Sprint HTC Hero :: Can I Alphabetize My Contacts By Last Name?

I've had my Hero (Cingular South) for a couple of weeks now, and have learned how to use all of the features and applications that are important to me, and have given myself time to adjust to the new phone's quirks and abilities.And I've collected a list of things that really annoy me that keep this from being a good phone. Googling each of these topics for suggested fixes either turns up nothing useful, or turns up suggestions that raise as many questions as they answer. So I'm posting here, the entire list, hoping that the community can help me eliminate these issues and transform my phone into something truly decent. Maybe one "big" fix will address many of these. Oh, but please don't tell me to wait for 2.0... no idea how long that will take, or if it will fix all of these problems.

1) Phone unlocks, dials, etc. in my pocket. What good is a slide to unlock screen if there are ways to unlock with hard buttons? Can I disable that behavior of hard buttons so that the phone only unlocks after a slide?

2) Phone hangs up, dials people, opens random apps etc. while I'm on a phone call. I guess this is what you get for not having a proximity sensor. If I don't hold the phone away from my face for the first fifteen seconds or so, my chin might do all sorts of weird things. I've been on hold by "company X" and the next thing I know I'm hearing my wife's voicemail message. wtf? Is there any better solution out there than having to be very very careful about how you hold the phone when you call people? God forbid you need both hands and have to hold the phone with your shoulder... all bets are off... you might get Obama, or worse.

3) Keyboard just sucks at knowing what letter you've pressed. I'm using BetterKeyboard paid version now, and it looks better and has more options, but I'm not sure it really does any better as far as wrong keypresses go. Even in landscape it messes up on essentially every word. Is there any better alternative out there? I've used a touchscreen phone with only marginally larger screen in the past and had no trouble, so I can't imagine that it is the physical key size but rather software determination of what your intention is. I've gone through the calibration with no improvement. In fact, I've noticed that in general the screen thinks I'm touching about an eighth of an inch below where I really intended to touch. Any ideas?

4) Can I alphabetize my contacts by last name? I've looked everywhere and can't find that setting. This would really put me in a better mood when looking for a phone number.

5) Is there an option or application similar to LockInfo for the iphone? i.e., a way to get a listing of calls, messages, tasks/calendar events, weather, mail etc. on the lock screen? I really miss being able to glance at the lock screen and get a pretty comprehensive update on all the important stuff without having to unlock and go through each application. I didn't see that on the stock lockscreen, but admittedly I've been using an iphone style slider lockscreen for the last two weeks or so and perhaps I overlooked it?I've left out the numerous complaints I might have about lag in the UI, lag in dialing numbers, lag in updating the recent call list that causes me to dial the wrong number, a weather widget that says it's sunny in the middle of the night, etc. because I've either found a third party app that works better than stock (SuperDial, WeatherWidget), or am just dealing with it until 2.0 arrives to see what I've really got. If suggestions involve a custom ROM (which I'm fine with), I'd like to know if the Sense UI remains or if I have to use the stock Android or one of the alternative home apps (like open home, or dxtop, both of which I tried and didn't like).I just want my phone to be a decent phone. Right now, it isn't. After that, all the pretty stuff is pretty, and cool, and all of that.