I’m exploring how I can use Agenda to replace my CRM - see thread here. I’ve been experimenting with Agenda and the Mac Contacts app.
Dragging a contact from Contacts to an Agenda note results in an icon of a contact. Clicking on the icon brings up various options including ‘Open’. If I open the contact it results in Contacts App offering to import the contact, and warning it will create a duplicate. I’ve tried control dragging, with the same result.
For my use, it would be great if the contact preview opened the relevant contact in Contacts so I could easily email, call etc.
Also, if I ‘quicklook’ at the icon, it merely displays another icon, with no contact details!
It would be great if this could be addressed, and also linked with the People tag.
The quicklook aspects are not really in our control. It is up to Contacts to provide a relevant preview.
Perhaps what you are after is more a link, than an attachment. Have you tried holding down control when you drop the contact? Does that give you a clickable link?
A link is exactly what I want! Unfortunately control dragging the contact doesnt’ create a link. This would be really helpful in my quest to use Agenda as a (quasi)CRM. Until Agenda People tags provide similar functionality!
I guess Contacts app doesn’t provide us with a link, otherwise holding control should work. Looks like special handling is needed for contacts. May end up falling under the People + Contacts integration.
Has there been any progress with linking to a contact? It would be a great feature but it still doesn’t seem to work. Clicking on the conact should open that contact (without an error messge about creating a duplicate) and opening a contact should simply bring up that contact. Am I perhaps missing something?
Thanks,
Chuck
Okay, Thanks. I am “patiently waiting impatiently”
Just a note on this topic:
I tried accessing a linked contact on the iphone version and it seemed to work just fine (i.e no “create a new contact message” & it simply brought up the linked contact).
On my end, I tried adding a contact with Share extension to Agenda. This is what happened:
From iPhone to Mac
On my iPhone 8+, iOS 14.4.2, Agenda 13 (182): From Cardhop
Works. An icon is added to the note. If I click on it within Agenda (i.e. without switching programs) the contact opens with all data and profile photo.
From ContactsXL
Works as above.
From Contacts.app
Only the vCard file is inserted as plain text. Since the contact has a photo, this results in about 2.5 m of text to scroll… The first time I tried this, Agenda crashed.
I synced this agenda note with my Mac (macOS 10.14.6, Agenda 13 (182))
The contacts inserted from Cardhop or ContactsXL on my Mac behave the same:
Only a thumbnail of the contact is displayed. Double clicking on it wants to add this contact to Contacts.app or BusyContacts.
Quicklook does not open the contact, it shows a preview window with a lock in the icon, so it is locked and does not show any contact information. If the contact contains a profile picture, at least it is displayed.
The contact coming from the native Contacts.app shows the same long vCard text.
From Mac to iPhone
The other way round: contacts are inserted on the Mac side and synced with the iPhone:
BusyContacts unfortunately does not support sharing capabilities for non-Apple applications.
Cardhop has a sharing feature. I can select the note in Agenda to save the contact to and click „insert“. Then the window freezes, I can’t click „Cancel“ or „Save“. I have to shoot down the process „Agenda : Cardhop“. Nevertheless the usual but unfortunately useless 2,5m vCard text is inserted.
Contacts.app shows the same behavior here as Cardhop.
I don’t have a chance to try this thing on the iPad right now.
Conclusion: No possibility for boredom for you. Or the feeling that Agenda is now finished…
Thanks for the detailed investigation. I guess we probably want to recognize contacts on the clipboard, and insert a link, rather than a vcard or whatever.
Actually, did you try that, at least on the Mac? Did you try holding CTRL as you drop? Should give a link. Maybe that will work better.
Holding CTRL while dragging on a Mac to Agenda did a better job. No vCard mess this time but a nice preview of the contact. Though, while showing the preview of it, I will only get this somehow meaningless picture.
Agree that is a pretty meaningless picture. We don’t have any control over that preview. We just call up the QuickLook panel. Do you see anything different if you preview the VCF in Finder, for example?
Forgive me for posting in an old thread but it touches on a very important issue for me. I’m a new Agenda user but have quickly become impressed by the intelligent design and consistent user interface across the macOS and iOS versions. Clearly the developers think the way I think, which is great. I’ve been seeking a notes app that integrates with my use of the Fantastical calendar and Good Task for reminders, and Agenda does this perfectly.
For me what would make Agenda a perfect app that I could almost run my life from would be integration with the Contacts app. Without contacts it feels there’s a piece missing. However having read the thread above I can at least add a link to my Agenda notes from the Contacts app. My experience is as follows:
On macOS -
With the Control key pressed I drag a contact from the Contacts app and drop it into a note. It creates a link with the contact’s name. The example below shows my local Ford dealership in the UK, Hine Motors Shaftesbury (This data is in the public domain). The link in Agenda looks like this:
If I double-click that link I’m asked if I want to add it to Contacts, which of course I don’t because it’s already in there. However if I right-click the link and choose Open With… → TextEdit i get a text view of the Vcard. Sure, it doesn’t show the photo but if I just quickly need to check the address this works for me.
On iOS -
If I double-tap that Vcard link in Agenda on my iPhone it immediately opens the contact in the Contacts app just like I would expect, so I can phone the contact in the usual way. Note that as far as I can tell this is still just the read-only Vcard so I can’t edit the contact but it gives me a workaround where at least I can add a contact to the Agenda note on my Mac, and then later when I’m out on the road I can pull up that note on my phone and call the contact.
Thanks for providing such a detailed report on how you use Agenda with contacts and what works and doesn’t work. We still have direct integration with the Contacts app very high up on our own wishlist too!
