iMessage not displaying Contact Names

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Level 1

12 points

iMessage not displaying Contact Names

I have a clean install of Mac OS X High Sierra on a MBP. iCloud is set up with contacts enabled:

In Contacts -> Preferences and System Preferences -> Language & Region both are set correctly to Australia:

All my iCloud Contacts synchronise without issue. However in iMessage no contact names are appearing - I get either 'Maybe [Contact Name] or the number only:

What is interesting is the little circle next to the conversation is showing the correct Contact Initial/Initials, it's just not displaying the Contact Name. Any suggestions?

I don't want to have to go into each contact separately and add the country code prefix if I can help it.

MacBook Pro, macOS High Sierra (10.13.2)

Posted on Jan 2, 2018 5:51 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Ralph-Johns-UK

Level 9

76,795 points

Jan 10, 2018 2:28 PM in response to njleach2

Hi,

I don't want to have to go into each contact separately and add the country code prefix if I can help it.

It may be your only choice although I do believe there are Automator items out there that will check your Contacts.

If you don't use FaceTime very much you might have some success in Launching it and setting the Location in the Preferences.

FaceTime and Messages uses some of the same files and this may be enough.

I have not had this issue as I took a MacBook Pro ver1,1 (2006) to France a couple of years ago and had to add the Country Code to Contact that were still At Home.

My FaceTime has always been set to the UK.

The issue is caused by the fact the OS can no longer write to the file that used to hold the location info for Messages

It has not existed since Sierra but some people don't seem to come across the issue until they Update or Upgrade.

10:28 pm Wednesday; January 10, 2018

 iMac 2.5Ghz i5 2011 (Sierra)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 iPhone 6 iOS 11.x and an iPad (2)

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