As you can see, the default contacts search on early Nokia phones is very primitive. It can search only the contacts' names (only first names for Series 40 devices) and supports only the slowest text entry method. But if you have a Nokia Series 60 phone, some additional software programs will drastically improve your search efficiency. One such program is Smart Dialer from Moov Software (available for evaluation and purchase at http://www.moovsoftware.com/).
Once Smart Dialer is installed, it automatically runs in the background when you start up the phone. You can see it or stop it by holding the menu key and bringing up the application switcher.
With Smart Dialer running in the background, you simply start typing the number, first name, or last name you want to dial from the phone's idle screen. Smart Dialer automatically searches through your contacts and recently sent, received, and missed calls lists and returns a list of matches, narrowing the possibilities as you press more numbers. Smart Dialer's key feature is that it supports a very effective form of predictive text to match the search string to contacts. You can think of it as being similar to T9 text entry [Hack #58]. But instead of using a T9 dictionary to predict your input, Smart Dialer uses the names and phone numbers already in your Contacts list to come up with matches. For instance, you can type 642 to match all contacts in your Contacts list that have the following characteristics:
Any contact with a combination of mno, ghi, or abc at the beginning of the first name or last name. For instance, Michael, Michele, and Nick all match this criterion.
Any contact with a phone number that contains the numbers 642.
To make the search more efficient, Smart Dialer orders its search results by the number of times you've dialed the contact. You can also spell Rec (732) to get calls in your recently dialed, received, and missed lists.
To dial a selected contact, you simply press the green Call button. If instead you want to view or edit information about the contact, press the center key on the navigation pad.
Once Smart Dialer is installed, it automatically runs in the background when you start up the phone. You can see it or stop it by holding the menu key and bringing up the application switcher.
With Smart Dialer running in the background, you simply start typing the number, first name, or last name you want to dial from the phone's idle screen. Smart Dialer automatically searches through your contacts and recently sent, received, and missed calls lists and returns a list of matches, narrowing the possibilities as you press more numbers. Smart Dialer's key feature is that it supports a very effective form of predictive text to match the search string to contacts. You can think of it as being similar to T9 text entry [Hack #58]. But instead of using a T9 dictionary to predict your input, Smart Dialer uses the names and phone numbers already in your Contacts list to come up with matches. For instance, you can type 642 to match all contacts in your Contacts list that have the following characteristics:
Any contact with a combination of mno, ghi, or abc at the beginning of the first name or last name. For instance, Michael, Michele, and Nick all match this criterion.
Any contact with a phone number that contains the numbers 642.
To make the search more efficient, Smart Dialer orders its search results by the number of times you've dialed the contact. You can also spell Rec (732) to get calls in your recently dialed, received, and missed lists.
To dial a selected contact, you simply press the green Call button. If instead you want to view or edit information about the contact, press the center key on the navigation pad.
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