Outlook
Data security wanted
Usually it is only one line, only a small slot, in which one types one or several terms of definitions, using your keyboard and within a split second you have a hit list. It started on 9.7.1998 in a garage and was called Google, and has by now found the way through the Internet onto plenty of personal computers. But what is the price? The big search engines like Google, Yahoo, Apple and Microsoft charge us with our personal data dearly for their services.
The current, very heated, debate to enforce a better protection for personal data, reaches a new dimension in view of the desktop search. Because it is the desktop search that is actually saving personal data and knowledge of business companies on their own servers right from the start. For example, Google desktop search even speaks explicit in the GTA about saving data on external servers. The index is first generated on the personal computer and then will be send to Google. What happens there with the data, nobody knows. But it isn’t over there. Because a personalization takes place at latest, when the Google mail account and the Gmail account is involved as well. This option can be deactivated on installing, if you pay keen attention, but who does so in the modern “click next” generation?
Everyone wants our data
But it’s not just Google who wants our Data. Apples Spotlight, Microsoft and Yahoos desktop search is also rather keen on the personal bits and bytes. If you look at this data saving, over exaggerating a bit, then you will find at latest when companies are involved, that, should the data get into the wrong hands, this could be disastrous and even cause the ruin of a company. Of course, Google has no interest to hand over data to third persons, but wasn’t it the USA, that thought, currently on Wikileaks published data was save? And we all know what happened.
So one is allowed to think about the worst case scenario, considering all the affairs around data that occurred lately. Because, if you transport such an affair to the business level, then it is time and it is appropriate to be very concerned.
Companies save design studies, plans, bank data, information about employees and plans for prototypes. That is a lot of sensitive data, which needs to be protected and shouldn’t be laying on some servers somewhere in the USA. That is one of the best reasons why companies shouldn’t use this kind of search engines. But not all search engines work like that. Lookeen can help you.
Lookeen is different
And right here the line will be written, where the desktop search from Lookeen has to be mentioned. Because, aside the well known E-Mail search function in Outlook, Lookeen is able to serve as a desktop search as well. It searches and sets up an index, without a search engine cant function, but now the difference comes into effect. And you better believe it; the complete index is only saved on the local personal computer, aka your own personal computer that has started the search. In thus the data remains with the owner and won’t go wandering to far away servers of companies that aren’t transparent and that no one has control over.
Photo: Markus Henkel
Over the last years, e-mail inevitably became the most often used internet-service worldwide. The Cisco 2008 Annual Security Report states that, around the globe, the incredibly high amount of 220 billion e-mails are sent and received on a daily basis. Based on the vast number of e-mails, every user is confronted with a sheer, flood like, e-mail chaos – also on a daily basis. At least if one does not use the small but excellent search expert for Outlook, named Lookeen.
The board of the Annual Security Report estimates the number of globally sent e-mails by reference to the figures of e-mail users and active e-mail accounts. Following new estimations the spiking amount of 220 billion e-mails will in fact double within the next years, due to the growing importance of social-media channels. In practice results are as follows: the average user receives an average of 150 e-mails a day. No matter if the concerning e-mail account is used for private or business purposes.
Faster, more precisely, more comfortable
The needed time to sort out and separate spam from relevant and important e-mails can easily add up to several hours. Searching for the wanted e-mail or attachment not included. To avoid that unnecessary waste of time only a quick glance on Lookeen is necessary and worthwhile. The installation of the add-on for Microsoft Outlook takes only a moment and pays out immediately, by putting an end to the endless searches. After the installation of Lookeen only a short indexing of the data is necessary to search mail-folders and -archives faster, more precisely and more comfortable than ever before. Even e-mail folders in the most remote network drive are included in the Lookeen based search. To Lookeen the amount of data is absolutely indifferent. All it takes to get it started is a search entry in the search mask. At a record time any information you want will be delivered to you, no matter if e-mail, attachment or both combined – neatly arranged, central and ready to hand. The final highlight is the convenient preview that allows you as a user to look at the contents of and read every data file without opening it.
The business day of the future therefore can be re-modelled into a more relaxed version that is free of negative stress and unenjoyable useless labor – at least if Lookeen is put to use. You will never miss an e-mail again, over are the days of data loss – no matter if document, table or picture – and overwrought nerves.
Successfull cooperation with asknet
From the worldwide renown University of Karlsruhe in Germany a Spin-off named asknet originated in 1995. Born out of a study project, asknet made it within ten years to the market leader in the section of electronic software distribution on the stock exchange.
The small firm was the first company in Germany to sell software through the internet and specialized in individual outsourcing solutions for software marketing. Asknet offers a wide spectrum of multi-channel-solutions for software companies as well. The asknet AG supports their customers with established B2C- and B2B-processes, eProcurement, eMarketing and the assistance with handling of payments. The online shop for asknet AG which specialized in support and advisory service of academies, colleges and government agencies is the most successful in the whole of Europe.
Fast and precise search with Lookeen!
The developer and distributor of Lookeen, Axonic Information Systems GmbH works very close with asknet AG. Because of this partnership, Lookeen is also listed on softwarehouse.de. Just like asknet AG, Axonic Information systems GmbH is versed in cooperation with government agencies, colleges and universities
Agencies and colleges have to deal with large amount of electronic data that can become difficult to manage. Additionally, these institutions often use exchange servers and other networked structures to function. Lookeen is able to search through these engines fast and efficiently Because of this, a cooperation of the two companies was obvious.
Lookeen is offered on www.softwarehouse.de as independent software. But because it is a perfect addition to Microsoft Outlook, it is also offered in various different product bundles.
Ever had canned meat in your in-box?
Canned meat, aka Spam, is in every mouth, unfortunately in every in-box too. Therewith the unrequested and unwanted Spam Emails have a lot in Common with the canned meat..
Sounds absurd?
It makes more sense if you look closer at the derivation of the word Spam. Even though the word Spam means nothing else, but litter, garbage or refuse, something the unwanted Mails indeed are, it doesn’t explain why Spam is the word everyone uses for them, while it could have been trash or waste too.
A sketch of the world famous Monty Python group is to be blamed that out of all things, the word Spam gained its questionable fame. The Comedians made fun out of the double meaning of the word Spam in said sketch. Spam is in the English language not only the word for waste and trash, but is also the unflattering synonym for an American canned meat product, called (Spiced Ham).
In the mentioned sketch the guest of a restaurant was offered meals solely containing the word Spam. To make it even more absurd, some of the dishes named contained the word Spam more than once, like “Spam Spam Spam Spam Spam Bacon and Span Beans Spam”.
The strange accumulation of the word Spam during the Sketch became a basic principle. As the first trash Emails appeared, the word Spam became the general term of that, what is today in everyone’s in-box. And in everyone’s mouth.
To escape this flood of unwanted and even more so unneeded Emails, a lot of users use the help of Spam-Filters that automatically filter the Spam-Mails out of the in-box. Spam-Filter are programs which are capable of learning. They use typical search criterion’s, Email addresses and domains, to try and spot the unwanted Emails and sort them out.
But Spam-Filter do have a great deficit; they simply overlook a lot of Spam-Mails, which then still find their way into the in-box. Even worse is the opposite case. This means, the Spam-Filter recognizes a “good” mail from Friends, family, colleagues or customers as spam and sorts it out.
To avoid this, Lookeen offers a comfortable and safe solution. Luckily Spam-Mails always distinguish themselves by the same keywords.
Here the search history of Lookeen proves to be a very useful feature. Simply look for the corresponding keywords and ban the unwanted Emails via drag&drop into the recycle bin.
To keep the Emails of the future clean, simply call up the past queries from the history. Instantly you have a tidy in-box that is free of Spam.
That way you are safe from unwanted Spam – and luckily from canned meat too.
In Situations where the success of certain projects is depending on a number of participants, it is important that all information is highly available and without redundancy.
For many years companies use the so called groupware in such matters. Groupware is supposed to alleviate the working process in the teams and enable the project coordination on a timely and spacial basis. One of the most famous exponents of the groupware application is the Microsoft exchange server.
The Microsoft exchange server offers a wide spectrum of functions which allow a various number of operators to use different systems to work in cooperation together.
The most often used features of exchange servers are:
-E-Mails
-Appointments and calendars
-Tasks
-Contacts and addresses
-Notes
-Documents
All of the above mentioned elements are stored on a central server and are made available to a user-defined number of operators. Therefore the information’s are always without redundancy and up to date.
The benefit of this architecture is obvious.
Let’s assume, that you have a support section in your company and use for the contact address support@yourcompany.com an exchange inbox. Now all of your associates can see, which E-Mails have already been answered, what cases still wait for a reply and they can even see the proposal for solutions that have been made.
But the working day has changed a lot in the past years. May it be that projects are realized at the customer’s location, companies use more and more outwork or that companies have structures reaching around the entire world.
Security: Encryption with VPN
Users from outside the company network can offer their knowledge and participate through the so called VPN (Virtual Private Network). This ensures that the participants of projects always are provided with information’s up to date and without redundancy.
Using the online mode you work within the infrastructure of your company and adjust information’s in real time with your system. If the connection to the company network is disabled, you just turn your exchange server into the offline mode. This creates a copy of your inbox, which in turn allows you to still have fast access to your data.
This copy of your inbox is regularly updated by the mail server when you are online. Once the connection is enabled again, Microsoft Outlook will switch back into the online mode. Changes made by you, while there was no connection to the server, are automatically adjusted as soon as the connection is enabled again.
Of course the synchronization of the worldwide data is a challenge for the exchange server. For example, if an operator uses a cell phone and has an UMTS connection, an adjustment of large files would take way to long.
Therefore Microsoft uses the so called “cached mode” since the exchange server 2003. In the cached mode, the exchange application possesses an automatic online/offline-management, which is running in the background. This equilibrates the encumbrance of the connection to the exchange server because some of the contents aren’t aligned despite the connection to the exchange server is established.
Bulletin boards and product reviews that are dealing with search tools, often complain about the fact that most tools aren’t able to search and index all exchange inboxes in all modes.
Especially for this case of application, and for a professional environment in general, Lookeen was developed.
We at Axonic Informationsdienste GmbH are aware of the fact, that the base principle of development for Lookeen is the compatibility to exchange servers.
After the release of Lookeen the feedback is thoroughly positive and a huge amount of encouragement reached us. All involved in this dialogue profited of it.
Companies used the smooth support of exchange servers as the reason for choosing Lookeen over other search tools.
Archives or inboxes that are on the exchange servers are simply added in the Lookeen options and because of the Lookeen terms of references, we spoke about in a previous article, all particulars of the handling of the exchange servers and their clients can be individually configured.
Lookeen supports the exchange server indication in all modes, no matter if you are online or offline, if you are using the cached or the uncached mode. With Lookeen you search through all of your data in a few seconds, even on your exchange servers.
Lookeen wins Reader’s Choice Award
The readers of the US website www.about.com have voted Lookeen the winner of the Reader’s Choice Award for “Best Outlook Add-in 2010”, demonstrating Lookeen’s breakthrough as an internationally recognized solution, convincing in its efficiency and application. This award is an important milestone for Axonic, developer and vendor of the email solution.
“This high-ranking award proves that Lookeen is indispensable to the international market as a professional solution for businesses and private individuals,” commented Martin Welker, CEO of Axonic.
Search quickly, confidently, reliably
The Outlook Add-in Lookeen convinced readers through its excellent performance at an adequate price. “Lookeen finds everything in Outlook,” summed up Heinz Tschabitscher, responsible editor at about.com. Lookeen searches Outlook folders, as well as folders on hard disks and servers, for all files that include the desired search term. The clearly arranged representation of all search results, whether they be e-mails, documents, pictures or other files, facilitates easy access and even makes e-mail correspondence more transparent. Lookeen also earns top marks in terms of speed: „Lookeen not only finds, of course, it also finds fast“, was the opinion of the American website.
The perfect solution
Lookeen 2010 has been especially optimized for corporate clients to make the working lives of their staff easier. But private users profit from this Outlook Add-in as well. Lookeen enables people to better master the flood of e-mails and data files by providing a clear and orderly overview as well as a quick, reliable search. Moreover, installation and operation of the tool are foolproof.
Get a feel for what Lookeen can do for you by downloading this free test version:
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