Check Permission and Read Contacts

Goal

Verify that your app has permission to access device contacts and read all contacts from the address book.

Actions Required

Action	Purpose
AddressBookGetContactsAccessStatus	Check current permission status
AddressBookReadContacts	Fetch contacts from device
AddressBookGetReadContactsSuccessResult	Get contact count and metadata
AddressBookGetReadContactsError	Get error details when read fails

Variables Needed

• accessStatus (Enum: AddressBookContactsAccessStatus)

• contactCount (Int)

• nextOffset (Int)

• errorCode (Int)

• errorDescription (String)

Implementation Steps

1. State: CheckPermission

Action: AddressBookGetContactsAccessStatus

• Outputs:

  • accessStatus → accessStatus variable

• Events:

  • authorizedEvent → ReadContacts

  • notDeterminedEvent → ReadContacts (will auto-prompt)

  • deniedEvent → ShowError

  • limitedEvent → ReadContacts (iOS 14+ partial access)

2. State: ReadContacts

Action: AddressBookReadContacts

• Inputs:

  • limit: 10 (read 10 contacts - Pass -1 to read all contacts)

  • offset: 0 (start from beginning)

  • mustIncludeName: true

  • mustIncludePhoneNumber: false

  • mustIncludeEmail: false

• Events:

  • successEvent → ExtractResult

  • failureEvent → ExtractError

Note: This action waits for the callback internally and caches results in AddressBookUtils.

3. State: ExtractResult

Action: AddressBookGetReadContactsSuccessResult

• Outputs:

  • contactCount → contactCount variable

  • nextOffset → nextOffset variable

• Transition: Go to DisplayCount

4. State: ExtractError

Action: AddressBookGetReadContactsError

• Outputs:

  • errorCode → errorCode variable (Int)

  • errorDescription → errorDescription variable (String)

• Transition: Go to ShowError

5. State: DisplayCount

Display the contactCount value in your UI (e.g., "Found 150 contacts").

Common Issues

• Permission Denied: If accessStatus is Denied, guide users to device Settings to enable contacts permission

• No Contacts: contactCount may be 0 if device has no contacts or filters are too restrictive

• nextOffset = -1: Indicates all contacts were loaded (no more pages available)

Flow Diagram

CheckPermission
    ├─ Authorized → ReadContacts
    ├─ NotDetermined → ReadContacts (prompts user)
    └─ Denied → ShowError

ReadContacts (waits for callback)
    ├─ Success → ExtractResult
    └─ Failure → ExtractError

ExtractResult
    └─ DisplayCount

ExtractError
    └─ ShowError