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Comment by jaclaz | Hacker News Reader

If I get this right, both the NFC tag and the app assume that these two conditions are true:

1) internet connection is available

2) that the neucard site is up and working

so it is in some ways an IOT of sorts, right?

For the NFC those two conditions are of course needed, but for the app, is there a "local cache" of contacts in case either of the two conditions are not met?

Or are these contacts automatically added[1] to the phone contacts?

And how does the updating works?

I mean, does the app "phone home" periodically or only when you ask for a given contact (or both)?

[1] even if in a possibly outdated version

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Yes, for the NFC tags you will need an internet connection, but the Neucards app does maintain a local cache of the digital cards you have received. You can view the details of those cards and kick off an action, like make a call or send an email, by just tapping on the info. Updates occur when I edit my card or account information and notifications are sent to the list of recipients for my card. Neucards does a sync at launch or when triggered by a notification.

As for adding info to the phone contacts, this is a tricky situation. Right now, I do not sync the contact info from received cards into the contacts on the phone. This is because the contacts on the phone are a shared resource that other apps can access, and I don't want people's contact info to leak. I do support caller identification, so you will see a person's name rather than just a number when they call for all of the numbers on your received cards. But, this isn't as robust of an experience as having all the info in the phone's contacts.

I understand how you don't want the contacts coming from neucard into the generic phone app, but then users wanting to call someone must know if the contact is in the neucard app or in the standard phone one (or look in both).

Maybe you could do the reverse, i.e. somehow allow the neucard app to "import" the standard contacts, if this would be possible, the neucard app could double as a "private contacts app" that might have more general use.

Actually, I have an option in Neucards' settings that adds a Contacts tab which lets you access your phone's contacts directly within Neucards. I agree people should not need to go back and forth to find what they are looking for.

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