[ ayttm-Feature Requests-990826 ] Confusing GUI for merging contacts

Feature Requests item #990826, was opened at 2004-07-14 07:31
Message generated for change (Comment added) made by vancel35
You can respond by visiting: 
https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=550747&aid=990826&group_id=77614

Category: None
Group: None
Status: Open
Priority: 5
Submitted By: Fatman (fatman_uk)
Assigned to: Nobody/Anonymous (nobody)
Summary: Confusing GUI for merging contacts

Initial Comment:
I have seen other chat clients where it is possible to
merge two or more contacts into a "meta-contact" [as
Trillian would have it]. I don't think I've seen one
quite as confusing as Ayttm's, though.

Firstly, it's not obvious which contact to right-click
on. The difference between "account" and "contact"
isn't made clear, so the "add contact" window is very
confusing.

I have three different contacts [or accounts?] for one
of my RL friends. How do I merge them? Where do they
end up? And what do the colours on the cubes mean?

I know I could probably work it out by RTFM, but most
users are lazy and will just delete the app instead.
IMHO the GUI should be reasonably easy to work out
without the manual.

Maybe you guys could add helpful tooltips or something?
Thanks for reading this.

Hope you can help,
[Great proggie btw! :) ]
Fatman

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Comment By: Laura Vance (vancel35)
Date: 2004-08-12 12:11

Message:
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The thing that probably happened is what happens to me
sometimes.  When I add an account to a contact, I sometimes
forget to select the protocol.  I've had them end up as ICQ
sometimes (green is ICQ).

To move an account from one contact to another (in the event
that you have two contacts that are the same person and you
want to file all of their accounts into a single AYTTM
contact).  All you have to do is the following:

("from" is used to indicate the contact name that the
account is moving from, and "to" is used for the one it is
moving "to".)

1. right-click on the account that you wish to move and
select "Edit Account".
2. In the window that comes up, you'll notice a "Contact
Name" "Group Name" and "Local Account".
3. If necessary, change the Group Name first if the "to"
contact group is different from the "from" contact group.
4. Once the correct group name is selected, click the
drop-down for the contact name and pick the "to" contact.
5. click save, and you'll notice that the old contact is
gone and the new contact now has multiple accounts under it.

To use the visual example from plasmoidia:
alignment before:
-Buddies
|-Jane
||-jmt982 (AIM account)
|
-Friends
 -Jane
 |-janemt (yahoo account)

alignment after:
-Buddies
-Friends
 -Jane
 |-janemt (yahoo account)
 |-jmt982 (AIM account)

Each protocol has their default groups that basically mean
the same thing.  AIM calls a group "buddies" that Yahoo
calls "Friends", etc.  So if you have a contact under the
"Buddies" group and you want to move them to the other one,
that's when moving the group becomes important.

Once you've done it a couple of times, it's a breeze.
Laura

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Comment By: Fatman (fatman_uk)
Date: 2004-07-26 18:37

Message:
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Hi plasmoidia,
Thanks for the clarification. I was intrigued however to
note that when I added an account to a contact and that
account was already present as an individual contact, the
colour of the account added to the contact was green instead
of [I think it was red]. Perhaps this signifies that I've
added a duplicate account. :) 
Not that I would change the colour coded cubes themselves, I
think they're fantastic.
Fatman

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Comment By: Jonathan Berry (plasmoidia)
Date: 2004-07-25 21:57

Message:
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user_id=895021

Hi Fatman,
Yes, I agree that the distinction between a contact and an 
account can be confusing.  A contact is an actual person (or 
virtual person, if you wish) that has one or more accounts 
under it.  The accounts are the actual names used by the IM 
services.  Contacts are shown under the groups in the tree 
list, and acounts are under them.  The contact name is like 
an alias in other clients (or "meta-contact" in Trillian, as you 
said).  To add accounts to a contact, you can right click that 
contact and click "Add Account to Contact" or in the "Add 
Contact" window, click on the contact drop down list and 
select the contact name.  To alias the contact, right click on 
the contact and click "Edit Contact" and change the contact 
name.  Groups are the top level of the tree, contacts are on 
the next level, and accounts on the next level, such as:
- Group1
 L - Contact1
 |  L Account1
 |  L Account2
 L + Contact2
The colors of the "cubes" for the accounts indicate which 
protocol the account uses, and the one for the contact 
indicates the default protocol (changed in the "Edit Contact" 
window).  Red is for MSN, blue for AIM, yellow (or brown?) for 
Yahoo!, etc.
Hope this helps.
plasmoidia


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