MacMost Now 732: Printing Lists of Contacts

Using the Address Book app you can print out lists of contacts, specifying exactly which fields you want to include. You can also print compact pocket lists that can easily be carried with you.

You can also watch this video at YouTube (but with ads).

Video Transcript: Hi, this is Gary with MacMost Now. On today's episode I want to show you how to print out lists from Address Book including handy little pocket lists.
So the Address Book in Lion, and it will be called Contacts in Mountain Lion, has a handy little feature where you can print out your data. You can do it as a standard list, maybe keep it as a backup or pass it off to somebody who needs a list of the addresses you have. Or you can even do this little pocket list which prints out really tiny, something you can fit into your purse or wallet. 
So here I am in Address Book. I want to make sure I am viewing both the List and Card so I can see both sides. I can go ahead and select the group I want to print out. So, let me select All Contacts but I can select a custom group that I've made and then I can go to File, Print to print out the list. So you should see a print dialogue box that looks like this with all this information on the right. If you don't see that and you see something like this then you want to click on Show Details and then you get all of this stuff here.  
So I want to change the Style from mailing labels or envelopes to Lists. I have several different options here. First thing I can choose is the paper size, of course. Standard stuff. Choose the orientation. I can also choose what information I want in this list. So if I just wanted phone numbers for instance I could do that. If I just wanted addresses and no phone numbers I could do that. So there are lots of different options here for actually what I want to print. I can even print, if I have everyone's birthdays there, I can even print a list of birthdays to hang on the wall. So I have lots of different options. You can set to regular or large file size. It will show you how many people it included here in the list.
Now, this can now come in handy. I can even save it as a pdf here to print out somewhere else or to store as a pdf if I like.
I can also choose, as another option, a Pocket Address Book. So what this does is create this cool little quick address book here. Let's go and just create one that shows the phone numbers. So it creates this tiny little pocket list. I can print it out on standard paper. It arranges it with the letters here on the side kind of like what you would want. I can choose index or compact style which just takes that away. I can also set the font for this. I can set the orientation for the paper as well. So let's go and print this out.
So what I've got now is this tiny little list here on a side of the page. It even includes littles marks for me to actually slice it up and create this cool little list that I can then fold up and stick in my wallet. It doesn't take up much space. It has just the information I want.
These lists come in really handy because say if you have your Mac in your office or your den or something and you want to have a list of phone numbers on the refrigerator in the kitchen, you can print out a quick list. Or if you want to carry one around in your wallet. Of course now with iPhones and such we usually have our Contacts with us but sometimes it can come in handy in cases where we don't have that available or you just want to have a backup somewhere. 
I hope you found this useful. This is Gary with MacMost Now.

Comments: 17 Responses to “MacMost Now 732: Printing Lists of Contacts”

Bev Mascara

12 years ago

I just want to thank you for your most interesting and valuable (to me) tutorials. I always look forward to your e-mails. Thank you

merry winslow

my address book app does not have the card plus list view option:
it has "card and columns". i am using 10.6.8...
is that why?

Gary Rosenzweig

Yes. You are using Snow Leopard but this video shows the Lion version of Address Book.

Antonio

I follow the instructions carefully but the photos don't print in the list, even though the photo option in the attributes is checked.

It doesn't appear that you can include photos. Perhaps something they'll fix in the future.

Dymphna SPINEDI

I used to be able to print out a list with the photo. I can't do it any more.

It seems Apple knows about this. They have a work-around here:
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS4408
Perhaps they will fix this in the near future.

Martha Schott

You should show how to alphabetize by last name. Following these instructions, you may find your address list entries are in a strange order.

Anthony Porter

The Contacts list created isn't in alphabetical order. Why is that?

I think it is a bug. Hopefully it will be fixed in some future version.

River Rance

Is there a work around to print my contact list in alphabetical order?
thanks
river

Use Numbers. Create a new blank spreadsheet. Select all the addresses in Contacts and drag and drop them into the spreadsheet. Then sort and print as you wish.

Megan

It will not let me drop them into numbers??

Make sure you are using the latest version of Numbers and Contacts. Also, make sure you haven't denied access to Contacts in System Preferences, Security.

Megan McGarty

Thank you thank you!! I didn't have the access allowed!

Can you select the fields it brings over to the spreadsheet? It brought last name, first name, phone & email. Can I get it to bring over addresses as well?

Yes. See http://macmost.com/exporting-contacts-using-numbers.html

Comments Closed.

MacMost Now 732: Printing Lists of Contacts

Comments: 17 Responses to “MacMost Now 732: Printing Lists of Contacts”

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