Getting better RES images in Dialer (Android M + ) and maybe earlier OS's - Nexus 5X Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Hey Guys,
Not sure if this has been posted but I couldn't find it anywhere.
Was always annoyed that when I received a call, the image was pixelated to buggery.
Anyway, I figured out that in the dialer, if you go to the "starred" tab, you see the images there of people you have called/received calls from.
Now click on the 3 dots at the top right of that contact and wait. Soon the image clears up. Go back and that's it, that contact will now have a clearer image than before.
Feel free to let me know your thoughts etc. Hopefully helps some people out.

I just use contactsyncduck. At first it was a pain on the ass because you have to enter the Facebook ID of your contacts in the notes field, but now all my contact photos are crystal clear and they update when your contacts change their profile pics.
If you ever owned an HTC phone (that ran Sense OS) the facebook ID may already be in your contact info.
Edit: I did your trick on some of my contacts that don't have Facebook and it did clear up a little. Good find

Yeah, I used to use an app like that. Think it was called Haxsync. Not all my friends are on Facebook so I ditched it.

Related

Contact list question regarding SMS

I have gone into the contacts and set my sim contacts as inactive, yet when I open the contact list when creating a new SMS, all my SIM contacts are there... this is really really annoying. I can not for the life of me figure out how to disable this.
I've had a G1 for the past 1.5 years, rooted and running custom roms, so I know this has to be a snake in the grass waiting to bite me. Can anyone lend a hand?
Sorry if this is a bit hard to follow, long day
And yes, I have searched.. again, I know this is probably right in front of my face.
same problem here hopefully gets fixed in and update
same crap here another two annoyances from the stock sms app is no led and if text are sent in the same minute they get outta order
I cant stand how you can sync your facebook with only the contacts that are in your address book. But then when you go to text someone is shows everyone from facebook as a option to message. I just want it to show the people in my addess book. is there any way to do this. Have it sync just your contacts with facebook and not have everyone and their mother show up in the who to message list?
go into contacts and press the option menu,then view. disable the t-mobile one contacts too. because t-mobile keeps all ur contacts too...
i had a similar problem, hope this help tho...
blazegunz said:
go into contacts and press the option menu,then view. disable the t-mobile one contacts too. because t-mobile keeps all ur contacts too...
i had a similar problem, hope this help tho...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
it still ends up coming up when you search for the name in the sms app or other apps thats just to clear it from the phone app
This phone handles syncing strange. I cant wait till its rooted so i can put a Cyanogen rom on it. Even when i delete all the tomobile contacts. It finds a way of bringing them back.
sdelcegno said:
I cant stand how you can sync your facebook with only the contacts that are in your address book. But then when you go to text someone is shows everyone from facebook as a option to message. I just want it to show the people in my addess book. is there any way to do this. Have it sync just your contacts with facebook and not have everyone and their mother show up in the who to message list?
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Click to collapse
This, 1000000000 times this. If I turn off veiwing facebook for mytouch contacts in the address book it still shows 100000 people form facebook in the sms part when i go to send a new message.
Yes... the syncing on this phone is indeed weird and annoying.. it was cool at first seeing everything pool in and popup without entering any info.. then it went awire , so I hit the killswitch on the whole operation. I know this isn't an answer to the problem, but maybe u can do without syncing until the froyo update comes next week (wishful thinking) ? Or do a hard reset and resync everything over slowly
No way I could find to not see all your contacts as is described in post #1. Dowload a full-featured sms app.
fl_jeep said:
No way I could find to not see all your contacts as is described in post #1. Dowload a full-featured sms app.
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Such as .... ? New to Android here.
BigFellor said:
Such as .... ? New to Android here.
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Handcent or Chomp. I prefer the former but have not used the latter much. For all new Android users reading this...please use androidtapp.com for reviewing apps. If they have reviewed the app, it is very thorough, including screen shots and an overall rating. This also gives you an idea of what the app can do, especially in comparison to a stock app so you don't have to frumpenuzzle with it yourself.
Just a word on handcent. I can not stand the way it looks. Its a blatent iphone look-a-like
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Sent via the XDA Tapatalk App
Switch the skin to the Hero skin.. I forgot it even came imitating the iphone since I always had it with the hero skin on my G1. When I installed it on the slide I was like aww wtf haha. I also have it with no bubbles or or handcent type bubbles.
turboyo said:
Switch the skin to the Hero skin.. I forgot it even came imitating the iphone since I always had it with the hero skin on my G1. When I installed it on the slide I was like aww wtf haha. I also have it with no bubbles or or handcent type bubbles.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ill check it out, after I installed it on my G1, I opened it up and RAGED cause it looked like the iphone and immediately uninstalled it.

Send Facebook messages directly from Contacts

Hey there,
I just unpacked my T-Mobile USA Vibrant (modified Galaxy S). I love the phone, but as always, there are things that I think are missing. So I played around a little bit with it and one thing kept bothering me.
The phone integrates all my Facebook contacts, which is great. But I think it would be a slick feature if you could actually send them a message directly from the contact list. As of now, I have to go into a browser or use the FB app to send messages and I think it would be a lot more convenient to just go into the contact and send a message from there (like a text basically).
Does anybody now if there is an app or some piece of software that can help me out here? If not, do you even think it is possible to do it? I am not a developer, but I can imagine there are some issues, cause as far as I know Samsung didn't open there UI code for developers yet (or showed any intention of doing it).
So I am excited what you guys think of that and hope there is a solution somewhere out there
Phill
edit: I just saw there is a specific Vibrant forum. If the admins would like to put this post in the right place I would appreciate it. However, I think the issue is omnipresent among all versions of the SGS.
This would be a fantastic mod for contacts I would think I don't know why someone hasn't done this previously. I think if we get the guy doing the standard froyo / eclair dialler / contacts mod to do this it will be extremely innovative.
Contacts -> Groups -> Facebook -> menu -> Send message -> Choose recipient
Wow, long path... Should work though.
hey yea that works. but it is kind of a long way dont you think? Thanks anyway, it got me one step closer What I think would be a tremendous improve is to add the fb msg feature directly to the first contact screen. You know, when you slide left on a contact for texting and right for calling. If there is no number available but a fb contact it should automatically go to the fb messaging.

Andoid vet w/ a n00b question

I've always had this problem on every ROM i've ever used. the thing was i never really cared enough to ask anyone what the issue was lol. so maybe someone can help me out here.
i typically use sense roms and i have photos assigned to a lot of my contacts. these arent facebook or twitter pics sync'ed with the contact, just default photos i saved for them. i also use SMS Popup. some pics dont show up in the messaging app. some pics dont show up on the popup notification. anyone know the reason for this?
PS. the photos DO show up when i go to my list of contacts though.
teddy_ballgame3 said:
I've always had this problem on every ROM i've ever used. the thing was i never really cared enough to ask anyone what the issue was lol. so maybe someone can help me out here.
i typically use sense roms and i have photos assigned to a lot of my contacts. these arent facebook or twitter pics sync'ed with the contact, just default photos i saved for them. i also use SMS Popup. some pics dont show up in the messaging app. some pics dont show up on the popup notification. anyone know the reason for this?
PS. the photos DO show up when i go to my list of contacts though.
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Gonna take a real quick shot in the dark, so take it with a grain of salt. Any photos that show up in all places correctly, check their dimensions, file type, and size. My guess, and I heavily emphasize guess here, is that each place you're looking for these (the app, built in contact list, etc) has its certain requirements for pic size, dimensions and file type. If you examine the ones that are working in all places correctly, it might give some headway into figuring out what is wrong with the other ones. If none are working in all places, try taking one of the contact pics, go into windows paint, crop it to the size you would want to see, do a "save as..." and choose .jpg. Windows paint will strip out any additional layers and such that are weighing on the image and pretty much break it down to its most simple form and reduce the size. Then load up that modified pic and see if it works everywhere, if it does, rinse and repeat. If it doesn't work, well, it was worth a shot.

Complain about gmail contact picture resolution to google

Hi guys, have started a thread at google mobile support forum so we can get some attention on the low res contact picture problem
join in !
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Mobile/thread?tid=49e2b1adea1aa11c&hl=en
I wouldn't say my contacts that use a Google+ or have a profile with Google have hideous pictures. Although I would agree that Facebook syncing looks terrible but it's not really Googles problem.
Edit: Oh and you miss-spelt bigger
haha ups.. cant change it now..
Actually it is a Google issue. The gmail contact list, where the pictures are synced to, downgrade the resolution of the pictures
The pictures I changed in my phone, most of them, have remained at the higher resolution. However, once I wiped the phone to flash a new ROM, Google sync brought them all back at the lower resolution. Definite Google problem.
Now I get what your saying. To be honest I wouldn't be surprised if Google releases that as a feature in the next few months anyway. Just sit tight
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA App
A Google Employee just answered
Thanks for the feedback, everyone. The icons used in Google Contacts used to be a relatively low resolution, more of a thumbnail really. Those are the pictures that the phone pulls from first. There are a couple of ways you can bring higher resolution pictures in for your contacts.
1) Use your own high resolution photo. You can do this by opening a contact in the People app, tapping the menu, selecting Edit, then tapping on the photo icon. You'll be offered a choice to either take a photo right then, or pick a photo you've already got on your phone from the Gallery app.
2) Sync your contacts with Google+. If you and your contacts use Google+, you can launch the Google+ app on Android and set it to sync contacts from the app's settings. If your contact has a high resolution photo for their portrait in Google+ it'll get sync'd to your phone. Note that the initial contact photo sync from Google+ takes a little while to finish.
(Advanced note on #2: I was just playing with this a couple of days ago and noticed that the initial sync with Google+ prioritizes syncing a contact that you happen to be looking at. For example, if you're syncing 200 contacts but go look at your best friend immediately, it'll pull down your friend's photo right then and there before working on the rest of your contacts.)
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If you ask me its not good enough we all want this fixed so we can have high res fb pictures...
So I guess we're stuck with these 2 options... I hope they put some kind of size difference in place. Like thumbnail size for Google Talk and high-res for phone sync.
I added my feedback there (NexusDude).
We can also open a new thread in the Official Google Contacts support forum:
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/gmail/label?lid=3a63236689cf8dbd&hl=en
Anyone can write a good problem description in clear and good english language?
I am not that good in english ...
just added my comment as well. thanks for initiating the post.
I am also opening a question in StackOverflow.com for an application that we can use to replace contact photos easily using locally stored high-resolution image files.
Please, if you are Android developer, this kind of app will be very useful!
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/...otos-using-local-image-files-programmatically
Think about it, your app will solve this on-going years of issue that will probably never be solved by Google.
Also put a request in the Android Software Development forum:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1391253
This may be a bit off topic, but does Kies sync Outlook 2010 (not exchange, but a local copy) to the phone?
I am coming from an HTC Desire and i hate the google contact sync.. i need my Outlock Sync back..
How this is still an issue with all the changes they made to contacts is just retarded.
gogol said:
I am also opening a question in StackOverflow.com for an application that we can use to replace contact photos easily using locally stored high-resolution image files.
Please, if you are Android developer, this kind of app will be very useful!
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/...otos-using-local-image-files-programmatically
Think about it, your app will solve this on-going years of issue that will probably never be solved by Google.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm sure it will be updated eventually. Personally, I find it easier to just manually go update my contacts; I'm utterly anal about perfect organization of data, though. I posted a reply to your SO post as follows:
It's certainly possible, and wouldn't need root access. The problem is going to be that the user would need to properly name all the images first, consistently, accurately, and in a unique manner. For example, if you had three contacts named John Rodeo, then the naming convention of JohnRodeo.png or Rodeo_John.png would not work, as you could not have three images with the same name. Even if there was no duplication of data, you would need to make sure all names followed a consistent naming scheme (lastname_firstname.png for example). Of course, you could also add an algorithm to search filenames for likely variations and not have to worry about exact consistency.
It's certainly a feasible idea, but it would be much easier if Facebook would kiss and make up with Google already, and just play nice with the Contacts API. :/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your feedback,
Looking into the history of this issue, I don't think it will ever get updated. Come on, it has not been fixed since 2008 ... 3 years.
And if you read the answer from Google employee in that Google Mobile support forum? They won't listen. They want to push people to use Google+. Forcing the solution by syncing with Google+.
That is sad ... same with syncing Facebook, not all contacts are on Facebook / Google+.
Obviously, Google should know this issue, otherwise they don't test their software properly. They should be aware how ugly is the low resolution contact photos, especially when user receives a phone call.
I cannot think any reason, that design master, Matias Duarte would allow this to happen!
About your feedback on my question in StackOverflow:
Naming the file is not really a problem. User needs only to do it once. And for multiple contact with same names, well, you can add phone number into it as additional option. Oh by the way, this is not about Facebook contact sync, especially because not all contacts are on Facebook. This is mainly to workaround the low resolution contact photos after synced with GMail Contacts
=======
Too bad, even though I am a developer (PC software), I don't have experience with Android software development. I don't know, probably this would push me to learn it.
Solution that I could think of, that I am capable of doing it:
- Root the device
- Download the contacts database (I read this is just SQLite3 db)
- Create PC application to manipulate the blob photo data inside the contacts db
- Push back the contacts db to the device
Yeah, it would be much better if we can have this Android app.
And I am begging to any dev around this XDA ... please, make this app for us!
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1391253
copkay said:
I'm sure it will be updated eventually. Personally, I find it easier to just manually go update my contacts; I'm utterly anal about perfect organization of data, though. I posted a reply to your SO post as follows:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't see how this is a Google problem when its simply grabbing the tiny photo off facebook.
Obviously the contact image supports high resolutions because I've added plenty of contact pictures myself from the camera. It saves them properly.
The problem is the SOURCE. If facebook has a bunch of 32x32 images for contacts, Google can't magically make them HD. Sure you can go in to a specific contacts photo album, download the picture, and add it manually... but there is no way to do this automatically.
Sync your contacts with a source which contains higher resolution images and your problem will be solved.
Facebook won't do it because Facebook uses the images all over the place. Images need to be small. Can you imagine trying to load a Facebook page with 500 HD pictures? It's facebook sync, not magic.
Blame it on the 4.63 HD resolution screen you have. On a tiny low res screen, the images don't look as stretched... but on a HD screen there will be lots of nasties.
So again, for HD pictures you'll need to find a source with HD images to sync with or add them manually. Have at it.
player911 said:
I don't see how this is a Google problem when its simply grabbing the tiny photo off facebook.
Obviously the contact image supports high resolutions because I've added plenty of contact pictures myself from the camera. It saves them properly.
The problem is the SOURCE. If facebook has a bunch of 32x32 images for contacts, Google can't magically make them HD. Sure you can go in to a specific contacts photo album, download the picture, and add it manually... but there is no way to do this automatically.
Sync your contacts with a source which contains higher resolution images and your problem will be solved.
Facebook won't do it because Facebook uses the images all over the place. Images need to be small. Can you imagine trying to load a Facebook page with 500 HD pictures? It's facebook sync, not magic.
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Click to collapse
It's syncing the PROFILE pictures. Facebook profile pictures are not 32x32! Mine is 728x688, for example. Facebook obviously has smaller versions to use for thumbnails on its own site. The problem is clearly not at Facebook's end.
player911 said:
I don't see how this is a Google problem when its simply grabbing the tiny photo off facebook.
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Click to collapse
Well it IS a google problem imho. Maybe Im just alone with this since I dont use fb, but I added pictures to my google contacts manually. (And I used the computer for it - not the phone )
I added a High Res photo to each contact, but the google contacts changed em to a crappy resolution. On my old phone (milestone) I had no problem with it ... but now? It just looks hideous :/
And since I still dislike the use of facebook I would have to search a good picture for each damn contact again :/
player911 said:
I don't see how this is a Google problem when its simply grabbing the tiny photo off facebook.
Obviously the contact image supports high resolutions because I've added plenty of contact pictures myself from the camera. It saves them properly.
The problem is the SOURCE. If facebook has a bunch of 32x32 images for contacts, Google can't magically make them HD. Sure you can go in to a specific contacts photo album, download the picture, and add it manually... but there is no way to do this automatically.
Sync your contacts with a source which contains higher resolution images and your problem will be solved.
Facebook won't do it because Facebook uses the images all over the place. Images need to be small. Can you imagine trying to load a Facebook page with 500 HD pictures? It's facebook sync, not magic.
Blame it on the 4.63 HD resolution screen you have. On a tiny low res screen, the images don't look as stretched... but on a HD screen there will be lots of nasties.
So again, for HD pictures you'll need to find a source with HD images to sync with or add them manually. Have at it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have been seeing this for 3 years now, it is not the source!!! you could manually stick a 24526246HD res picture the...............it's what happens to the original picture after it syncs with Google servers.
See my comment:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=27930642&postcount=10
It's about an app I made that syncs the high resolution photos with picasaweb. Hope it helps.

Facebook contact pictures - solved

Syncmypix, Friendcaster, forget it. I've found a way to get higher resolution pictures of my Facebook friends as their contact pictures in the People app, and it was easier than I thought.
The official Facebook app. The recent update allows you to set a picture in any album as a contact picture - just tap a photo, press the menu key, press 'Set as', then Contact photo. I've been able to get much better quality pictures than I was able to using Syncmypix (which crashed every time I linked a photo to a contact).
Anyway, enjoy!
Thanks... work perfect.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA App
Gotta do this once for each contact? :/
Just did this and the quality isn't any better than using SyncMyPix.
Nice
but for me with 100+ contacts to match its to much work
jvvpc said:
Nice
but for me with 100+ contacts to match its to much work
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Click to collapse
And then what happens when someone changes their pic on facebook? That won't reconcile with the phone.
no thank you.. i will be there atleast 2 or 3 hours
Yeah, I only did it for about 30 of my contacts - the ones I contact regularly.
I was able to get much better images than I did from Syncmypix, and I was able to choose which picture of them I wanted. I don't think it'll be affected if they change their profile picture because you can choose any image.
Might not be for everyone, but if you have a spare 15 minutes and care enough about higher-res contact pictures, I recommend it.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA App
I think his point was that he would want it it change when they changed their Facebook pic.
Sent from my DROID RAZR using XDA App
I read the original post and thought it was to good to be true. Then I did one and that was enough B.S. for me. Wow I'm lazy!
nice one, thanks!
eric b
Don't they still get shrunk down once they sync up to google though?
jmbillings said:
Don't they still get shrunk down once they sync up to google though?
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Click to collapse
Id like to know the answer to this too.
I've actually turned off Contacts sync - under the Accounts & sync > [email protected], I saw several things were being synced and I was worried that was one of the reasons I was getting poor battery performance. I keep Calendar and Gmail synced and unticked everything else. My contacts aren't affected.
I don't feel that compelled to keep syncing contacts, especially if it'll mean reducing image size for contact pictures. Again, I realise this isn't a panacea for everyone, just wanted to let people know. For me, it's better than nothing.
What's a good way to get contacts into your phone w/o using contact sync?
I have about 2-3k contacts with email, multiple phone #s all stored in gmail. Honestly doubt I'd spend the time to manually put them all in. Contact sync was one of the biggest reasons for me to choose Android back when I first jumped ship from iPhone. It's a perfect sync with what I have on gmail.
So do you have any solutions to my problem?
Black Mirror said:
I've actually turned off Contacts sync - under the Accounts & sync > [email protected], I saw several things were being synced and I was worried that was one of the reasons I was getting poor battery performance. I keep Calendar and Gmail synced and unticked everything else. My contacts aren't affected.
I don't feel that compelled to keep syncing contacts, especially if it'll mean reducing image size for contact pictures. Again, I realise this isn't a panacea for everyone, just wanted to let people know. For me, it's better than nothing.
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