Ovi Contacts Updated: Finally gets Touch Support

Ovi Contacts (the application formerly known as Nokia Chat, Ovi chat and then Contacts on Ovi), now finally has Touch Support for S60 V5 devices.

With Ovi Contacts, you can let your friends know what you are doing and where you are. You can also check your friends’ status messages to see what your friends are up to. Ovi Contacts is all about keeping in touch with people who matter.

If you have used Nokia Chat you will find Ovi Contacts mobile application familiar. Key features: (note: supported features depend on the platform)

• Presence: Let your friends know if you are available, busy or on the phone. Check your friends’ availability.
• Enhanced presence: You can share – or hide – your favorite places with your friends. You can also let your friends know what you are listening.
• Chat: Get in touch with your friends with chat. Convey your messages with emotions and share your location on the map via chat.

If you have an N97, you have one extra “feature” on Ovi Contacts. You have the ability to integrate your instant messaging friends with the contact cards in your traditional contact list. By doing this, you can see the presence status of your friends in the main phonebook tab too.

Here’s how you can do it:

1. Select the contact you want to link from the Ovi Contacts tab
2. Choose either create new or update existing (depending on if you have the contact in your main phonebook tab already or not)
3. Update the details, and you’re done

Also, if you use the Favourite Contacts feature in N97, you’ll be able to see when your friends are online directly from the device home screen.

Apparently they’ve also made improvements to the contact list management system, so that the other Ovi services may later on utilize the same friend list. About time.

There’s also apparently an updated version out for S40 and S60 3rd Edition clients too.

You can download the update by heading to Contacts.Ovi.com/dist/app on your Nokia Device.

For some strange reason, the site keeps telling me my N97 is an incompatible device and hence I cant actually download the file. Hopefully they’ll fix this soon !