But I'm trying to at least get a cut down version happening.

I've been working on the Address Control (which is admittedly fairly complex, but I thought it's a main field of an address card... surely?), and I thought that the layout code was just about done. But to my shock / horror / anger the control failed to layout correctly in the FlowLayOut Panel!! But only when the preceding control had a FlowBreak applied...

So, off to search the internet for an answer... and very quickly discovered that Yauhen Safrankou had only recently solved the same problem. Well, in fact, the problem was "solved" by LewisG over at Windows Forms General: Flowlayoutpanel flowbreak bug. It creates unwanted empty space.

To quote Yauhen:

It seems the height of the gap is the same as the height of the second control following after the flow break. And the workaround to get rid of the gap is to add an additional panel of zero size just after the flow break.

Quoted from Workaround an old bug in FlowBreak of FlowLayoutPanel (at Friday, 24 December 2010 12:13:13 AM).

The internet is a wonderful thing when it works

So it seemed natural to include those abilities into ContactFX as our relationships are often much more complex than our spreadsheets.

I discussed in this post about field linking: that's the ability to include values from other fields and other contacts (even contacts from other file locations) into the contact data.

Functions add the ability to manipulate the linked data.

Current Functions

Initialise
Return the upper case initial letter plus a period (".")

{ INITIALISE name.additional }

If the text in the Additional Name field is "perry" the above function will return "P."

{ INITIALISE "some string" }

Will return "S."

UCase
Return the upper case of the string.

{ UCASE 1#name.family }

If the text in the Family Name field of Contact #1 is "mowbray" the above function will return "MOWBRAY"

{ UCASE "thiS Is a MiXeD sTrInG" }

This will return "THIS IS A MIXED STRING"

Join
This is a conditional join: if the object being joined is non-blank then it is joined to the previous joined result with the constant.

{ JOIN ', ' [ "me" , name.additional , { UCASE name.additional(2) } ] }

If the text in the first Additional Name is "myself" and the text in the second Additional Name field is "i" then the above function will return "me, myself, I"

{ JOIN ' :: ' [ "me" , "" , "you" ] }

Will return "me :: you".

Ternary
Well, like a ternary... if the Object is blank then the constant is returned otherwise the Object is returned.

{ name.additional ?? 'Additional Name is empty' }

If the Additional Name field is empty then the above function will return the constant "Additional Name is empty".

{ "" ?? 'Empty String' }

Will return "Empty String".

Conditional Pad
Pad the string with a constant if the string is not blank.

{ 'Mr. ' && name.family}

If the text in the Family Name field is empty the above function will return an empty string "".

If the Family Name field has the text "Mowbray" the above function will return "Mr. Mowbray"

{ name.family && ' esq.'}

If the text in the Family Name field is empty the above function will return an empty string "".

If the Family Name field has the text "Mowbray" the above function will return "Mowbray esq."

A real life example

{ { JOIN ' ' [ name.given , { INITIALISE name.additional } , { UCASE name.family } ] } ?? 'New Entry' }" />

When entered into the displayName field:
When

• Given Name = "Perry"
• Additional Name = ""
• Family Name = "Mowbray"

Then
Display Name will display: "Perry MOWBRAY"

When

• Given Name = "Sandra"
• Additional Name = "Jane"
• Family Name = "Mowbray"

Then
Display Name = "Sandra J. MOWBRAY"

Some other files that you can play with have been posted over on DonationCoder.

There will be two methods of linking or rehashing contact data:

1. Field Source
2. Link Fields

I'll leave Link Fields for another time and concentrate on Field Source for now...

ContactFX allows you to use the field value of another field, either from the same contact or a different contact (and eventually even a different addressbook) to the field being edited. The Contact / Field is specified using a source string.

To demonstrate the functionality I've set up two fictitious contacts, Sandi and Perry. The data from Sandi's record being displayed on Perry's record. Sandi's record has been set up with Given, Additional and Family names, I've added an extra Additional name and changed the label to Maiden Name:

Perry's record has his own Given and Family names plus links to Sandi's Formatted Name, middle name and her maiden name:

Links can be created by using the Link Effect when dragging and dropping:

...or by typing directly into the Field's text box (link source must be prefaced with an equals character "="). Once links are created they will update automatically when the contact is opened or manually using the Refresh button on the menu. Source links can reference fields that are themselves referencing other fields, and so on...

Sandi's Formatted Name demonstrates linking to the same contact's fields:

Link references can be in the form:

• ContactID#FieldID
• ContactID#FieldName
• ContactID#FieldName( index )
• ContactGUID can be used instead if ContactID

When dragging and dropping ContactID & ControlID are used:

The "wife's middle name" field demonstrates a typed-in link in ContactGUID#FieldName format:

The "Sandi's Maiden name" field demonstrates using the FieldName() format. Because multiple "Additional Name" fields were used, this format gives the ability to reference a particular field.

Note that the label on that field linked to Sandi's dislayname:

ContactFX does simple error checking on the source string and highlights the first problem area. The following example shows a misspelt function name:

To run the application just download, unzip and run... the application should perform properly in portable mode.

At the moment all you can do is:

• Addressbook
  
  • Create a new contact
    
    • Add fields to the Contact by dragging from the Control Pallet
      
      • Edit the fields
        
        • Add values
        • Edit labels (via context menu)
          
          • Set width
          • Set layout (fill width | add linebreak )
          • save it back to the addressbook
  • Open thus created contacts to view or edit
• Settings
  
  • Change the few settings that are currently available (more will come)
• About
  
  • Show the About window
  • Follow some of the links

ContactFX is designed to be flexible by the user, with as few "rules" about how to set out any Contact. So although I've designated some suitable uses for the various parts of the Contact window, they wont be enforced in any way: each Contact's layout could be unique if that's what you wanted. Hopefully it'll become clearer when I've got a bit more functionality implemented, but I hope you get the idea.

I'm keen for comments and suggestion!

There had been some discussion over at DonationCoder.com, but it's taken me a little while to get to it.

I'm hoping that 1.4.1 fixes both the recent bugs: it seems to on my machine, so fingers crossed!

One bug was the codepage of the javascript file was accidentally set to UTC-8 and XP disliked that.

Download here: TimeZone Website


Leave comments here or discuss over at DonationCoder.com.

FARR will be providing Desktop integration including searching contacts, adding contacts and other actions with the contact data (emails, maps, urls, etc). So I wanted to at least get a bare bone working, just to relieve the nerves

This is not what the final FARRCfx will look like, but just my initial foray to get a link between ContactFX data and FARRCfx:
FARRCfx Menu

Display Contact

FARRCfx will display ContactFX data in the FARR HTML window. Each card will be displayed using HTML in a format similar to how they are designed in the main application: i.e. each card can be unique with it's own layout, sorting order, TABS, sections and colours, etc.

The HTML will have the usual functionality that will include: mailto links; hyper-links to webpages, maps, etc; micro-format integration including hCard, XFN, hCalendar, etc.

This will be the same format that will be used for HTML Export (for storing on a USB for example).

I actually started with FarrContacts, which got shortened to fc and had an x added for xml... therefore fcx.

Then I realised that even although Farr was going to be an important part of the development it wasn't critical.

It was the Contacts that was the central part... but I wanted to keep the xml and farr as they were both important... and they sort of merged into Effects!

So Cfx :: Contacts Effects works pretty well for me

But it's just a name after all...

For a long time I've attempted to use Open Contacts, which, by the way, I think is a very good programme, it just never seemed to click with me. I think it is the interface, because the functionality, in many respects, is pretty much what I'm aiming at too. In fact the Open Contacts "Big Picture" is very similar to my overview.

The Open Contacts Big Picture

The Proposed Cfx Requirements

Not that I'm basing Cfx on Open Contacts in any way; OC is just the closest application I found to what I wanted in an Address Book.

Why on earth make a new one?
Probably the main reason is that I've wanted to for some time because I didn't want my address book to be based somewhere else (FaceBook, Google Contacts, etc), and the next is NANY 2011 has given me the impetus

But apart from that I'm hoping to make these general additions / improvements:

• Flexible import and export: very easy to get contacts both in and out of Cfx.
• Off-line access: not dependant on a website or web application.
• Non-Cfx dependant search [e.g. via FARR]: FARR integration will give Cfx very flexible system integration on the desktop.
• Non-Cfx dependant access [e.g. via HTML on USB]: can take address book anywhere and access just via a browser.