Sync Contacts from Outlook

When you first set up your handheld with your computer, you were asked whether to use Outlook or Palm Desktop as your computer's default info manager. You can switch to Outlook at any time. Just insert your installation CD into your computer and select Install Microsoft Outlook Conduits . Your handheld's contacts stay the same, but are now synchronized with the personal info manager of your choice.

Create new contacts

Don't hesitate to add incomplete contacts, even if all you have is a name and email address from a brief exchange. You never know when it'll come in handy. When it does, Contacts makes the person easy to find.

Use Palm Desktop

Palm Desktop is a great, quick way to enter contact info. Type in info on your PC and sync to your handheld when you're done.

Auto-complete

When you enter letters in the Title, Company, City, and State fields, a match will appear if one of your contacts has a similar field name. When the word you want appears, tap the next field. (Note that auto-complete doesn't work if you're using the onscreen keyboard.)

Enter info

Order is important

If a contact has several phone numbers, the first one you enter becomes the main phone number. When you first open Contacts, that's the number that appears in list view. To see additional numbers , tap the contact.

Change the order

Have a friend who prefers to be called on his cell phone? Customize his info to make that number appear in list view. Select the contact, tap Edit > Details , and pick the number from Show in List .

Duplicate to save time

To quickly add people who work in the same office or live together, use Duplicate Contact to save time. Go to the contact you want to duplicate and select Duplicate Contact from the menu. The information appears in the Contact Edit mode so you can edit fields that are unique, such as the name, job title, email, and phone extension.

Enter addresses

Open Contacts and tap New . Tap any field to set the cursor.
Enter the info. Write the tab character ( ) in the writing area to jump down to the next field.

Add fields

If you want to add an instant-messaging address or you just run out of room in a contact, open the contact and tap Edit . Tap the blue + icon and pick the type of field to add.

Find contacts

Use Look Up, at the bottom of list view, to find a contact fast. Or use Find to search by area code.

Auto caps

In Contacts, the first word in all fields except numeric and email fields is automatically capitalized.

Type your entries

Don't forget your onscreen keyboard! Filling in some fields with handwriting can be frustrating, especially for email addresses and URLs, which require special characters . Write ( ) to quickly call up the keyboard. To get symbols such as @, tap the 123 box at the bottom of the keyboard screen (see page 39).

Icon to look for

Address fields

Want to keep track of your sister's home, business, and beach house addresses? Each contact can have up to three addresses. Designate an address as work (W), home (H), or other (O). By default, the first address is designated as work (W). To add another address for a contact, tap the blue + icon at the bottom of the screen and select Address .

Beam contacts

Beam the info for one of your contacts by selecting Record > Beam Contact or by using the beaming command ( ). To beam an entire category, select it from the pick list at the upper right and select Record > Beam Category .