Cristian D’Aloisio: That handy little known tool for Notes mail... (Swiftfile)

October 24 2007

Cristian writes of his fondness for IBM's Swiftfile tool for Lotus Notes...

I'm trying to love Notes mail folders, and I must say that one handy tool is helping me a lot: its name is SwiftFile ! (SwiftFile 4.0 for IBM Lotus Notes 8.0 , [part number] C1436EN)

In my opinion, SwiftFile is a great utility for managing mail folders, although it is a not well-known utility among Notes users, many people don't even know it exists. ...

Anyway, SwiftFile is very handy because it "learns" how to manage you Inbox messages and then, for any open memo, it suggests which folders are likely to be chosen by the user, just showing folders name on top of the memo. Then the user make just one click on a folder name to move the memo inside that folder! Easy and fast!
From time to time, we get asked why Swiftfile isn't a part of the core Notes client.  The answer, which is a bit of an inward-looking one, is that SwiftFile has been developed in English only.  To ship it in the Notes client, it would have to be translated into all the languages in which Notes ships, and for all the client platforms.  In typing those sentences, I realize that there are a lot of responses you could offer (like, "how is that different than any other part of the Notes client?")...but this is the party line, and I'm just passing it along.

Anyway, it's worth checking Swiftfile out...if you are a folder kinda person (which your mail administrator will appreciate as well, since a lighter inbox improves Domino performance).  You can download Swiftfile from PassportAdvantage downloads (use the part number above).

Link: DominoBaloney: That handy little known tool for Notes mail... >

Ed Brill | Highland Park, IL USA Category:  Notes and Domino 8  Add/View Comments [41]

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  1. 1  Jim Casale  | 10/24/2007 10:11:37 AM

    Swiftfile is big here because of our email retention policy. Suffice to say people are foldering like crazy because of that policy. I would suggest Swiftfile to one person, then the person sitting next to them would see it and say "Can I get that too?"

    If this company moves to Exchange (which is a constant rumor these days) I can't wait to say to them "Sorry that feature is not available in Outlook. And while you're at it neither is All Documents and Send and File. And oh, forget about point in time restores for the email you got this morning and have already deleted." :-)

  1. 2  Rob McDonagh http://www.CaptainOblivious.com | 10/24/2007 10:46:36 AM

    I'm not sure how this could happen, but my organization does not have access to Swiftfile on Passport Advantage. Given that we have access to every version of Notes and Domino imaginable, I doubt it's deliberate. So consider this a gentle suggestion that someone review the Swiftfile eligibility in PA - it really ought to be available to absolutely everyone.

    PS I suppose it's possible I just can't find it, but I used the part number given (which returned every conceivable Notes and Domino version, along with some add-ons) and I also searched for a description containing Swiftfile, but there are no matches.

  1. 3  Dan King  | 10/24/2007 10:48:18 AM

    I don't get swiftfile either, we're on Collaboration Express but does that really make a difference?

  1. 4  Bill Geimer  | 10/24/2007 10:48:37 AM

    I agree with @2. The number appears to be valid, but nothing comes up for it in passport.

  1. 5  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 10/24/2007 10:59:37 AM

    OK, looks like I need to check on the download...

  1. 6  Stuart Bogom  | 10/24/2007 11:01:24 AM

    Don't know if it's the same in version 8, but in 7.x, 6.x, and (I think) 5.x you can find swiftfile on the Notes installation CD.

  1. 7  Jim Casale  | 10/24/2007 11:38:40 AM

    @ 6 I am not sure if there is anything really different about the version but there is a separate version for 8. But I do recall the 7 version did would withe beat 3

  1. 8  Jim Casale  | 10/24/2007 11:49:05 AM

    OK My fingers were typing to fast. That should have read "But I do recall the 7 version did work with Beta 3.

    I need a vacation :-(

  1. 9  Tim Rand  | 10/24/2007 12:17:31 PM

    I would also like Swiftfile for Mac OS. I use it on Windows, but since I have mostly migrated off of Windows now, I hate not having it available.

  1. 10  Brian Baum  | 10/24/2007 12:41:09 PM

    The search for part numbers has never worked for me correctly in Passport. I had to manually go to the eAssembly for Notes 8, expand it and use Firefox to search. It's there.

  1. 11  Rob McDonagh http://www.CaptainOblivious.com | 10/24/2007 1:48:21 PM

    @10 I admit that I expected it to be its own entry, so I was almost certainly not going to find it anyway. But when I look the way you found it, it is still not there.

    Bear in mind, it's entirely possible and even likely that I'm just being an idiot.

  1. 12  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 10/24/2007 2:38:41 PM

    @11 - You're not an idiot, they just hid it well. I found it under the section for IBM Lotus Domino Messaging Server 8.0 with Notes 8.0 Multiplatform English eAssembly(CR5STEN). It's not listed under the Enterprise server section. And I couldn't get it by searching for "swift" or the part number.

  1. 13  Rob McDonagh http://www.CaptainOblivious.com | 10/24/2007 2:52:52 PM

    @12 And we have a winner. Thanks, Charles! Wow, that's much harder to find than it should be.

    And it doesn't show up there on 7.02, by the way, which is the one I need at the moment - I have a director with thousands of folders who would LOVE Swiftfile, but he's on 7.x for the foreseeable future. I can show it to him in 8, but I'd rather not.

    I know I'm giving PA a lot of grief, but is it too much to ask that we be able to search for a product name? And why on earth would Swiftfile be included in the Domino Messaging server but not the Domino Enterprise server? I don't think I'm being unreasonable to ask that it be easier to find things than this...

  1. 14  Rob McDonagh http://www.CaptainOblivious.com | 10/24/2007 3:01:06 PM

    FYI, if anyone else is looking for Swiftfile 3.0 for Notes 7, it can be downloaded from here:

    { Link }

    What does it say that I could find it by Googling when I couldn't find it using IBM's site search and/or navigation?

  1. 15  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 10/24/2007 3:03:11 PM

    @14 it says what many of us already recognize -- the search engine on ibm.com doesn't help you find anything easily. I am hopeful some new efforts will address this.

  1. 16  Bill Smith  | 10/24/2007 3:04:52 PM

    @13 Did some looking around too and could not find the 7.x version. I'd love to hear if anyone locates it.

  1. 17  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 10/24/2007 3:06:09 PM

    Rob, I'm right there with you on PA being more difficult than it should be. I've never found it very usable, but it's a necessary evil.

  1. 18  Bill Smith  | 10/24/2007 3:08:01 PM

    @14 Thanks for the link!

  1. 19  Alan Lepofsky http://www.alanlepofsky.net | 10/24/2007 3:09:37 PM

    I'm not sure what I am doing differently, but I click "Find By Part Number:, enter C1436EN, click search. On the screen that is returned, I click on Expand All, and it is listed there: SwiftFile 4.0 for IBM Lotus Notes 8.0 (C1436EN)

  1. 20  Rob McDonagh http://www.CaptainOblivious.com | 10/24/2007 3:24:09 PM

    @19 I don't know either, but those steps produce 22 pages of results for me, not one item, and none of those 22 pages contain Swiftfile, other than the way Charles indicated earlier - under the Messaging Server Assembly for 8.0. I originally thought it was its own item, and I was somehow not entitled to it. If you see it as a separate item, maybe I was correct.

  1. 21  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 10/24/2007 3:38:31 PM

    @19 - I get exactly what Rob gets. And I've never been able to search PA by item number or description. I either get 0 results or I get everything, and it's been that way since 1999.

  1. 22  Carl Tyler http://www.iminstant.com | 10/24/2007 4:20:08 PM

    @19 Alan you are an IBMer, you talk IBM :-) IBMers have special easy access to IBM sites and special superhuman search powers. For customers/partners we are presented with constant legal profile popups, redirect warnings and a search engine that decides what and when to search :-)

    Does the PA site use Omnifind?

  1. 23  Alan Lepofsky http://www.alanlepofsky.net | 10/24/2007 4:24:23 PM

    @20/21/22.. as I said, I don't know why it is any different. I have my IBM ID/PW assigned to allow me access to PartnerWorld, the idea being so that I can "see what you see", but apparently that is not the case!

  1. 24  Carl Tyler http://www.iminstant.com | 10/24/2007 6:20:05 PM

    @23, Partnerworld and Passport Advantage are different...

  1. 25  Richard Schwartz http://www.rhs.com/poweroftheschwartz | 10/24/2007 6:23:15 PM

    @23: I find it by part number in PartnerWorld, too. But I think I recall being told a while back that PartnerWorld and Passport Advantage access the same downloads via different front-ends, so it's not entirely surprising that the indexes and search results are different.

  1. 26  Richard Schwartz http://www.rhs.com/poweroftheschwartz | 10/24/2007 6:32:40 PM

    Ed -- I'll take a pass at "How different is that from the rest of the Notes client?" SwiftFile's algorithm's have not, as far as I know, been divulged, but I think it's more than just a naive Bayesiean classifier, and if I'm right about that there's a good chance that it is doing some linguistic analysis or at least using language-specific statistics.

  1. 27  Chris Blatnick http://interfacematters.com | 10/24/2007 8:01:49 PM

    This is a great tool, but I've been trying hard to convince people *not* to use folders for the last couple of years. This is perhaps one of the greatest personal productivity enhancements I have made in my career. Notes has great text searching and by using this and eliminating folders, I have reduced the cognitive strain I went through every time I had to decide where to file a message. What if it belongs in multiple folders? What if I need to find it in the future...will I remember what folder I put it in? Etc., etc. Since I use the Getting Things Done methodology, handling even large amounts of mail with this system is easy.

    Step 1: Open mail. Can I do it in 2 minutes or less? If so, do it. If not, place action on one of my next action lists.

    Step 2: Use my handy dandy toolbar button to add tags to message (if necessary). Yes, I plan to share this soon.

    Step 3: Remove message from inbox. Don't file it...just remove it.

    End Result: My inbox is usually empty at the end of the day and I can easily find mail by doing a quick search. Extremely efficient and highly recommended. And...my mail file stays nice and trim. The admins love me. A happy story indeed. The end!

    (If anyone wants more info on my system, feel free to drop me a line)

  1. 28  Bill Geimer  | 10/25/2007 12:09:39 AM

    @Alan search by part number does no seem to work for anybody outside IBM. It would be nice to have search by number tool. The closest I can come is to list all and use the search function in firefox. But as as been said before, C1436EN does not exist on the list. Cheers to those who found in in the e-assembly.

  1. 29  Simon Scullion http://simonscullion.com | 10/25/2007 3:23:09 AM

    I managed to find it by part number on Partnerworld, and have it running with Notes 7 no problems.

  1. 30  Jim Casale  | 10/25/2007 4:48:21 AM

    @26 There is more information about how Swiftfile works at { Link } It came from IBM Research and from what I can see it is a "text classifier". There are links on that page to some research papers which explain how Swiftfile works. Cool stuff :-)

    As for Swiftfile being available just for the Windows client, we have the same issue with Administrator client. It would be great to get both Swiftfile and Administrator client available for other platforms as well.

  1. 31  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 10/25/2007 6:40:39 AM

    @26, that's always been my belief as well, but I felt like I shouldn't assert it until/unless I ask one of the IBMers who actually built it. :)

  1. 32  Mike McPoyle http://www.openntf.org/mPortal | 10/25/2007 7:57:26 AM

    Sounds like a good candidate for open-sourcing *cough*openntf.org*cough*.

    - It's buried to the point most don't know about it.

    - The language pack could be externalized and localized by contributors

    - Sounds like it hasn't really grown as a product in quite a bit.

  1. 33  Todd Carpenter http://www.embraer.com | 10/25/2007 9:08:57 AM

    I was just thinking about this the other day when using my Blackberry. When I file a message on the BB, it seems to "know" which folder I want to file it in (either that or it's a really good guesser). I was thinking to myself, WOW this would be great if Notes could do this as well.

  1. 34  Bill Malchisky http://www.EffectiveSoftware.com | 10/25/2007 12:14:30 PM

    It would seem at this point, that any English Notes client built with Eclipse, should have SwiftFile available.

    I love the ND8 client on Linux, but as I use folders quite extensively to organize the daily onslaught of inbound mail received, not having SwiftFile on Linux forces the Inbox to be much larger than I would like. Thus, when I need to find a message from <User_X>, I then either sort by name or do an FTI search, then move the lot of them over in one-shot. Hardly efficient, but better than nothing.

    Ed, what are the prospects of getting SwiftFile provided for Linux? Since we don't have a Mac client---yet---this is less of a concern to me, but would want SwiftFile on my iMac when that platform's client is released.

    I also, train my clients to use SwiftFile and they really like it. Quite the tool.

  1. 35  Keith Brooks http://lotus.tech.blogspot.com | 10/25/2007 12:15:31 PM

    How odd, can't search by number, but type in swiftfile and it pops up with the 4 versions.

    I went to partnerworld, then software access/download.

    Got it, now to play with it.

  1. 36  Bill Malchisky http://www.EffectiveSoftware.com | 10/25/2007 12:30:26 PM

    Also of note...

    I find that this tool's suite spot is with executives, assistants, department heads, and anyone else who receives lots of mail. I position it as a productivity enhancer, facilitating rapid Inbox management, with a competitive advantage over the competition.

  1. 37  Karl Laird http://iiq374.blogspot.com | 10/28/2007 9:57:20 PM

    Cheers!! I've been looking for this since upgrading from the 7.0 client and failing miserably. Now I can get back to being productive again :D

  1. 38  Eric Larson  | 11/7/2007 9:33:13 AM

    @27 - Chris, see my post on ideajam <{ Link }

    I look forward to seeing what you are working on in this space.

  1. 39  Barry Graham  | 9/7/2011 3:53:13 PM

    On the internal IBM forum I see lots of people needing Swiftfile for Linux.

  1. 40  Adrian A  | 8/18/2012 5:16:56 PM

    Any update on swift file for Mac clients? This tool is indispensable and I just cant get used to not having it on my mac.

  1. 41  Dan States  | 10/8/2012 6:18:46 PM

    Are there plans to release swift file for mac?