SIP/Ekiga accounts don't store contacts

Binary package hint: empathy

I'd like to be able to store some contact details for other users of Ekiga using Empathy. But the Add Contact dialog silently accepts my input but then doesn't show up the contact in my contacts list, even when I activate 'Show offline users'.

Either it should be impossible to add SIP contacts, or else the bug should be fixed and the contacts stored and displayed.

I can confirm this bug.

There are 2 bugs here.

Empathy shouldn't let you add contacts if the connection manager doesn't support it. This is http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=459100

telepathy-sofiasip should support roster: http://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=16306

I encounter this bug too.
I have Empathy version 2.24.1 in Ubuntu 8.10 from the standard repo's

empathy bug is already fixed on jaunty.

I'm sorry... but... how was this exactly fixed???

I'm on Karmic and I can't add a SIP contact.

In fact, for Karmic with Empathy 2.28.1 the behavior is EXACTLY the same as in description of this ticket. The bug is now more than a year old AND Empathy is the default IM client in Karmic.

I think this is bad, especially for new users. In France it's actually normal to get a SIP account from your ISP: I think this will bother more than 1. Sure, there's always Ekiga... but... how difficult is to somehow store the contacts for the SIP account? locally?

The part of the bug that is in empathy is reportedly fixed. The rest of the bug is it telepathy-sofiasip, and that bug is still open.

Well... it's not entirely fixed.

Let's put it this way: if you have *only* the SIP account enabled, then the SIP account is still pre-selected in the account selection list (when you add a contact). The "Add contact" is even smart enough to add the prefix sip: and the @server.net suffix when you finished typing the phone number ;).

If you have multiple accounts (and at least one of them supports the "Add Contact") then, indeed, it's not possible to select the SIP account.

I agree, this makes SIP with Empathy impossible to use. I want to call landlines in a different country using SIP, do I have to remember all the numbers than? It's crazy. That is not how a default SIP application should behave I think.

In case it helps, I can't add contacts at all. The drop down is greyed out for both SIP and IRC.

The same problem here on Ubuntu 10.10 64 bits.
This bug is opened for more than 2 years and is not yet resolved!!!

$ dpkg -l | grep telepathy | awk '{print $2 "\t"$3}'
libfolks-telepathy0 0.1.17-0ubuntu2
libtelepathy-farsight0 0.0.14-2
libtelepathy-glib0 0.12.0-0ubuntu1
libtelepathy-logger1 0.1.5-1ubuntu1
python-telepathy 0.15.17-1
telepathy-butterfly 0.5.14-1
telepathy-gabble 0.10.0-1
telepathy-haze 0.4.0-1ubuntu0.1
telepathy-idle 0.1.6-1
telepathy-logger 0.1.5-1ubuntu1
telepathy-mission-control-5 1:5.6.0-1
telepathy-salut 0.3.12-1
telepathy-sofiasip 0.6.3-1

dpkg -l | grep empathy | awk '{print $2 "\t"$3}'
empathy 2.32.1-0ubuntu1
empathy-common 2.32.1-0ubuntu1
nautilus-sendto-empathy 2.32.1-0ubuntu1

Being able to add phone contacts is actually crucial for anyone using SIP. Please consider this for Empathy. Thank you!
As far as there is no solution to it, I need to use Ekiga for SIP.

I confirm, lack of that feature makes SIP with Empathy useless.

I concur with saepia and elPraga. It is painful to see that a half-done SIP program like Empathy made it into Ubuntu (no contacts = absolutely useless in practice), replacing a working piece of software like Ekiga.

Please add this feature ASAP. On a side note, I don't quite understand why contacts can only be stored if the plugin supports them. Contact information is quite universal (see GNOME Contacts for example) and should be stored by Empathy directly IMO.

In Ubuntu 12.04 the problem persist.

I have 1 SIP account and 1 IRC "account".
I can't add SIP contact - both accounts are listed bud grayed out - not selectable.

Why is such elementary problem in 4 years !!! not yet solved ?

Is Empathy developed at all ?

I am experiencing this issue with the most up to date 12.04 beta as well.

Once you tick the box in Empathy's accounts dialog saying you want to use this account for calling phone numbers, you can call SIP numbers from gnome-contacts. This will store the numbers in evolution-data-server. This approach makes more sense and is more flexible than storing things which don't really have presence information in the Empathy roster.

please comment on upstream bug that would be more better.

@Danielle,

tried this what you mentioned (regarding gnome-contacts), which sounded like some sort of a solution (if not the solution most people probably prefer);

While I am able to call out from empathy, on the SIP account (by manually entering the phone number),
having the phone number in gnome-contacts and registering the SIP account as usable for phone and mobile, didn't seem to work.
I click on the 'phone' icon in gnome contacts, and nothing at all happens.

Any idea what I can check, to troubleshoot this?

Same bug in Empathy 3.4.2.3-0ubuntu1 on Ubuntu 12.04 :(