Introduction

Archiving is one of the most important features provided with the IBM® Notes® client. This article is intended to help you understand how to set up and manage Archiving in IBM Notes client.

How to set up client-based archiving

 Steps to set up client based archiving:

1) Open your mailfile in the IBM Notes Client.

2) Go to “Action ->Archive ->Settings”.

3) Click on ‘Create button’ on the Create criteria tab.

                Note: You can directly open this using “Action->Archive->Create Criteria”.

               4) Enter the name of the Archive Criteria and select the checkbox ‘Enable this criteria’.

Note: You can also enable the criteria from the Manage your Archive Criteria window by clicking the ‘Enable’ button.

5) Click on ‘Selection Criteria’ and select the required criteria

6) Click OK.

Note: You can refer below article to understand archive criteria.

http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/dominowiki.nsf/dx/Understanding_Archiving_feature__in_IBM_Notes_Client

7) Set cleanup options for your mailfile by doing one of the following:

a) To archive documents in a separate archive mailfile and remove them from the current mailfile, select “Copy old documents into my archive application specified here, then clean up this application”, then click the folder icon to specify the file name and path of the mailfile.

b) To delete documents instead of archiving them, select “Just clean up this application without archiving”.

Note: Once documents are deleted, they cannot be recovered. It’s safer to create an archive application, and then set up archiving, which uses this setting for the archive application. This lets you save documents in the archive as long as you want, but still have them automatically deleted from the mailfile for you.

                8) If, in Step 8, you chose to both archive and remove the documents, select one of the following options:

 

Option	Description
Remove archived documents from this application	This setting deletes entire documents, without changing the content of any documents
Reduce the size of documents in this application	This setting streamlines the content of documents instead of deleting them. You can: “Remove attachments, leave summary”. The summary preserves certain basic fields, for example, in mail, the subject of the message. “Remove attachments, leave summary and 40KB”. Most mail messages contain less than 40KB of rich text, so this option reduces as few documents as possible.

 

9) Click OK.

10) Below window will prompt you to schedule the archiving.

If you want to schedule archiving, then click ‘Yes’, else ‘No’.

 

        Figure 1. Enable criteria window

11) After clicking ‘Yes’, users will be taken to the Schedule tab where they can specify the specific time, day and location.

12) Click the checkbox ‘Schedule Archiving’ to have documents archived automatically at a given time, date and location.

         Note: User must be running Notes Client at the time the schedule archiving is supposed to run.

 

Different ways to perform archiving

This section discusses multiple ways to perform archiving.

Archive Now

 This type of archiving immediately archives a document, based on the selection criteria.

  Steps to archive:

        1.  Open your mailfile.

 2. Go to “Actions ->Archive ->Archive Now”.

       Figure 2. Archiving from Notes Client

3. Click “Yes” on the below prompt:

      Figure 3. Archiving action prompt

4. Archiving will start, and you will see the below messages in your status bar

       Figure 4. Messages on Status bar of Notes Client

5. Users can open the archive database from the left navigator of their Notes Client

       Figure 5. Archive database link in Notes Client

6. Users can find their archived documents in the archive database.

      Figure 6. Archive database

Note :  Archive Now and Schedule Archive is similar to each other and execute all enabled criteria. The only difference between them is Archive Now executed by user and schedule archive automatically executed on schedule.

 

Archive selected documents

This type of archiving immediately archives documents which are explicitly selected by the user.

Steps to archive:

1. Open your mailfile
2. Select the documents to be archived
3. Go to “Actions ->Archive ->Archive Selected Documents”

        Figure 7. Archiving user selected documents in Notes Client

4. Click “Yes” on the below prompt:

         Figure 8. Archiving action prompt

5. Now you will be prompted to select the enabled criteria and click ‘OK’:

       Figure 9. Archive destination prompt

6. Archiving will start and the user will see the below messages in their status bar:

       Figure 10. Archiving messages on Notes Client Status bar

7. Users can open the archive database from the left navigator of their Notes client

      Figure 11. Archiving database link in user’s mail file

8. Users can find the archived documents in their archive database.

Figure 12. Archiving database

 

Schedule Archiving

Users have control over the schedule for archiving if mail is set to use client-based archiving through criteria which the user has previously created.  Users can select days and a time for archiving, and specify in which locations to run the archive schedule. In this case, a user has to keep their Notes client open so that archiving can be done as per the schedule.

Note: When a user’s mail is set to use server-based archiving, the user has no control over the schedule. Archiving is performed nightly by the Domino server. Users can turn off their system without interfering with archiving.

 

Steps to configure scheduled archiving:

1. Open your mail file, and create and enable archive criteria.
2. Click “Actions > Archive > Settings > Schedule”.

Figure 13. Schedule Tab

3. Select “Schedule archiving”.

Figure 14. Enabling schedule archiving

4. Select a time from the “Run at” field by clicking the clock icon, dragging to the time you want, and then clicking the checkmark.

Figure 15. Select time to run archiving

 

     NOTE: Make sure your system is ON each day at this time. You can exit your mailfile, but do not shut down the Notes client.

5. Select all the days on which you want archiving to run.

Optional: Leave “Any location” selected, or click “Specific location” and select the locations where you want archiving to run.

Optional: To remove your customizations, click “Reset to default”.

6. Click “OK”.
7. Now the documents will be automatically archived as per the schedule.

NOTE:  Schedule Archive and Archive Now is similar to each other and execute all enabled criteria. The only difference between them is Archive Now executed by user and schedule archive automatically executed on schedule.

 

Drag-and-drop Archiving

In drag-and-drop archiving, a user:

1. Opens their mail database and, clicks “Tools” in the left navigation pane to see the Archive folder.

2. Selects mail messages to be archived, and drags-and-drops the documents to the Archive folder.

       Note: You cannot drag-and-drop emails unless the archive database has been created.

 

Conclusion

You should now understand how archive feaure in IBM Notes can be set up and managed. This document has discussed details of setting up Archive criteria and different way to perform archiving.

Included in the References section are some documents with more information about archiving, and common issues that may occur after setup.

 

References

IBM Product Information Centre for Archiving

http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/dominowiki.nsf/dx/Understanding_Archiving_feature__in_IBM_Notes_Client

 

IBM Support Technotes:

Sent mail is stored in archive database in which the memo is composed

Unexpected behavior when archive criteria setting 'selected by user' option is chosen with Archive Now

Which archive database will be used when documents match multiple sets of archive criteria

How to archive NSF applications (databases) to an alternate file system using directory links

How do I upgrade a local archive after upgrading the client?

Enhancement request to restore documents from archive database to mail database

Archive Criteria do not Truncate Documents with MIME content
 

About the authors

Bhavana Paul is a Staff Software Engineer based at IBM’s Software Lab in Pune, India, currently working as a Quality Engineer for IBM Notes Client. She has more than 10 years of experience as Quality Engineer. You can reach her at bhavana.paul@in.ibm.com.

 

Reetu Sharma is a Staff Software Engineer based at IBM’s Software Lab in Pune, India, currently working as a Quality Engineer. She has extensive experience in IEI, LSXLC, DECS, Domino Server, and Notes Client. You can reach her at reesharm@in.ibm.com.