Our next helpful article for those new to Windows Phone is all about the People Hub — the one stop for all your social needs when you’re on the go. As the name implies, in the People Hub, all your contacts are available for communication. After launching the hub from the home screen (by default, a mosaic is present — a mosaic of randomly generated photos) you will be presented with a summary profile of your profile with the latest Facebook status or a tweet (if not just swipe right — we’ll keep it simple and start with the contact list).
Below your Live ID photo and status is a list of synced contacts removed from your Windows Live account and any other account you’ve set up on Windows Phone (Facebook, Outlook, Google, etc.). The settings can be manipulated to filter and show/hide friends from different accounts (more on that in a second).
Selecting a contact will display available data for Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, as well as numbers, addresses, and other miscellaneous information. You’ll notice that there’s a «link» option in the app bar that, when selected, will show similar contacts, which you can then merge to keep order and tidiness if you have the same contact on Live and Facebook (or even on Facebook). Twitter and LinkedIn like Well).
Swiping inside a contact will show «What’s new?» panel, which is an RSS feed of social activity for this person. Latest tweets, images, Facebook status updates and live updates are on this list. A second swipe takes us to the photos that are available on their Facebook and Live accounts. Photos can be uploaded, annotated and used as wallpaper — that’s the beauty of Windows Phone integration. Last but not least, we have contact history. This panel lists all communications between you and that person, be it SMS, email, or previous phone calls.
It’s all about me
Going back to the contact view, let’s take a look at the Me area in the People Hub. Selecting your photo at the top of your contact list will take you to your personal Windows Phone social media headquarters. The user can post messages on social networks; sign in to Messenger (and Facebook Chat); view Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn notifications; and watch your own «What’s New?» — which can also serve as a preview of how other Windows Phone users will see your social media updates.
In addition to actually visiting the «Me» section of the People Hub, you can also pin «Me» to your home screen for easier access (tick the «pin» option in the app bar).
So what’s new?
What’s new? The People Hub panel is a lot like the separate news feeds in Contacts, except that this feed aggregates all the updates from all your contacts and displays them in one easy-to-read place. As with contact news feeds in the hub, you can comment, like, retweet/reply, view photos, and more.
Which social networks are active in this feed can be configured, which is especially useful if you are a popular guy on Facebook, for example.
Check your latest
Next to «What’s new?» this is the recent section, which displays the number of contact tiles you’ve recently interacted with (or accessed through the hub itself). Think of the history list in the Music & Video Center, this section of the People Hub makes it easy to access (and view) the latest messages or activities.
Join my group
Another nice feature of Windows Phone is groups. Contacts can be sorted into easily accessible groups that appear above the contact list. In the photo above, we have a «family» group with contacts added. Selecting a group will bring up a list of all contacts added to the group, as well as «What’s new?» a panel that will reset channels for the group only.
Groups can be pinned to the home screen just like the Me element and act like linked mailboxes for convenience.
Is there a setting for this
