merge_highrise_contacts.rb

#!/usr/bin/env ruby

# merge_highrise_contacts.rb
# 2009 Robert Jones, Craic Computing LLC (jones@craic.com)
# Distributed under the terms of the MIT Open Source license

# This is a utility to convert a CSV dump of People and Companies from 
# Highrise (http://highrisehq.com) into a mailing list suitable for a Mail Merge 
# with Excel/Word or Numbers/Pages (09 version)

# I create Company records with full addresses and Person records with no address
# This script performs the 'join' between the two types of record in the CSV dump file
# Highrise ought to do this for us... but until then, this script fills the gap

# 1: To create the input file, go to your Highrise account
#    then -> Contacts -> Export -> Export to Excel
# 2: Then run this script:
#    ./merge_highrise_contacts.rb highrise_dump.csv > mail_merge.csv
# 3: Load the file into Excel or Numbers, save as Worksheet
#    and follow the Mail Merge instructions in Word or Pages
#    In Numbers, you will need to designate the first line as a Header line

# The script requires that you install the 'fastercsv' gem with:
# 'sudo gem install fastercsv'
require 'rubygems'
require 'fastercsv'

# Clean up extraneous spaces and newlines in a string
def clean_up_string(string_in)
  return '' if string_in.nil?
  string_out = String.new(string_in)
  string_out.sub!(/^\s+/, '')
  string_out.sub!(/\s+$/, '')
  string_out.sub!(/[\r\n]+/, ' ')
  string_out
end


# Specify the columns to be extracted 
company_cols = ['Name', 'Address - Work Street', 'Address - Work City', 
                'Address - Work State', 'Address - Work Zip', 'Address - Work Country' ]
person_cols  = ['First name', 'Last name', 'Company']

abort "Usage: #{$0} <highrise.csv file>" unless ARGV.length == 1

companies = Hash.new
people    = Hash.new
columns   = Hash.new

i = 0
FasterCSV.foreach(ARGV[0]) do |row|

  # Parse out the header row to build the column map
  if i == 0
    j = 0
    row.each do |label|
      columns[label] = j
      j += 1
    end
    i += 1
    next
  end
  
  # Parse out Person and Company rows
  if row[0] =~ /^Person/
    # Build a unique key for each person 
    name = row[columns['Company']] + ' '  + row[columns['Last name']] + ' ' + row[columns['First name']]
    people[name] = Array.new
    person_cols.each do |label|
      people[name] << clean_up_string(row[columns[label]])
    end
  elsif row[0] =~ /^Company/
    name = row[columns['Company']]
    companies[name] = Array.new
    company_cols.each do |label|
      field = clean_up_string(row[columns[label]])
      companies[name] << "\"#{field}\""
    end
  end
end

# Link People to Company Addresses and output in CSV format

output = ['First name','Last name','Company','Street','City','State','Zip','Country']
puts output.join(",")

people.keys.sort.each do |name|
  output = Array.new()
  output << "\"#{people[name][0]}\""
  output << "\"#{people[name][1]}\""
  company = people[name][2]
  output.concat(companies[company]) unless companies[company].nil?
  puts output.join(",")  
end