Download VCF (vCard) for each contact

#1

Dear Glide community,

My spreadsheet consists of hundreds of contacts, and I was wondering if it’s possible to download a selected individual’s VCF with a click of a button, so users can easily add contacts from Glideapp to their phone.

Currently, my not-so-easy solution is to generate a VCF with a direct Google Drive download link and make a button action in Glideapp that goes to that link. But it can become tedious when there are hundreds of contacts on the list (which means I have to create VCF for each individual one at a time)

I’ve also attempted using Zapier to trigger a Google Contact download action, but it’s not possible :frowning:

Is there a possible way to download the VCF of an individual with just a click of a button? Wish someone can help me :slight_smile:

Sincerely

Bryan

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Download Vcard to local contacts
#2

Seems like this is the best solution for now.

1 Like
#3

oh darn- i wanted to check your demo out, but it says Not Found…

#4

If it’s possible @kabookie can you walk through the solution here again :wink: Thank you.

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#5

Thank you for your comment sir. This is the not-so-easy way I was talking about.

#6

Hey @ThinhDinh. Thank you for your information :slight_smile:

I looked into VCardHosting.com. It is for sure a bit easier in terms of generating VCF direct download links, but you still gotta go to the site, copy in the name, email, phone, generate a link, and put that link into the Glide Spreadsheet. :frowning: and the most premium option only allows 200 vCards, not more than that :frowning:

Still would be great to just download VCF with a click, based on the Glideapp row information.

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#7

Maybe one can use a template column to generate a column of VCF text (each cell under the template column contains a complete VCF text), only if users can download a single cell as a .vcf file …

#8

Here are the notes that I wrote down at the time:

  1. Fill in data on GSheet - (make this a Google form in future if doing many files)
  2. Download sheet as CSV file
  3. Convert CSV to VCF file with “Importer For Contacts” - launch app
  4. Add VCF file to VCard Hosting here: https://vcardhosting.com/cp/dashboard.
  5. Download VCard link from MyVCards / file name / yellow box on right
  6. Add link to GlideApp worksheet as action for download button.
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#9

Thanks for the info! Have a great day.

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#10

I was going to suggest that you could create a VCF file through a template and then convert it to a qr code (this should all be possible in app with the qr code stuff that was mentioned the other day). However I then realised you wouldn’t be able to read that file through the phone camera of the phone that you are using :man_facepalming: this can be done on a android phone, but requires processes that a user may not be familiar with.

Instead of downloading, can you get Zapier to email it? Receiving vCards via email is something that users will be used to.

#11

Thank you for your suggestions @Mishta_P

I don’t really see a Glide feature that allows you to generate QR code within Glide. But I’ll confirm that.

I just tried sending a cell value as an attachment to Gmail through Zapier trigger action. The file receives as .txt and I don’t find a way to make it automatically VCF. Thank you for your idea though.

Another thing I tried with Zapier is to send Name, Email, and Phone columns in Glide to Google Contacts, which supports vCard download, but I expect Zapier can handle the downloading for me but it doesn’t, so I still have to go to Google Contacts myself and download vCard there, which is still too many steps for me :frowning: Would still prefer a way to just click and download a vCard in Glide

#12

Thank you for your information! I wish it could be more efficient. At this point perhaps I should request a feature update or something

#13

You can build url template column that points to quickchart.io . They have an option to return an image of a qr code based in the url you pass it.

#14

This post should do it. I have tested this at my end and it all works. It pops up on screen to add a contact.

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#15

The vCard format appears as though it can be a little flakey, I have tested a couple of contacts and it got funny with some extra data.

Just messed around with the MECARD format, it certainly works on Android (I can’t imagine it won’t on iOS), it is simpler in terms of the data string and was a little more reliable in my test.

Wiki entry for MECARD

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#16

This is so far the best solution. Now each of my contacts has a button that links to a QR code of MECARD text that contains the Glideapp spreadsheet column: Name, Email, and Phone. This is what I did:

  1. Create a Template Column with text: https://quickchart.io/qr?text=MECARD:N:item1;TEL:item2;EMAIL:item3;;

  2. Add 3 replacements in the template column, and replace item1, item2, item3 with their corresponding columns.

  3. Create a button for all contacts that leads to the QR code link in their row.

Still not the most elegant way comparing to click and download in my opinion. Perhaps I’ll make a feature request, once I find out it’s a reasonable request.

Thank you @Mishta_P

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#17

Amazing tool. Thank you.

1 Like
#18

There may be a way to do this, but I think you will need one of the Experts to weigh in on it.

If you can get a template column to build an hCard (this should give you an idea of the format)

Assuming there is a way to display that in app, in a way that can be deeplinked to.

Check out this link which will point you in the direction of a live hcard to vcf downloader.

It is tenuous, but is as near as I could get.

#19

I was reading about this just the other day, although I haven’t tried it yet. Uses integromat.
https://www.onlinedatabase.expert/post/send-a-vcard-from-a-database-with-integromat

And for the vcard format, see https://vcardmaker.com/

Again, I haven’t tried implementing this yet, but looks promising

#20

This information helped me set up what i needed for my app. Thanks