Import Google Contacts into abook for neomutt

As a part of abandoning Google services I wanted to get all my contacts collected over the years and be able to use then in neomutt.

Neomutt works well with abook contact “manager” so that was an easy choice.

How to Export Google contacts

Go to Google Contacts.
Check the box next to any contact and in the top left,
click Selection Actions and then All.
In the top left, click More actions and then Export.
To back up your contacts, select Google CSV.
To save your file, click Export.

Import to abook

Unfortunately the Google CSV is not compatible with what abook expects. I inspected the source code and found the most suitable input format: allcsv. It’s listed with

$ abook --formats

Python for the rescue

This script google2abook.py will filter and rearrange the columns in the Google CSV file and output the format suitable for abook conversion (allcsv input format).

import sys
import csv


if __name__ == "__main__":
    reader = csv.DictReader(sys.stdin)
    writer = csv.writer(sys.stdout, delimiter=",", lineterminator="\n")
    for rec in reader:
        if not rec["E-mail 1 - Value"].strip():
            # no email no cry
            continue
        # abook converter expects these columns
        writer.writerow(
            [
                rec["Name"],
                rec["E-mail 1 - Value"],
                rec["Address 1 - Formatted"],
                "",  # address 2
                rec["Address 1 - City"],
                "",  # state
                rec["Address 1 - Postal Code"],
                rec["Address 1 - Country"],
                rec["Phone 2 - Value"],
                rec["Phone 3 - Value"],  # guess
                "",  # fax
                rec["Phone 1 - Value"],  # mobile - guess
                rec["Nickname"],
                rec["Website 1 - Value"],
                rec["Notes"],
                rec["Birthday"],
            ]
        )

Putting it together

So let’s take the Google exported file google-contacts.csv and create an abook address book.

cat google-contacts.csv | python3 csv2abookcsv.py > abook-contacts.csv
abook --convert --informat allcsv --infile abook-contacts.csv \
  --outformat abook --outfile address.abook

Then you need to put the output file into $HOME/.abook/addressbook and voìla!

published: 2023-05-01
last modified: 2023-05-01

#code #own-your-data #Google #Python

https://vit.baisa.cz/notes/code/google-to-abook/