Introducing Maemo 5 (Part 1): Contacts on the Nokia N900

Maemo 5 introduces a number of new features to Nokia’s range of devices, with the N900.

One of them, is the amazing Contacts (Phonebook) app that does a great job of integrating all your Facebook, Twitter, Gtalk, Skype (among many other services) and IM contacts alongwith your standard Phone contacts.

Here’s more about it.

Like we mentioned earlier, Maemo 5 does an amazing job of integrating all your contacts.

All your Phonebook entires, IM contacts (from Gtalk, etc) along with their email address, Facebook and Twitter contacts (provided you install the plugin), all appear here in this list.

Their Display pictures (if they have any) are automatically pulled in from the service they’re from, and if your availability is set to “Online” (or “Busy”, as long as you’re online), you’ll see little green dots to let you know which contacts are online on their service. Ofcourse the “Dot” color changes to let you know if they’re busy or idle. And if you’re offline (that is, not connected to any online network) these “Dots” disappear.

But like we said, this all depends on your “Online Status“.

As you can see in the screenshot above, you can set your status to Online, Busy or Offline. Offline disconnects you from all IM Services, as the name suggests.

You can also set a Status message which will be pushed to all your services, or allow these services to access your Location Data (if they support it).

Below that, is a scrollable list of all the Services you’ve subscribed to.

We’ve been mentioning “Services” a lot. Like we mentioned the N900 does have support for various services (like Gtalk, Skype) out of the box. If you want to add more, all you have to do is look through the Maemo App repository (or Ovi Store) for the “Pidgin Protocols Plugin“.

What this plugin does is, add all the services that arnt already on the N900. It adds this “support” to both the Contacts app as well as the Conversations (Messaging) app among a couple others.

It’s a tiny install at just 148kb, and integrates so well with the Maemo OS that you wouldnt even notice it’s there. There’s no extra icon in your Menu, or the apps list, just more service options appear in your “Voip and IM” accounts list.

Coming to the “Voip and IM” accounts list, Maemo 5 (or atleast the N900) has one section in its settings menu, where you enter in all your services.

As you can see, there’s quite the amount of services there.

Adding an account is as easy as tapping on the Service name, and entering your Username and Password.

Then all you have to do is sign in once.

The N900 remembers your username and password and from then on, and the Sign-in process is controlled directly from the “Availability” option we spoke about earlier in this post.

After that’s completed (takes a second or two depending on your Internet connection), you’ll see your service listed in the Voip and IM account list.

You’ll see it’s status as “Signed in” usually, and the contacts from that account pulled in and listed in your contacts app.

Of course, if you dont wish those contacts to appear in your list, just “Sign Out” from that particular service. For example, I have way too many people on my twitter list, so I’ve chosen not to Sign in for that account, unless I really have to, and as a result it doesnt pull in my Twitter contacts.

If these werent good enough ways to “get” your contacts on your N900, you can also choose to “Get Contacts” from another device or service.

You can sync with another device, Import Contacts from a Service, Copy from a Sim card or just Import Contacts from a File.

Not bad eh ?

It’s worth mentioning the Contacts App also has “Groups” support, allows you to set your own information, and also allows you to export your contacts.

Under “Settings” you can also choose how to arrange your Contacts. By Default it’s “First Name, Last Name” but you can change this if needed.

You can also arrange your Contacts by “All” or choose to arrange them by Who’s Online (or “Available” as mentioned earlier) or by whom you recently interacted with.

Now you might think all these “Pulling in Contacts from Services” might create a lot of Duplicate Contacts. Well, it does, but to counter that, Maemo 5 allows you to “Merge Contacts“.

It’s as easy as selecting the name of a Contact, and choosing “Merge Contact“, which allows you to choose and Merge with any Duplicate Contacts if present. Select “Done” and they’re all nicely merged into one, with all their details added in. For example, I merged a Friends Facebook, Gtalk, Twitter and Phone number accounts and now have all those details listed under his name.

Coming back to the Contacts App itself, there’s Kinetic Scrolling implemented everywhere in Maemo 5, so all you have to do to scroll though the list, is touch and drag/slide/flick.

You can also begin typing a name on the N900′s keyboard to narrow down the list of contacts.

Adding a contact couldnt be easier. You can either use the Dial Pad to enter in a new contact, or if they happen to be in your recently called list, add them from there too.

Ofcourse you can choose to Merge this new Number with an already present Contact too, if you have to. Otherwise just tap the “New Contact” icon to add them to your list.

Apart from their name and number, you can also add their Email Address, AIM account, Gadu Gadu Account :

Or their Google Talk, ICQ, Jabber, Msn (Haze), QQ Accounts :

Or their SIP, Skype, Yahoo accounts (in addition to Facebook, Twitter, etc). You can also add their Birthday, or Address (which will show it to you in Ovi Maps if you’ve saved it).

And if that wasnt enough, you can also add their webpage (or Blog), Gender (incase you need to be reminded if your friend is a dude or a dudette), Nickname, Job title, Company, etc etc etc (or Blah Blah blah).

Yeah, there’s lots of fields you can assign to a contact.

Here’s a short video to show you more about how Contacts on Maemo 5 look and work on the Nokia N900 :

So as you can see, we werent kidding when we said Maemo 5 does a great job of integrating all your contacts.

Have any questions about Contacts on the N900 ? Something we missed ? Do let us know in the comments y’all !