Contacts +Model Overview

Purpose

The purpose of this document is to give +guidelines on how to use the Contacts Model API most efficiently for a range +of typical operations. The Contacts Model is an engine component that provides +access to contact information stored on a Symbian OS device. Just like a real-world +address book it stores and organises names, telephone numbers, addresses and +other details of individuals and companies. It can be used to add, delete +and edit data as well as providing information to clients, and sorting and +searching contacts.

Description

The CContactDatabase class +allows clients access to the contact data stored on the device and has the +following functionality:

Contact database management

More than one Contact Database +can exist on a phone, but a default Contact Database is used if no other is +specified. Clients can open, close, alter and delete the Contact Database. +Extra databases can be added as required. The Contact Database can be moved +between drives, and can be compressed in order to save space.

Contact items management

Contact Items are made up of Contact +Fields and can be added to and removed from the database. Items in the database +can be opened, read, sorted and deleted. An item must be opened before it +can be edited. Editing an item often means altering data in one or more fields, +such as name or telephone number. To provide different sorting views Contact +Items can be grouped in categories such as ‘colleagues’ or ‘family’.

Searching the database

Searching CContactDatabase implements +searching and sorting and also provides separate phone number matching functions. +These provide a fast way of indexing and looking up phone numbers, for example, +for looking up caller IDs on incoming calls.

Speed dial functionality

The database owns speed dial information. +This is a mapping between a single digit integer and a telephone number. There +may be up to nine speed dial telephone numbers. If a Contact Item is deleted, +its speed dial mapping is removed.

Notification of changes

The database needs to be informed +of data changes made to it. Sometimes a UI-level application may need to respond +to updates made by other clients. The Contacts Model provides an observer +to transmit this information between CContactDatabase instances.