Add person to group in Address Book?

[SReubart]

I’m working on a script to do some special imports of data into the Address Book. Most things work fine. However, I can’t figure out the syntax for adding a person to a group. Should I “make new person at end of group xxx” or use the “add” command to add a “child” record? I’ve not been able to find out much about this anywhere else. Anyone have any ideas? Any code samples? Thanks!!

[Rob]

This might work:

set group_name to "Test Group"

tell application "Address Book"
	set new_ to make new person at end of group group_name
	tell new_
		set first name to "Fool"
		set last name to "Hardy"
	end tell
end tell

– Rob

[SReubart]

Rob,

Thanks for the info. That worked to add new people records, but I wanted to link already-existing people records to existing groups. The answer turned out to be more obvious than I thought:

tell application “Address Book”
add ExistingPerson to ExistingGroup
end tell

Boy, do I feel dumb…this seems so simple. But I had to experiment to make sure the “add” command syntax was correct.

[jonn8]

This works for me as long as there is at least one custom group defined. The only issue I have found is that the group doesn’t update until I quit and relaunch Address Book:

–Click here to open this script in a new Script Editor window.

property search_name : “”
property group_name : “”

repeat
set search_name to text returned of ¬
(display dialog “What is the name you want to search for:” default answer search_name buttons {“Cancel”, “Search”} default button 2 with icon 1)
try
set {the_names, the_people, the_groups} to [color=green]get_info/color
if the_groups = {} then
beep
(display dialog (“No groups were found.”) buttons {“OK”} default button 1 with icon 2)
exit repeat
end if
set the_person to (choose from list the_names) as string
if the_person = “false” then exit repeat
repeat with i from 1 to count of the_names
if the_person = item i of the_names then exit repeat
end repeat
set the_person to item i of the_people
set group_name to (choose from list the_groups with prompt “Add this person to group:”) as string
if group_name = “false” then exit repeat
tell application “Address Book” to add the_person to group group_name
exit repeat
on error
beep
if button returned of ¬
(display dialog (“No matches were found for “” & search_name & “.” Search for a new name?”) buttons {“No”, “Yes”} default button 2 with icon 2) ¬
= “No” then exit repeat
end try
end repeat

on [color=green]get_info/color
tell application “Address Book”
set the_groups to name of groups
set the_names to {}
set the_people to every person whose last name = the_name
repeat with the_person in the_people
tell the_person to set end of the_names to name
end repeat
end tell
return {the_names, the_people, the_groups}
end get_info

Jon

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[This script was automatically tagged for color coded syntax by Script to Markup Code]

[Rob]

The only issue I have found is that the group doesn’t update until I quit and relaunch Address Book:

Jon,

Does the ‘save addressbook’ command force the update?

– Rob

[jonn8]

Yes, that works, great catch, Rob. Here is a revised script including a slight revision to the search routine to return names that contain the search string, not just exact matches of the last name:

–Click here to open this script in a new Script Editor window.

property search_name : “”
property group_name : “”

repeat
set search_name to text returned of ¬
(display dialog “What is the name you want to search for:” default answer search_name buttons {“Cancel”, “Search”} default button 2 with icon 1)
try
set {the_names, the_people, the_groups} to [color=green]get_info/color
if the_groups = {} then
beep
(display dialog (“No groups were found.”) buttons {“OK”} default button 1 with icon 2)
exit repeat
end if
set the_person to (choose from list the_names) as string
if the_person = “false” then exit repeat
repeat with i from 1 to count of the_names
if the_person = item i of the_names then exit repeat
end repeat
set the_person to item i of the_people
set group_name to (choose from list the_groups with prompt “Add this person to group:”) as string
if group_name = “false” then exit repeat
tell application “Address Book”
add the_person to group group_name
save addressbook
end tell
exit repeat
on error
beep
if button returned of ¬
(display dialog (“No matches were found for “” & search_name & “.” Search for a new name?”) buttons {“No”, “Yes”} default button 2 with icon 2) ¬
= “No” then exit repeat
end try
end repeat

on [color=green]get_info/color
tell application “Address Book”
set the_groups to name of groups
set the_names to {}
set the_people to every person whose name contains the_name
repeat with the_person in the_people
tell the_person to set end of the_names to name
end repeat
end tell
return {the_names, the_people, the_groups}
end get_info

Jon

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[This script was automatically tagged for color coded syntax by Script to Markup Code]