Contacts

Contacts are reusable people / org records you can attach to a single IP address as the owner. Use them when the same person owns dozens of addresses and you don't want to retype "Jane Doe (jane@example.com)" on every row, or when you want a clickable jump from an address back to its owner's full details.

The free-text Owner field on every address still works exactly as before — contacts are an optional upgrade. You can mix and match: some addresses use the typeahead-linked contact, others use a free-text owner string, and the page renders both consistently.

When to use a contact vs. the free-text Owner field

Use a linked contact when…	Use the free-text Owner field when…
The same person owns multiple addresses	The owner is a one-off ("temp lab box")
You want one place to update name/email/phone	You don't have an email or care to track one
You need a clickable owner card in the address list	You want to keep notes inline with the address

You can switch between the two at any time per-address — there is no migration step.

Creating a contact

Open Admin → Contacts (contacts.php).
Click New contact.
Fill in Name (required) plus any of Email, Phone, Org, Note (all optional).
Save.

The contact is now eligible to be linked from any address.

Linking a contact to an address

On the address create or edit form (in the right-side drawer on addresses.php):

Start typing into the Owner field. The input is wired to a contact typeahead (data-contact-typeahead on the input — fuzzy-matches name and email).
Pick a contact from the suggestion list. The address now stores both the displayed text and a hidden owner_contact_id pointing at the contact row.
Save.

In the address list, linked owners render as a clickable contact card (name + email badge) instead of plain text.

Inline edit clears the link

If you double-click the Owner cell directly in the address table (the inline edit shortcut, not the drawer form), the new value is treated as free text and the owner_contact_id link is cleared automatically. This keeps the displayed owner and the linked contact in sync — when you go off-script with free text, the system trusts that you mean it.

To re-link, open the full edit drawer and use the typeahead again.

Removing a contact link from an address

Two ways:

Open the edit drawer, blank the Owner field, save. Both the text and the owner_contact_id clear.
Use the inline edit on the Owner cell (see above) to overwrite the value with free text.

Deleting a contact

From Admin → Contacts, deleting a contact is a soft-cascade: the contact row is removed and any addresses linked to it have their owner_contact_id set to NULL (the schema's ON DELETE SET NULL). The free-text Owner value on those addresses is preserved — no data is lost on the address side.

API alternative

The contacts API is documented in REST API. Highlights for IP-address linking:

Pass owner_contact_id in the address create/update body to link or unlink (null to clear).
Filter addresses by linked contact: GET /api.php?resource=addresses&contact_id=42.
Address responses include owner_contact_name and owner_contact_email when a link is set, so clients don't need a second roundtrip.

For the contact resource itself (CRUD, search), see the same section.