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JohnnyLicious
03-22-2009, 05:09 PM
Contacts Blast

Contacts Blast is the revolutionary and fun new way of organizing your contacts. Contacts Blast seamlessly integrates with the Android contacts book and extends it allowing you to create groups and assign contacts to them. Quickly selecting your group from the main screen will display only the contacts for that group.

Contacts Blast features a visually stunning display to showcase your contacts with pictures and contact information. Touch the picture and it will dial the default phone number, touch a specific phone number to dial, SMS, or email. All of your groups and contacts can automatically synch with your GMail account and will exist even if you uninstall the program. Contacts Blast supports both landscape and portrait view along with lots of beautiful icons for you to use with your custom groups.
Have a blast organizing your contacts!

Screenshots:

http://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu47/Droidmatic/Contacts%20Blast/3.png
http://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu47/Droidmatic/Contacts%20Blast/1.png
http://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu47/Droidmatic/Contacts%20Blast/10.png
http://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu47/Droidmatic/Contacts%20Blast/13.pnghttp://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu47/Droidmatic/Contacts%20Blast/6.png

Group Selections

http://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu47/Droidmatic/Contacts%20Blast/4.pnghttp://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu47/Droidmatic/Contacts%20Blast/5.png
http://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu47/Droidmatic/Contacts%20Blast/8.png
http://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu47/Droidmatic/Contacts%20Blast/21.pnghttp://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu47/Droidmatic/Contacts%20Blast/14.png

Screenshots courtesy of Zeruel (http://androidcommunity.com/forums/members/zeruel/) (Thanks)

Features:
* NEW: Contacts Blast easily becomes your default contacts app. Activate Contacts Blast automatically from the Android desktop with use of the green "Call" button and you will be able to choose between Contacts Blast or the default dialer. No extra work necessary. Easily reverts back to default behavior whenever you want.

* NEW: Super high performance. Every aspect of the app has been highly optimized since the initial release and provides a smooth, consistent user experience whether scrolling through huge lists of contacts or browsing through your groups.

* NEW: Configure exactly what buttons you want to be displayed on your main screen in the preferences menu. SMS, Email and Edit Contact can now be turned on or off to your liking.

* NEW: Speed Dial your contacts with the new speed dial screen. Every group supports the speed dial screen which can be activated with a single touch.

* NEW: Intelligent contact searching. Tap the search button or simply start typing and Contacts Blast will rapidly narrow down the list of contacts that match what you are typing. A single click will automatically select the contact you want. Search is very intelligent and will narrow down your results in real time as you type.

* Sleek high quality and high performance graphics and icons.

* Stylish and colorful user interface that shows off the power of your Android smart phone better than the default black and white contacts manager / dialer.

* All standard phone features including touchpad dialer and call log.

* Assign pictures to your contacts and slide through contacts by face and name.

* Screen automatically rotates when the phone is turned or keyboard opened.

* Voice Mail button for one touch voice mail dialing.

* Create new groups and assign them contacts on your phone!

* Full group management right from your phone: Add new groups, Edit groups, Delete groups.

* Personalize your groups by assigning each one a custom icon.

* Add, edit, or remove any contact or group any time. ALL changes on your phone automatically sync with GMail.

* Switch between groups or view all of your contacts at once.

* Perform most tasks in a single click on the main contact screen.

* Click and hold a contact picture in the list to automatically speed dial their default number.

* Full support for standard Android groups such as Recent calls, Favorites, and All Contacts

* Scrolling interface neatly displays all phone numbers per user.

* Have a contact with multiple email addresses or SMS numbers? No problem! Contacts Blast makes messaging easy.

* Send SMS text messages or email in a single click.

* See your current Android background transparently behind Contacts Blast.

* Fully supports GMail "their picture" feature for your contacts.

Review:

Pros:
- Photo icons for all contacts / grid and dock to slide to see contacts at the bottom
- Ease to find contact with search button
- Easy to sms / email / call / contact with this app because of the shortcut right on the home screen
- View changes for favorites / all contacts / groups
- Landscape mode is nice with photo contact icons.

Cons:
- Background is distorted
- Contact information seems to be floating on desktop
- When clicked on contact the contact information to the right of photo icon is hard to see and sort of offset
- Icon where it show mobile number is offset on the icon / gets lost into background if its black

Features I'd like to see:
- Make this contact app like more like a "app" maybe resemble the default contact phonebook with the same layout maybe but incorportate photo icon views for all icons and search bar.
- Less of a desktop feel for the icons that float in the top
- Organize tabs at the bottom to the top and space them equally to fill the entire screen.


and big thanks to Matt for providing me this application for my review, screenshots weren't needed because he already provided them and I didn't want to disclose my personal contact information / photos.

This app has HUGE potential in my opinion, just take a look at my features / changes and other users feedback

Thanks again :]

gbk1
03-22-2009, 05:27 PM
+1 for JohnnyLicious

Always giving the thorough review.

BadBoy
03-22-2009, 05:31 PM
Great review.

JohnnyLicious
03-22-2009, 05:33 PM
thanks alot everyone, I can't wait for new updates for this app and hope they take my feedback / suggestions along with others to make this app amazing!!

yeaaaaah cause im tired of the default dialer / phonebook its super plain and ugly ahaha

*susan*
03-22-2009, 06:15 PM
Awesome review, Johnny!!

JohnnyLicious
03-22-2009, 09:00 PM
thanks susan i lagged on puttin up these review since ive been busy with school but got it done =D

i got another one coming tonight or tomorrow.

animguy
03-25-2009, 04:01 PM
Is anyone else who is using CB experiencing a very long lag when the program is first opened? I bought this as soon as I could after updating to rc33 and being able to access Paid Applications in the market. When I open CB, I will wait up to 20 seconds with just a blank screen before the contacts pop up.
A couple of times, the ForceClose option has popped up but I just click Wait and the program pops up.

I have a brand new (less than 1 week) G1 and do not have many applications on it yet. I am not in a 3G area so that may have something to do with it. I just wanted to see if anyone else experienced the lag before I uninstalled it which I don't want to do. I used FaceContact on my windows mobile phone before the G1 and I love not having to scroll through the default contact list.

*susan*
03-25-2009, 06:07 PM
I had a horrible lag with the program and ended up uninstalling as a result. I hope they can fix that problem, because other than that, I really like it a lot. But, I have no patience for laggy apps.

Zeruel
04-02-2009, 07:10 PM
Thanks for all of the feedback and reviews. We have been addressing all suggestions we have received and will be releasing Contacts Blast 1.4 in the near future with several new features and enhancements.

Zeruel
04-09-2009, 04:47 PM
I just wanted to mention that we released Contacts Blast 1.4 today and most of Johnny's features (as well as several other requests that we received) have made it in. :D

If anyone is having any issues with Contacts Blast, especially with performance, please let me know (you can contact me through a private message or email droidmatic.support@gmail.com).

Full details are on www.droidmatic.com (http://www.droidmatic.com)

http://droidmatic.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/1.png?w=320&h=480

http://droidmatic.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/7.png?w=320&h=480[IMG]http://droidmatic.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/9.png?w=320&h=480

JohnnyLicious
04-09-2009, 05:43 PM
wow amazing :]]

great job guys!

*susan*
04-09-2009, 07:25 PM
Going to re-download it now.

ROGUE7474
04-09-2009, 08:39 PM
Going to re-download it now.

How is it now Susan? I'll wait til you say theres no more lag before I purchase it.

*susan*
04-09-2009, 09:05 PM
No lag at all!!

ROGUE7474
04-09-2009, 09:52 PM
No lag at all!!

I'm sold. Thank you.

*susan*
04-10-2009, 11:59 AM
Your welcome. I am loving it now.

animguy
04-27-2009, 12:33 PM
They released another update this weekend and it hsa finally solved the long delay in opening the program. It took up to 25 seconds before but it now opens in under 4 seconds - normally within 1-2.

It's now well worth the purchase price.

Zeruel
04-27-2009, 01:15 PM
We did release version 1.5 as a performance release over the weekend. I'm glad to hear that the changes made to the code are working as expected. We are working on another update to be released within the next few weeks that will add more features and further improve performance.

If anyone still has any issues with load time please let us know! I think we finally nailed that problem though. :D

SilleeString
04-27-2009, 02:53 PM
Great! I'm going to have try this again.

caribbeancats
05-15-2009, 12:13 AM
Is anyone having any weird problems lately with Contact Blast? I installed it this am & noticed there was only 1 contact in there. I went to settings to sync contacts & emails, there was no problems with the emails but there was a little message saying Sync is currently experiencing problems & will be back shortly.
I checked it tonight & there is no change.
I had it before & stupidly uninstalled it.
Any one have any ideas what I can do because I really like the application.
Thank you, you all are great.

Zeruel
05-15-2009, 03:46 AM
Is anyone having any weird problems lately with Contact Blast? I installed it this am & noticed there was only 1 contact in there. I went to settings to sync contacts & emails, there was no problems with the emails but there was a little message saying Sync is currently experiencing problems & will be back shortly.
I checked it tonight & there is no change.
I had it before & stupidly uninstalled it.
Any one have any ideas what I can do because I really like the application.
Thank you, you all are great.

This is a problem that happens with contacts and GMail synchronization for some reason. It is not caused by Contacts Blast -- the reason for it occurring isn't quite known yet.

I have run into this issue myself actually (along with many others). I searched for a long time for a solution but was unable to find one until I figure out something that works myself.

Check out this thread: http://androidcommunity.com/forums/f7/sync-issues-13589/

I made the very last post there and explain one way to fix it. Make sure you follow the directions precisely and it should resolve the failed sync issue.

Zeruel
10-02-2009, 05:03 PM
As a special thanks to all of our fans and supporters, Contacts Blast is now on sale for only $0.99 in the Android Market.

BirdieMN
12-21-2009, 12:25 AM
OK, I downloaded the "Lite" version of this today to check it out, and I liked it enough to want to upgrade to the full version. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find the full version in the market. I've even tried using the upgrade prompt I get from the freeware version and it tells me it can't find it. Am I missing something?

Zeruel
12-21-2009, 02:29 AM
I just checked the market and its still showing up as available for me. If you can't find the full version of Contacts Blast for some reason you could try looking for our new app (not officially announced although we put it on the market about a week ago -- we were one of the finalists in the ADC II contest) called My Friend Book. Right now its on sale for only $0.99 and has all of the features of Contacts Blast and more. We don't have a free version but if you decide you don't like it you can always refund within 24 hours.

I'll be providing more information on Friend Book including screen shots in the coming week or two.

BirdieMN
12-21-2009, 03:05 PM
OK, now I'm really weirded out. I searched for the new app, as well as searched by the dev name and it doesn't show anything in the market except CB Lite.

What am I doing wrong here?

Zeruel
12-21-2009, 03:07 PM
What phone / version of Android do you have? You can also try restarting your phone (sometimes it helps).

BirdieMN
12-21-2009, 03:15 PM
Samsung Moment running 1.5. I've tried powering up and down several times and it hasn't changed.

A Murder of Crows
12-22-2009, 03:27 PM
I just got My Friend Book and immediately there's a lot i love...and a couple of things i don't like.


First and foremost, there should be a view for horizontal contact viewing. I've been using Phonebook for awhile now, and when flipped to landscape mode i get a row of contacts along the lines of Mac OSX's Dock, where the central focused contact is zoomed in. Clicking on the contact brings up the interface with all their contact info. I love that feature and i immediately missed it as soon as i turned my phone sideways.

Secondly, use darker colored background themes with lighter colored text. The blazing white/light blue background with black text pretty much killed my eyes and will end up forcing me to continue using a less functional program (which was free) because i can't handle looking at the contact list provided by My Friend Book.


Please add a couple of color themes and horizontal viewing to My Friend Book.

Thanks much guys

Zeruel
12-22-2009, 03:31 PM
I just got My Friend Book and immediately there's a lot i love...and a couple of things i don't like.


First and foremost, there should be a view for horizontal contact viewing. I've been using Phonebook for awhile now, and when flipped to landscape mode i get a row of contacts along the lines of Mac OSX's Dock, where the central focused contact is zoomed in. Clicking on the contact brings up the interface with all their contact info. I love that feature and i immediately missed it as soon as i turned my phone sideways.

Secondly, use darker colored background themes with lighter colored text. The blazing white/light blue background with black text pretty much killed my eyes and will end up forcing me to continue using a less functional program (which was free) because i can't handle looking at the contact list provided by My Friend Book.


Please add a couple of color themes and horizontal viewing to My Friend Book.

Thanks much guys

Thanks for the feedback. We'll definitely look into this. I should note that we did support both automatic horizontal and vertical resolutions on Contacts Blast but didn't have time to get it fully working for My Friend Book due to the short time frame of the ADC II contest. Its something we want to address.

As far as supporting color customization of background and fonts, that's another feature we had with Contacts Blast that hasn't yet made it into My Friend Book.

Thanks again and keep an eye out for future updates and our official release announcement.

A Murder of Crows
12-22-2009, 03:52 PM
Thanks for the feedback. We'll definitely look into this. I should note that we did support both automatic horizontal and vertical resolutions on Contacts Blast but didn't have time to get it fully working for My Friend Book due to the short time frame of the ADC II contest. Its something we want to address.

As far as supporting color customization of background and fonts, that's another feature we had with Contacts Blast that hasn't yet made it into My Friend Book.

Thanks again and keep an eye out for future updates and our official release announcement.


I'm currently downloading contacts blast paid based on about 1 minute with contacts blast lite. Here are my thoughts on Lite:

1. No lag issues
2. Correct pics displayed for all contacts. Phonebook doesn't do this
3. Color scheme is easy on the eyes.

So yeah, as soon as i get it installed i'll give the pro a chance. I would say that the constant push of the paid version on lite was a little much, but i was so happy inside of 30 seconds that i felt the app deserved my 99 cents.

A Murder of Crows
12-22-2009, 06:31 PM
Alright, so impressions on Contacts Blast:

When i use it to text or call someone, going back to Contacts Blast using the Back button on my G1 results in it going back to the first entry in the contact list....it doesn't remember what contact i happened to have been at when i sent the message or made the call. It should remember where i was last if i'm coming "back" and start at the top of the list when i am coming "forward" to it. That way, if i call someone and decide i want to try to text that same person, it's ready for me to go,

I'd also like to see a cleaner interface for the horizontal orientation. I'd prefer to have the contact information show up on a "double tap" as opposed to just showing up when the contact is selected. This would allow for bigger images for those contacts, something i'd much rather use the space for.

So, bigger pictures for selected contact, fisheye style i guess, and bigger pictures in general. double tap or tap-hold to get into contact details like phone number type, etc, phone button to call it outright

uconnrob
12-25-2009, 12:25 PM
:confused: Eris Droid HTC does not have contacts blast or my friend book available . . . . . . . .

BirdieMN
12-25-2009, 07:47 PM
:confused: Eris Droid HTC does not have contacts blast or my friend book available . . . . . . . .

I'm in the same boat, I can find neither in the market.

jb4kats
01-17-2010, 11:14 PM
I cant find them either i have the samsung moment and really would like to have this app. i wish someone would post a link if there is one!