Messenger Beta Contact Grouping

I like contacts grouped in the "traditional" way:

• displayed in groups
• offline and mobile contacts grouped or hidden
• Away contacts displayed inline, so that "locational memory" still applies (eg, I know that if a friend is online, they will always be in the same relative position)

I've installed Messenger beta 8.0.566 a couple of times, but playing with the view settings eventually gets this combination lost somewhere.

To restore my sanity, I've been editing a value in this registry key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\MSNMessenger\PerPassportSettings\(number)\GroupState

As the name implies, if you have a bunch of passports, it's per-passport. There's a DWORD called .FilterContactsBy, and the value 2 is the one I want, but the UI doesn't seem to be able to set it in v.566. It's been bugged; I assume it'll be fixed in the next release.

I'm in sunny Melbourne (that's pronounced Mel-burn by the way) at the moment, for the first time. It's a good-looking city, with lots of crazy 80's coloured shapes all over the place. Fun!