How can a native application as basic and important as Address Book be 
so unremittingly mediocre?!?

A moment ago I was looking at a particular subset of my Address Book 
cards (results of a search for a certain city) which included three 
cards having identical names -- cards which turned out on closer 
examination to be exact duplicates.  I'm sure if I looked further I'd 
find many more such pairs of duplicates among my just under 2000 total 
cards.

So, I went back to my full list of cards and executed the Window >> 
Look for Duplicates command -- and a window opened up  and told me 
Address Book had found a grand total of _two_ (2!) duplicate cards in 
my collection, and offered to merge them for me.

It didn't tell me which cards these cards were, or offer to display 
them, or give me a chance to review them -- and apparently it had 
missed the dozens of other duplicates I know are in there.

If I use the corresponding "Find Duplicates" command in one of my 
longstanding and densely population iView MediaPro image catalogs, it 
hides all the non-duplicate listings; shows me the thumbnails and 
associated metadata for _all_ the duplicate listings in that catalog, 
in pairs, side by side; and gives me choices to do things to 
individual items, one at a time, or eliminate the duplicate copy from 
each pair, all in one operation.

Repeat: How can some many of Apple's native applications be so 
unremittingly mediocre at this stage compared to third-party Mac apps 
that were available decades ago (Address Book v. Now Contact; iCal vs 
Now Up to Date; TextEdit vs Bean; Mail vs Eudora)?!?

In article <siegman-340094.10512602092011@sciid-srv02.med.tufts.edu>,
 AES <siegman@stanford.edu> wrote:

> How can a native application as basic and important as Address Book be 
> so unremittingly mediocre?!?
> 
> A moment ago I was looking at a particular subset of my Address Book 
> cards (results of a search for a certain city) which included three 
> cards having identical names -- cards which turned out on closer 
> examination to be exact duplicates.  I'm sure if I looked further I'd 
> find many more such pairs of duplicates among my just under 2000 total 
> cards.
> 
> So, I went back to my full list of cards and executed the Window >> 
> Look for Duplicates command -- and a window opened up  and told me 
> Address Book had found a grand total of _two_ (2!) duplicate cards in 
> my collection, and offered to merge them for me.
> 
> It didn't tell me which cards these cards were, or offer to display 
> them, or give me a chance to review them -- and apparently it had 
> missed the dozens of other duplicates I know are in there.
> 
> If I use the corresponding "Find Duplicates" command in one of my 
> longstanding and densely population iView MediaPro image catalogs, it 
> hides all the non-duplicate listings; shows me the thumbnails and 
> associated metadata for _all_ the duplicate listings in that catalog, 
> in pairs, side by side; and gives me choices to do things to 
> individual items, one at a time, or eliminate the duplicate copy from 
> each pair, all in one operation.
> 
> Repeat: How can some many of Apple's native applications be so 
> unremittingly mediocre at this stage compared to third-party Mac apps 
> that were available decades ago (Address Book v. Now Contact; iCal vs 
> Now Up to Date; TextEdit vs Bean; Mail vs Eudora)?!?

You can buy Bento and use it to scan through your Address Book.  It's a 
full-on database.  Or you can research Address Book replacements.  I use 
AB only because it integrates with most of the Apple suite that comes 
with MacOS X.  If I used Google Mail, Calendar, and Address Boot, that 
would all go away.  Same with Office.

It was free and you're complaining how crappy it is.  Guess you got what 
you paid for.

Oh wait.  You're going to outlive us all with all the complaining you 
do.  Better get used to disappointment.

-- 
DeeDee, don't press that button!  DeeDee!  NO!  Dee...
[I filter all Goggle Groups posts, so any reply may be automatically ignored]

In article <siegman-340094.10512602092011@sciid-srv02.med.tufts.edu>,
 AES <siegman@stanford.edu> wrote:

> How can a native application as basic and important as Address Book be 
> so unremittingly mediocre?!?
> 
> A moment ago I was looking at a particular subset of my Address Book 
> cards (results of a search for a certain city) which included three 
> cards having identical names -- cards which turned out on closer 
> examination to be exact duplicates. 

Do you happen to sync w/ MobileMe and Google?  I do, and my address book 
is a mess because of it.

In article <thom-0775EE.11431603092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
 Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:

> > A moment ago I was looking at a particular subset of my Address Book 
> > cards (results of a search for a certain city) which included three 
> > cards having identical names -- cards which turned out on closer 
> > examination to be exact duplicates. 
> 
> Do you happen to sync w/ MobileMe and Google?  I do, and my address book 
> is a mess because of it.

No, I took an initial look at MobileMe and decided, I'm _never_ going 
to go there (or anywhere else in the cloud).  

Most of the duplicates in my Address Book arrived there during my 
initial conversion from Now Contact to Address Book (which I never 
should have done!!).  Others arrived from some kind of autoconversions 
to Address Book from my Eudora address book, and from email messages 
with vCard attachments.

In article 
<siegman-3D4998.14342003092011@bmedcfsc-srv02.tufts.ad.tufts.edu>,
 AES <siegman@stanford.edu> wrote:

> In article <thom-0775EE.11431603092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
>  Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> 
> > > A moment ago I was looking at a particular subset of my Address Book 
> > > cards (results of a search for a certain city) which included three 
> > > cards having identical names -- cards which turned out on closer 
> > > examination to be exact duplicates. 
> > 
> > Do you happen to sync w/ MobileMe and Google?  I do, and my address book 
> > is a mess because of it.
> 
> No, I took an initial look at MobileMe and decided, I'm _never_ going 
> to go there (or anywhere else in the cloud).  
> 
> Most of the duplicates in my Address Book arrived there during my 
> initial conversion from Now Contact to Address Book (which I never 
> should have done!!).  Others arrived from some kind of autoconversions 
> to Address Book from my Eudora address book, and from email messages 
> with vCard attachments.

It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
contacts from 3 different sources, no?

In article <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
 Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:

> In article 
> <siegman-3D4998.14342003092011@bmedcfsc-srv02.tufts.ad.tufts.edu>,
>  AES <siegman@stanford.edu> wrote:
> 
> > In article <thom-0775EE.11431603092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
> >  Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> > 
> > > > A moment ago I was looking at a particular subset of my Address Book 
> > > > cards (results of a search for a certain city) which included three 
> > > > cards having identical names -- cards which turned out on closer 
> > > > examination to be exact duplicates. 
> > > 
> > > Do you happen to sync w/ MobileMe and Google?  I do, and my address book 
> > > is a mess because of it.
> > 
> > No, I took an initial look at MobileMe and decided, I'm _never_ going 
> > to go there (or anywhere else in the cloud).  
> > 
> > Most of the duplicates in my Address Book arrived there during my 
> > initial conversion from Now Contact to Address Book (which I never 
> > should have done!!).  Others arrived from some kind of autoconversions 
> > to Address Book from my Eudora address book, and from email messages 
> > with vCard attachments.
> 
> It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> contacts from 3 different sources, no?

That won't stop him.  He likes to do this whether it seams like a 
reasonable assumption or not.  If something doesn't work the way _he_ 
thinks it should work, it's broken or busted or generally inferior.  I'm 
not saying I don't do that to.  But I just look for better solutions 
rather than complaining about it.  God help his wife, if he has one.

-- 
DeeDee, don't press that button!  DeeDee!  NO!  Dee...
[I filter all Goggle Groups posts, so any reply may be automatically ignored]

In article <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
 Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:

> It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> contacts from 3 different sources, no?

Maybe he has so few friends that it should be able to figure out that he 
couldn't know two different John Smiths.

-- 
Barry Margolin, barmar@alum.mit.edu
Arlington, MA
*** PLEASE post questions in newsgroups, not directly to me ***

Michael Vilain <vilain@NOspamcop.net> writes:

>> It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
>> contacts from 3 different sources, no?
>
> That won't stop him.  He likes to do this whether it seams like a 

In fairness, I've had MobileMe sync cause duplicates several
times in AddressBook.  And with *only* addressbook and MobileMe
involved (though two separate Macs).

I can certainly affirm that it's possible for MobileMe sync
to cause duplicates.

One time, it not only created duplicates, but it even mangled
things by mixing data between contacts.

It's been vastly better behaved for the last few years,
but after those experiences, I got in the habit of making
a backup by exporting from AddressBook to an outside file
on a regular basis.  (Export AddressBook Archive now)


-- 
Plain Bread alone for e-mail, thanks.  The rest gets trashed.

In article <yoby5y5oyva.fsf@panix2.panix.com>,
 BreadWithSpam@fractious.net wrote:

> Michael Vilain <vilain@NOspamcop.net> writes:
> 
> >> It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> >> contacts from 3 different sources, no?
> >
> > That won't stop him.  He likes to do this whether it seams like a 
> 
> In fairness, I've had MobileMe sync cause duplicates several
> times in AddressBook.  And with *only* addressbook and MobileMe
> involved (though two separate Macs).
> 
> I can certainly affirm that it's possible for MobileMe sync
> to cause duplicates.
> 
> One time, it not only created duplicates, but it even mangled
> things by mixing data between contacts.
> 
> It's been vastly better behaved for the last few years,
> but after those experiences, I got in the habit of making
> a backup by exporting from AddressBook to an outside file
> on a regular basis.  (Export AddressBook Archive now)

Oh, I agree.  Apple's syncing has done all sorts of flakey things to my 
contacts, too.  I was syncing w/ 7 different sources/devices, so I 
accepted the mea culpa.

In message <siegman-340094.10512602092011@sciid-srv02.med.tufts.edu> 
  AES <siegman@stanford.edu> wrote:
> How can a native application as basic and important as Address Book be 
> so unremittingly mediocre?!?

I think you're being overly generous.

-- 
There's no present. There's only the immediate future and the recent
past.

In message <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net> 
  Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> In article 
> <siegman-3D4998.14342003092011@bmedcfsc-srv02.tufts.ad.tufts.edu>,
>  AES <siegman@stanford.edu> wrote:

>> In article <thom-0775EE.11431603092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
>>  Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
>> 
>> > > A moment ago I was looking at a particular subset of my Address Book 
>> > > cards (results of a search for a certain city) which included three 
>> > > cards having identical names -- cards which turned out on closer 
>> > > examination to be exact duplicates. 
>> > 
>> > Do you happen to sync w/ MobileMe and Google?  I do, and my address book 
>> > is a mess because of it.
>> 
>> No, I took an initial look at MobileMe and decided, I'm _never_ going 
>> to go there (or anywhere else in the cloud).  
>> 
>> Most of the duplicates in my Address Book arrived there during my 
>> initial conversion from Now Contact to Address Book (which I never 
>> should have done!!).  Others arrived from some kind of autoconversions 
>> to Address Book from my Eudora address book, and from email messages 
>> with vCard attachments.

> It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> contacts from 3 different sources, no?

Nah, it spawns dupes all the time. At one time I had 13 copies over
almost every contact, and I had over 100 of two of them.


-- 
I WILL NOT ENCOURAGE OTHERS TO FLY Bart chalkboard Ep. 7F03

In article <slrnj661bl.2ktn.g.kreme@ibook-g4-2.local>,
 Lewis <g.kreme@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote:

> In message <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net> 
>   Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> > In article 
> > <siegman-3D4998.14342003092011@bmedcfsc-srv02.tufts.ad.tufts.edu>,
> >  AES <siegman@stanford.edu> wrote:
> 
> >> In article <thom-0775EE.11431603092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
> >>  Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> >> 
> >> > > A moment ago I was looking at a particular subset of my Address Book 
> >> > > cards (results of a search for a certain city) which included three 
> >> > > cards having identical names -- cards which turned out on closer 
> >> > > examination to be exact duplicates. 
> >> > 
> >> > Do you happen to sync w/ MobileMe and Google?  I do, and my address book 
> >> > is a mess because of it.
> >> 
> >> No, I took an initial look at MobileMe and decided, I'm _never_ going 
> >> to go there (or anywhere else in the cloud).  
> >> 
> >> Most of the duplicates in my Address Book arrived there during my 
> >> initial conversion from Now Contact to Address Book (which I never 
> >> should have done!!).  Others arrived from some kind of autoconversions 
> >> to Address Book from my Eudora address book, and from email messages 
> >> with vCard attachments.
> 
> > It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> > contacts from 3 different sources, no?
> 
> Nah, it spawns dupes all the time. At one time I had 13 copies over
> almost every contact, and I had over 100 of two of them.

Not here, it doesn't. You're obviously using it in a certain way that 
creates duplicates. Stop doing that.

-- 
Send responses to the relevant news group rather than email to me.
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my very hungry SPAM
filter. Due to Google's refusal to prevent spammers from posting
messages through their servers, I often ignore posts from Google
Groups. Use a real news client if you want me to see your posts.

JR

In article <yoby5y5oyva.fsf@panix2.panix.com>,
 BreadWithSpam@fractious.net wrote:

> Michael Vilain <vilain@NOspamcop.net> writes:
> 
> >> It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> >> contacts from 3 different sources, no?
> >
> > That won't stop him.  He likes to do this whether it seams like a 
> 
> In fairness, I've had MobileMe sync cause duplicates several
> times in AddressBook.  And with *only* addressbook and MobileMe
> involved (though two separate Macs).

I've used it with MobileMe on multiple Macs for years with no such 
issues.

-- 
Send responses to the relevant news group rather than email to me.
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my very hungry SPAM
filter. Due to Google's refusal to prevent spammers from posting
messages through their servers, I often ignore posts from Google
Groups. Use a real news client if you want me to see your posts.

JR

In article <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
 Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:

> It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> contacts from 3 different sources, no?

I'm blaming Apple for the fact that Address Book's function to "find, 
identify, and remove duplicates" seems to be dysfunctional.  I use or 
have used extensively at least three other modestly-priced third-party 
Mac cataloging apps (for addresses, images, and literature citations), 
all of which had excellent built-in tools for this routine task.

In article 
<siegman-99E2ED.07174404092011@bmedcfsc-srv02.tufts.ad.tufts.edu>,
 AES <siegman@stanford.edu> wrote:

> In article <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
>  Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> 
> > It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> > contacts from 3 different sources, no?
> 
> I'm blaming Apple for the fact that Address Book's function to "find, 
> identify, and remove duplicates" seems to be dysfunctional.  I use or 
> have used extensively at least three other modestly-priced third-party 
> Mac cataloging apps (for addresses, images, and literature citations), 
> all of which had excellent built-in tools for this routine task.

That's a legitimate complaint. 

I would probably have written an AppleScript script to do it without 
even realizing Address Book had such a feature!  : )

-- 
Send responses to the relevant news group rather than email to me.
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my very hungry SPAM
filter. Due to Google's refusal to prevent spammers from posting
messages through their servers, I often ignore posts from Google
Groups. Use a real news client if you want me to see your posts.

JR

In article 
<siegman-99E2ED.07174404092011@bmedcfsc-srv02.tufts.ad.tufts.edu>,
 AES <siegman@stanford.edu> wrote:

> In article <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
>  Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> 
> > It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> > contacts from 3 different sources, no?
> 
> I'm blaming Apple for the fact that Address Book's function to "find, 
> identify, and remove duplicates" seems to be dysfunctional.  I use or 
> have used extensively at least three other modestly-priced third-party 
> Mac cataloging apps (for addresses, images, and literature citations), 
> all of which had excellent built-in tools for this routine task.

Ah, ok.  I have to agree.  It's not that great.  In Snow Leopard, there 
was an option-key-modified-menu item that claimed to be more accurate at 
finding dupes, but it seems to be gone in Lion.

On 2011-09-04 14:17:44 +0000, AES said:

> In article <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
>  Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> 
>> It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported
>> contacts from 3 different sources, no?
> 
> I'm blaming Apple for the fact that Address Book's function to "find,
> identify, and remove duplicates" seems to be dysfunctional.  I use or
> have used extensively at least three other modestly-priced third-party
> Mac cataloging apps (for addresses, images, and literature citations),
> all of which had excellent built-in tools for this routine task.

I've just run that on my address book which had several duplicates and 
it found them all and cleaned them up. Worked perfectly.

In article <jollyroger-24005B.09081104092011@news.individual.net>,
 Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> wrote:

> In article <slrnj661bl.2ktn.g.kreme@ibook-g4-2.local>,
>  Lewis <g.kreme@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote:
> 
> > In message <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net> 
> >   Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> > > In article 
> > 
> > > It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> > > contacts from 3 different sources, no?
> > 
> > Nah, it spawns dupes all the time. At one time I had 13 copies over
> > almost every contact, and I had over 100 of two of them.
> 
> Not here, it doesn't. You're obviously using it in a certain way that 
> creates duplicates. Stop doing that.

I lol'ed.

In article <thom-F445B9.10373804092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
 Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:

> In article <jollyroger-24005B.09081104092011@news.individual.net>,
>  Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> wrote:
> 
> > In article <slrnj661bl.2ktn.g.kreme@ibook-g4-2.local>,
> >  Lewis <g.kreme@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote:
> > 
> > > In message <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net> 
> > >   Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> > > > In article 
> > > 
> > > > It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> > > > contacts from 3 different sources, no?
> > > 
> > > Nah, it spawns dupes all the time. At one time I had 13 copies over
> > > almost every contact, and I had over 100 of two of them.
> > 
> > Not here, it doesn't. You're obviously using it in a certain way that 
> > creates duplicates. Stop doing that.
> 
> I lol'ed.

Happy to entertain.  : D

-- 
Send responses to the relevant news group rather than email to me.
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my very hungry SPAM
filter. Due to Google's refusal to prevent spammers from posting
messages through their servers, I often ignore posts from Google
Groups. Use a real news client if you want me to see your posts.

JR

In article <201109041537113518-johnmasters@mecom>,
 John Masters <johnmasters@me.com> wrote:

> On 2011-09-04 14:17:44 +0000, AES said:
> 
> > In article <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
> >  Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> > 
> >> It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported
> >> contacts from 3 different sources, no?
> > 
> > I'm blaming Apple for the fact that Address Book's function to "find,
> > identify, and remove duplicates" seems to be dysfunctional.  I use or
> > have used extensively at least three other modestly-priced third-party
> > Mac cataloging apps (for addresses, images, and literature citations),
> > all of which had excellent built-in tools for this routine task.
> 
> I've just run that on my address book which had several duplicates and 
> it found them all and cleaned them up. Worked perfectly.

Oops!

-- 
Send responses to the relevant news group rather than email to me.
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my very hungry SPAM
filter. Due to Google's refusal to prevent spammers from posting
messages through their servers, I often ignore posts from Google
Groups. Use a real news client if you want me to see your posts.

JR

In message <jollyroger-24005B.09081104092011@news.individual.net> 
  Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> wrote:
> In article <slrnj661bl.2ktn.g.kreme@ibook-g4-2.local>,
>  Lewis <g.kreme@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote:

>> In message <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net> 
>>   Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
>> > In article 
>> > <siegman-3D4998.14342003092011@bmedcfsc-srv02.tufts.ad.tufts.edu>,
>> >  AES <siegman@stanford.edu> wrote:
>> 
>> >> In article <thom-0775EE.11431603092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
>> >>  Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
>> >> 
>> >> > > A moment ago I was looking at a particular subset of my Address Book 
>> >> > > cards (results of a search for a certain city) which included three 
>> >> > > cards having identical names -- cards which turned out on closer 
>> >> > > examination to be exact duplicates. 
>> >> > 
>> >> > Do you happen to sync w/ MobileMe and Google?  I do, and my address book 
>> >> > is a mess because of it.
>> >> 
>> >> No, I took an initial look at MobileMe and decided, I'm _never_ going 
>> >> to go there (or anywhere else in the cloud).  
>> >> 
>> >> Most of the duplicates in my Address Book arrived there during my 
>> >> initial conversion from Now Contact to Address Book (which I never 
>> >> should have done!!).  Others arrived from some kind of autoconversions 
>> >> to Address Book from my Eudora address book, and from email messages 
>> >> with vCard attachments.
>> 
>> > It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
>> > contacts from 3 different sources, no?
>> 
>> Nah, it spawns dupes all the time. At one time I had 13 copies over
>> almost every contact, and I had over 100 of two of them.

> Not here, it doesn't. You're obviously using it in a certain way that 
> creates duplicates. Stop doing that.

heh.

The issue, as far as I can tell, is having multiple machines and
multiple iOS devices all connected to the same MobileMe account. At some
point it just goes batshit and starts duping everything.


-- 
'And I promise you this,' he [Carrot] shouted, 'if we succeed, no-one
will remember. And if we fail, no one will forget!' 

In article <slrnj6aqul.2r5m.g.kreme@ibook-g4-2.local>,
 Lewis <g.kreme@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote:

> In message <jollyroger-24005B.09081104092011@news.individual.net> 
>   Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> wrote:
> > In article <slrnj661bl.2ktn.g.kreme@ibook-g4-2.local>,
> >  Lewis <g.kreme@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote:
> 
> >> In message <thom-BC9DD4.19454903092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net> 
> >>   Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> >> > In article 
> >> > <siegman-3D4998.14342003092011@bmedcfsc-srv02.tufts.ad.tufts.edu>,
> >> >  AES <siegman@stanford.edu> wrote:
> >> 
> >> >> In article <thom-0775EE.11431603092011@blt.news.speakeasy.net>,
> >> >>  Thom Rosario <thom@nospam.com> wrote:
> >> >> 
> >> >> > > A moment ago I was looking at a particular subset of my Address 
> >> >> > > Book 
> >> >> > > cards (results of a search for a certain city) which included three 
> >> >> > > cards having identical names -- cards which turned out on closer 
> >> >> > > examination to be exact duplicates. 
> >> >> > 
> >> >> > Do you happen to sync w/ MobileMe and Google?  I do, and my address 
> >> >> > book 
> >> >> > is a mess because of it.
> >> >> 
> >> >> No, I took an initial look at MobileMe and decided, I'm _never_ going 
> >> >> to go there (or anywhere else in the cloud).  
> >> >> 
> >> >> Most of the duplicates in my Address Book arrived there during my 
> >> >> initial conversion from Now Contact to Address Book (which I never 
> >> >> should have done!!).  Others arrived from some kind of autoconversions 
> >> >> to Address Book from my Eudora address book, and from email messages 
> >> >> with vCard attachments.
> >> 
> >> > It hardly seems fair to blame Apple for the dupes, having imported 
> >> > contacts from 3 different sources, no?
> >> 
> >> Nah, it spawns dupes all the time. At one time I had 13 copies over
> >> almost every contact, and I had over 100 of two of them.
> 
> > Not here, it doesn't. You're obviously using it in a certain way that 
> > creates duplicates. Stop doing that.
> 
> heh.
> 
> The issue, as far as I can tell, is having multiple machines and
> multiple iOS devices all connected to the same MobileMe account. At some
> point it just goes batshit and starts duping everything.

Huh... but that's exactly what I have had for the past couple years.

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JR