Resolved Ideas for reversing the first and last name of hundreds of contacts?

[zach-coleman]

A family member of mine didn’t like the default sort of the contacts app on iPhone so they put the first name in the last name field and vice versa for all of their 500+ contacts. They were unaware you could just swap it from settings. Is there any program that has been made to correct this?

 

[sack_peak]

Go to Settings > Contacts and choose from the following:

- Sort Order: Sort your contacts alphabetically by first or last name.
- Display Order: Show contacts' first names before or after last names.
- Short Name: Choose how your contact's name appears in apps like Mail, Messages, Phone, and more.

Manage and delete contacts on your iPhone or iPad - Apple Support

Learn how to set up and manage your contacts to change what shows up in the Contacts app, delete contacts, and more.

support.apple.com

 

[zach-coleman]

Go to Settings > Contacts and choose from the following: Sort Order: Sort your contacts alphabetically by first or last name. Display Order: Show contacts' first names before or after last names. Short Name: Choose how your contact's name appears in apps like Mail, Messages, Phone, and more.

Manage and delete contacts on your iPhone or iPad - Apple Support

Learn how to set up and manage your contacts to change what shows up in the Contacts app, delete contacts, and more.

support.apple.com

This is not the problem. They have hundreds of contacts entered backwards due to their manual effort. It is an issue of bad data entry, not system settings.

Say someone’s name was John Smith. In their iPhone, they typed it as

First Name: Smith
Last Name: John

So when someone texts it says Smith John as the person who sent the message instead of John Smith.

 

[bogdanw]

Just an idea: export as csv, edit the file to switch columns, re-import.

 

[Basic75]

Just an idea: export as csv, edit the file to switch columns, re-import.

What about: export as csv, write a script to switch columns, re-import.

 

[sack_peak]

This is not the problem. They have hundreds of contacts entered backwards due to their manual effort. It is an issue of bad data entry, not system settings.

Say someone’s name was John Smith. In their iPhone, they typed it as

First Name: Smith
Last Name: John

So when someone texts it says Smith John as the person who sent the message instead of John Smith.

I am providing a creative solution to your problem that is already built into iPhone.

You want the names to appear Last Name, First Name.

Then change the way Contacts shows it from First Name Last night.

No need to write scripts or import/export/import.

 

[zach-coleman]

I somehow decided that writing a Python script was easier than trying to convert a vcf into a csv (would be as easy as changing the file extension…) and fixed it. On the bright side, it also allowed me to fix the company info being in the last name in parentheses too. I didn’t realize it was just raw text when I first posted. I’ll upload it later in case it comes in handy for anyone else.

 

[zach-coleman]

### Select all contacts in Contacts.app, select export to vCard.
### It will generate one big file with all contacts.
### [MAKE SURE TO MAKE A BACKUP OF THIS CONTACTS.VCF FILE!!]

### When finished, delete all contacts then import "output.vcf" into Contacts.app.

### BEFORE EXAMPLE
### First Name: Appleseed
### Last Name: John (Apple)
### Company:

### AFTER EXAMPLE:
### First Name: John
### Last Name: Appleseed
### Company: Apple

input_file_path = "edit.vcf"
output_file_path = "output.vcf"

with open(input_file_path, "r") as input_file:
    file_content = input_file.read()

to_delete = []

file_content = file_content.split("\n")
for i in range(len(file_content)):
    if "N:" in file_content[i] and "FN:" not in file_content[i] and "ON:" not in file_content[i] and "IN:" not in file_content[i]:
        #print(i)
        name_str = file_content[i]
        name_str = name_str.replace("N:","")
        name_str = name_str.split(";")
        print(name_str)
        for j in range(len(name_str)):
            name_str[j] = name_str[j].strip()
        temp = name_str[0]
        temp = temp.replace(")", "")
        temp = temp.split("(")
        print(temp)
        if len(temp) > 1:
            occupation = temp[1]
        else:
            occupation = ""
        name_str[0] = name_str[1]
        name_str[1] = temp[0]
        name_str = "N:"+name_str[0] + ";" + name_str[1] + ";;;\n"+"ORG:"+occupation
        print(name_str)
        file_content[i] = name_str
    if "FN:" in file_content[i]:
        to_delete.append(i)

to_delete = to_delete[::-1]
for i in to_delete:
    del file_content[i]

output = "\n".join(file_content)

# Open the output file for writing
with open(output_file_path, "w") as output_file:
    output_file.write(output)

print(f"File '{input_file_path}' has been edited and saved as '{output_file_path}'.")

If anyone stumbles upon this in the future and requires assistance, I'll attempt to help. This could absolutely be cleaned up but it did the job so what's the point.