Lion's Address Book - A WARNING

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Level 2

198 points

Lion's Address Book - A WARNING

for those upgrading to the latest version of osx ("lion"), a word of warning. prepare to groan over some annoying changes to ical. but when you launch the new address book, be careful. your first impulse, like mine, may be to jump out the nearest window.

apple's later rev to address book is a TOTAL DISASTER. and just to be clear: the problem is not the ugly "leather" cover (but make no mistake: it is ugly) or the misguided and juvenile attempt to mimic a real-world object (for the sake, one assumes, of simplicity and ease of use). the problem is that the "updated" functionality of the address book *****. it is both harder to use and less useful than its predecessor.

being able to see groups, people, and their data at the same time is essential to easily modify and browse the address book. now not only do i have a more difficult click-path to navigate my contacts, but i have to hold in memory (my memory) the context of what i am looking at.

the old address book, while not perfect by any means, helped me organize and use my contacts. the new address books makes it significantly more difficult. in this age of social networking where people and connections are fundamental to how we work and play on the web, is this really the best apple could do? TOTAL FAIL, APPLE.

iMac / iBook / iPhone, Mac OS X (10.5.2)

Posted on Jul 31, 2011 11:30 AM

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Answer 1

Jul 31, 2011 11:32 AM in response to markmal

If you have concerns about the new look in either iCal or Address Book you would do better to send Apple feedback about how you feel: apple.com/feedback

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Answer 2

macjack

Level 10

111,168 points

Jul 31, 2011 11:35 AM in response to markmal

Yes, many of us are scratching our heads over AddressBook. Just search the subject on these forums.

Send Apple Feedback

or, file an ER (enhancement request)/bug report on the issue.

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Answer 3

Jul 31, 2011 11:38 AM in response to markmal

I don't care about the aesthetics much. But I agree that there should be an option to see Groups->List->Individual Data. The new format is nice for casual home users, but makes my job - and life - more tedious.

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Answer 4

markmal Author

Level 2

198 points

Jul 31, 2011 11:45 AM in response to AppleGeek1990

i have of course done this. (given feedback.)

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Answer 5

Aug 27, 2011 5:39 PM in response to markmal

In light of the other UI changes in Lion taking on a more subdued, toned-down appearance, this decision to make Address Book an iCal look so garish makes no sense. I agree on all points about the loss of usability in these applications.

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Answer 6

mejudy

Level 1

95 points

Aug 27, 2011 6:52 PM in response to markmal

I just installed Lion today & I find that the address book works fine. I just clicked on the red ribbon bookmark & my entire list of groups opened up. Go to the opposite page & drag whatever name you want into the correct group.

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Answer 7

Aug 27, 2011 6:57 PM in response to mejudy

Sure, it works. But it doesn't work as well as it used to. In Snow Leopard and earlier, one could see the Groups list, the list of members of the selected group, and the selected individual contact all at the same time.

It's now necessary to repeatedly swap between two different views while working with Address Book information, and it can't all be seen at a glance.

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Answer 8

Aug 28, 2011 4:53 AM in response to markmal

It's horrible! Apple please bring back the old version.

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Answer 9

bd525

Level 1

0 points

Aug 29, 2011 10:46 AM in response to markmal

I agree with every criticism posted here. The new Address Book is horribly, epicly bad! PLEASE, Apple, keep the silly new look if you must, but bring back the clarity, simplicity and usability of the earlier version.

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Answer 10

macjack

Level 10

111,168 points

Aug 29, 2011 11:05 AM in response to bd525

bd525 wrote:

epicly bad!

LOL! Best one I've heard since, "galatically moronic" 😁

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Answer 11

Aug 29, 2011 1:24 PM in response to markmal

I have just restored SL and abandoned Lion as I could not stand the address book being a heavy user of the three pane functionality. The only way to resolve this at the moment is through a gimmicky solution: opening 2 instances of address book side by side.

It is really puzzling to see how Apple managed to make the already worse native application in Mac even more abysmal.

There is a substantial worsening of functionalities as highlighted time and time again in comments here, in Twitter and in all Lion reviews that care to include the address book (not all do!).

In address book I would be looking to resolve these issues:

1- Revert to original 3 pane view (was available in SL)

2-Allow creation of new contacts directly in a group (was available in SL)

3- Restore the counter present for every folder to give number of entries in a given group (now you have to scroll to the bottom of the group to see it) (was available in SL)

4- Restore the icon to distinguish entries between company/person (was available in SL)

5- Possibility of removing of alphabetical letter grouping of entries

6- Option to change leather skin (revert to SL clean look)

7-When you check to see what groups a contact belongs to (by hitting the Option key while the contact is selected), the groups used to be clearly highlighted in bright yellow in OSX 10.6, but now the font just slightly changes colour from black to dark blue.

and desirable improvements:

8-Allow font selection to facilitate reading and page display and reduce waste of space (was not available in SL)

9-Option to display contacts in table view for quick bulk editing (was not available in SL)

10-Show which (smart) group each contact belongs to on the contact’s page (was not available in SL)

11-Facilitate the creation of a new contact from the same company (i.e a colleague) without having to copy across most details (was not available in SL)

12-The find duplicates function is as bad as it was--no chance to see the duplicates and choose which to keep or whether to combine.

It really seems Apple has given over the app to develop to some kids that could not think of anything better than making a book view. There are, unfortunately, no serious apps to compensate for this in the app store, address book is a real disaster with Lion. So developers should quickly step in!

Last point: Apple has not even bothered to de-bug the previous version and replicated the same bug that has been around for over 2 years: if you want to print a set of contacts (company type) that belong to a group in list mode and you want to see the name of the person along with the company basic request!) you cannot do that. By selecting “Name” in the print dialog list, the “Introduced by” appears instead. This I have written to Apple about 2 years ago and told the “geniuses” countless times... Pathetic.

Please can we at least have the SL version of the address book back?

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Answer 12

Sep 1, 2011 10:18 AM in response to markmal

I am not alone.... I am not alone.

Goodness, the "new" Address Book is a quantum step back. Who'd a thunk losing one pane could create some many more, such bigger pains.

Seriously, beloved Apple, what were you thinking? Were you thinking? This wasn't a step forward.

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Answer 13

Sep 1, 2011 12:37 PM in response to eventhedogshaveipods

Agreed. This looks like something from Microsoft circa 1998. It is now unnecessarily difficult to get to the information. A 3-pane display would solve most issues I have.

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Answer 14

Sep 2, 2011 7:30 PM in response to Graflin Booth

Graflin Booth wrote:

Agreed. This looks like something from Microsoft circa 1998. It is now unnecessarily difficult to get to the information. A 3-pane display would solve most issues I have.

Agreed. Apple is the last company I expect to repeat mistakes like this from the 90s.

See also the disaster that was IBM realphone.

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Answer 15

Sep 19, 2011 1:11 PM in response to markmal

Agreed, Lion’s address book is a colossal catastrophe, reduced to a miserable Rolodex that is acceptable to grandparents andself-mutilating masochists alone! I bought a volume install of Lion from apple,but wish that I did not.

I keep over2500 contacts for business and have enjoyed the simple yet efficient interfaceof Mac address book for several years. This and the dependability ofsynchronization is precisely why I abandoned outlook, PC, and Palm Pilot sohappily in 2007. After Lion, I suddenly I find myself wondering, has outlookgotten better while I’ve been away? In light of Steve Jobs departure, would Ibe better off with a PC? Should I be looking at the Droid instead of waitingfor the iPhone 5?

Apple, are these the first pangs of a paradigm shift? Shouldwe now expect changes that are improvement in neither form nor function, but looselyveiled attempts to boost the budget in the third and fourth quarter? To whom doyou intend to cater; the stockholder, the competition, or the consumer? If youchoose the consumer, you will find Apple Inc. leading yet another generation.If you choose another, you will find yourself struggling to keep pace with thealready greedy whims of the less visionary.

-Disappointed and watching

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