Contacts
We all have human contacts stored on our computers. Some of them, we “talk” to all the time and others, not so much. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to open the Start Menu and have your most favorite people sitting right there, a simple mouse-click away? Well, that’s what I’ll show you in today’s Quick Tips article.
People App
The People App that ships with Windows 10 contains all the Contacts that Windows is aware of. Windows populates this App with eMail contacts that it has “seen” you use in the past, for instance, on your Hotmail or Outlook account. You can add, edit and delete these contacts as you see fit.
Pinning Contacts in this App to the Start Menu is dead simple.
Pinning a Contact
Open the People App. If you don’t already have this App pinned in the Start Menu, you can just start typing “People” in the Start Menu to bring it up.
- Right-click the Contact you want to Pin
- Choose Pin to Start
Windows will throw up a Yes/No question because it thinks you couldn’t possibly know what you want:
Guess what? If you click Yes, then it will be pinned to your Start Menu.
I chose our very own Dave Hartsock contact as an example:
Removing a Contact
Un-pinning a contact from the Start Menu is even easier. Right-click the pinned Contact in the Start Menu and choose Unpin from Start.
This time, Windows won’t pester you with a, “Do you really want to do this?”, pop-up. Apparently, it’s OK to unpin a contact without confirmation, but pinning one is a much more dangerous operation. Go figure… I’ll never understand their reasoning.
This Quick Tip was so quick I almost feel guilty. Almost…
Enjoy!
Richard
—
Richard, you should feel guilty for giving any tip for this truly useless app. I have it on my travelling laptop thinking I could use it to keep in touch when away. NO.
In all my research, there is no way to populate People with contacts unless they send you an email first. “Windows populates this App with eMail contacts that it has “seen” you use in the past, for instance, on your Hotmail or Outlook account.”
The problem is I setup a new email address when I purchased this unit, not wanting it associated with my desktop. Boy, that was a mistake.
Now, nobody knows this email address. I tried forwarding emails sent to my desktop personal email address (managed in Thunderbird), but “People” will not let me grab these names from the email.
When I previously used a browser to login to “outlook.live.com”, using my new email address for my laptop, I was able populate the “contacts” with imported information, but these contacts do not synchronize with the “People” app. TOTALLY USELESS and frustrating.
Any help would be appreciated.
Hi Thomas,
Have you tried Adding an Account? It’s in the Settings Menu of the People App. Use the Gear Icon, bottom-left corner.
Richard
How would that help? I already setup the account I wanted when I first tried using the app. Can I add the same account again?
Here is an MS Help page:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/14103/windows-8-people-app-help
I know it says Windows 8, but it should be a beginning for you,
Richard
Yes, I have been there few times. It only offers;
“Add contacts one at a time
On Start, tap or click People. Swipe in from the bottom edge to see the app commands.
(If you’re using a mouse, right-click within the app.)
Tap or click New contact.
Enter the info you want for this contact, and then tap or click the save button .”
There is NO import contacts.
I will be forced to send myself a TXT file with the contacts I want for this email address and then enter them ONE-AT-A-TIME. (I have a lot of contacts.)
This app still is terrible.
OK, I succumb. The App is terrible 🙂
You are forgiven. 🙂 I find it hard to believe MS actually put out such a crappy app when at one time they were the leaders when it came to email. The same group must have worked on Edge.
Thomas, go to Start > Settings > Privacy > Contacts. At the top of the Contact settings page you should see an option to “Let apps access my contacts”. Is this set to On or Off?
It must be set to On for the People app to automatically populate with your contacts.
Hi Jim,
Yes, it is set to “ON”. It is not that “People” will not pick up a contact if the “Mail” app is sent an email, it is that I cannot IMPORT contacts to populate the “People” app from the beginning.
I have not put this “new” email address out there, so my regular contacts do not know to send me an email to this address. (Catch 22).
There should be an easy way, like any other email/contact program I have used, to IMPORT my contacts.
Thanks for your reply.