How can I get an iPhone to download a contact card via URL redirect - iphone

Question

I am working on a tracking tool and I am wondering if anyone knows how to get the iPhone to download a contact card via a URL redirect. iPhone will not download contact cards from the web. Has anyone figured out a way around this? In other cases with most mobiles, I can redirect them to a vcard or similar file, and using the correct http headers, get the phone to download it. iPhone does not allow vcard downloads so how would one get a vcard onto an iPhone via the web browser?

Answer 1

I have just published an alternative solution on my blog which describes how to attach the contact file as an attachment to a calendar file which is handled by mobile safari
http://mobicontact.info/iphone/download-contact-from-web-page/
Perhaps there is something here that you can work with. Doesn't specifically solve the redirect question but it does allow the user to open contact directly after going through the calendar app.
The blog shows complete solution including source code and images of the whole process and as such is a lot easier to read than what I can put here on Stack Overflow and I was trying to prevent duplication between many such forums. The main point to note is that Apple use :
ATTACH;VALUE=BINARY;ENCODING=BASE64;FMTTYPE=text/directory;
X-APPLE-FILENAME=iPhone Contact.vcf:
QkVHSU46VkNBUkQNClZFUlNJT046M…etc… [base64 encoded VCARD]
for embedded VCARD in VCALENDAR files. Create a VCALENDAR file and then base64 encode your VCARD within it - code snippet below (full details on my blog)
<?php
# Send correct headers
header("Content-type: text/x-vcalendar; charset=utf-8");
# Alternatively: application/octet-stream
# Depending on the desired browser behaviour
# Be sure to test thoroughly cross-browser
header("Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=\"iphonecontact.ics\";");
# Output file contents - simple version
#echo file_get_contents("iphonecontact.ics");
# Generate file contents - advanced version
# BEGIN:VCALENDAR
# VERSION:2.0
# BEGIN:VEVENT
# DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20120617T090000
# DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20120617T100000
# SUMMARY:iPhone Contact
# DTSTAMP:20120617T080516Z
# ATTACH;VALUE=BINARY;ENCODING=BASE64;FMTTYPE=text/directory;
# X-APPLE-FILENAME=iphonecontact.vcf:
# QkVHSU46VkNBUkQNClZFUlNJT046My4wDQpOOkNvbnRhY3Q7aVBob25lOzs7DQpGTjppUGhvbm
# UgQ29udGFjdA0KRU1BSUw7VFlQRT1JTlRFUk5FVDtUWVBFPVdPUks6aXBob25lQHRoZXNpbGlj
# b25nbG9iZS5jb20NClRFTDtUWVBFPUNFTEw7VFlQRT1WT0lDRTtUWVBFPXByZWY6KzQ0MTIzND
# U2Nzg5MA0KRU5EOlZDQVJE
# END:VEVENT
# END:VCALENDAR
echo "BEGIN:VCALENDAR\n";
echo "VERSION:2.0\n";
echo "BEGIN:VEVENT\n";
echo "SUMMARY:Click attached contact below to save to your contacts\n";
$dtstart = date("Ymd")."T".date("Hi")."00";
echo "DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:".$dtstart."\n";
$dtend = date("Ymd")."T".date("Hi")."01";
echo "DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:".$dtend."\n";
echo "DTSTAMP:".$dtstart."Z\n";
echo "ATTACH;VALUE=BINARY;ENCODING=BASE64;FMTTYPE=text/directory;\n";
echo " X-APPLE-FILENAME=iphonecontact.vcf:\n";
$vcard = file_get_contents("iphonecontact.vcf"); # read the file into memory
$b64vcard = base64_encode($vcard); # base64 encode it so that it can be used as an attachemnt to the "dummy" calendar appointment
$b64mline = chunk_split($b64vcard,74,"\n"); # chunk the single long line of b64 text in accordance with RFC2045 (and the exact line length determined from the original .ics file exported from Apple calendar
$b64final = preg_replace('/(.+)/', ' $1', $b64mline); # need to indent all the lines by 1 space for the iphone (yes really?!!)
echo $b64final; # output the correctly formatted encoded text
echo "END:VEVENT\n";
echo "END:VCALENDAR\n";
?>

Answer 2

You could try redirecting to a .tel site.
For example, my QR code redirects iPhones to http://edent.tel/
Or, if you don't want to buy a .tel, you can create a simple website which contains the phone number that you want with a "click to call" link.
<a href=”tel:[phone]″>Call me on 123456789</a>