Add alphabetical sort to contacts list

Objective

• Add alphabetical sorting to Tools → Contacts so staff can scan large contact lists and spot duplicate profiles next to each other.
• Support duplicate-cleanup workflows where teams need to merge contacts after visually comparing names in list order.
• Reduce daily friction for client care and schedulers who today scroll or search without a predictable name order.

Background

• Product feedback: staff want to sort contacts A–Z to find duplicates to merge. Reporter also suspects a separate search bug may have created duplicate contacts, but the immediate blocker is no sort control on the contacts table.
• Screenshot (current UI — search, role/period volume filters, tag filter; no sort):

• Current behavior (confirmed in code):
• Tools → Contacts (ContactsListClient) loads GET contact with pagination, optional search, tag, and _roleId (for volume metric columns). No sort parameter is sent.
• ContactsTableControls exposes search, tag, role, and period (3m / 6m / 12m) — no sort UI.
• Backend GET /contact without search uses MainModel.find(...).skip().limit() with no .sort() — list order is not alphabetical.
• With search, results sort by relevance score, not name.
• Contact merge already ships (ATT-164 — Done): staff can merge two contacts from a profile, but finding duplicates at scale is still hard without list sort or duplicate discovery tooling.

Product Decisions

Locked

1. Problem type — Feature gap. Alphabetical list sort does not exist today; this is not a broken sort control.
2. Primary surface — Tools → Contacts main table (/tools/contacts).
3. User goal — Make duplicate profiles easier to see in list order, then use existing merge to consolidate.
4. Merge scope — Contact merge is already built; this issue is list sort / findability, not rebuilding merge.

Open

1. Sort key — Sort by last name then first name, first name only, or displayed full name as shown in the Name column?
2. Default order — Should A–Z become the default list order, or stay unsorted until the user picks sort (preserving today’s behavior for users who rely on current order)?
3. Sort directions — A–Z only, or A–Z and Z–A toggle?
4. Sort + search — When the user is searching, should name sort override relevance ranking, be disabled, or be a separate “sort results by name” option?
5. Sort + filters — When Role, Period, or Tag filters are active, should sort apply to the filtered page of results (server-side across full dataset vs client-side on current page only)?
6. Duplicate discovery — Is alphabetical sort enough for v1, or should this link to ATT-1194 (duplicate report by email/phone/name)? Reporter’s duplicate worry may need that broader tool, not sort alone.
7. Search-created duplicates — Reporter mentioned a search bug that may have created duplicates. Confirm separate bug ticket and keep out of scope for this feature unless product wants a combined cleanup epic.

Scope

Frontend (attik-frontend)

• Contacts list — src/app/tools/contacts/ContactsListClient.tsx fetches paginated contacts; add sort control and pass sort params to the API.
• Table controls — src/app/tools/contacts/ContactsTableControls.tsx is the natural place for a sort selector (alongside search, tag, role, period).
• Merge entry points — existing merge UI (ContactSearchForMerge, contact profile merge flow) unchanged unless product ties sort rows to a “merge duplicates” shortcut.

Backend (attik-backend)

• List endpoint — src/routes/contact.ts GET /contact: add supported sort query (e.g. lastName, firstName) for the non-search list path; ensure sort is stable and works with includeMeta pagination.
• Search path — searchContactsOnly currently sorts by score; define behavior when sort is requested alongside search (see Open #4).

Out of scope (unless product expands)

• Automated duplicate detection / duplicate report grid (ATT-1194).
• Multi-contact merge in one flow (ATT-1191).
• Root-cause fix for search bug that may have created duplicates (track separately when ticket ID is known).

References

• Screenshot: inline image above
• Slack feedback thread (duplicate cleanup + search bug mention)
• Related backlog: ATT-1120 (alphabetical sort), ATT-1194 (duplicate discovery)
• Merge (shipped): ATT-164
• Key files: attik-frontend/src/app/tools/contacts/ContactsListClient.tsx, attik-backend/src/routes/contact.ts