Introducing the Xobni Gadget Store. Kick your email up a notch with Evernote, Yammer, Salesforce, Chatter, Dropbox, JIRA, WebEx and more.

by Josh Jacobson 

Today marks a major milestone for Xobni—and for our customers. You may already have been following the progress of our Xobni Gadget platform, available to developers to seamlessly integrate web-based services into the Xobni for Outlook experience. Having seen incredibly useful and time-saving gadgets created and beta-tested over the past few months, we’re now thrilled to announce the Xobni Gadget Store. Take advantage of direct access to a new world of productive services and applications from a wide range of industry-leading partners (press release).

Web-based document sharing, lead tracking, issue monitoring and editing, note-taking—your inbox is about to get a lot more powerful.  Imagine being able to integrate great services like these right into your Xobni experience (without leaving Outlook):

• Productivity Gadgets: Dropbox, Evernote, GoldMail, Google Translate, JIRA, WebEx
• Collaboration Gadgets: Huddle, Microsoft SharePoint, Salesforce Chatter, Yammer
• Content Gadgets: Facebook, Flickr, Hoover’s, Klout, LinkedIn, Twitter, XING, YouTube, Yelp
• CRM Gadgets: Salesforce.com

Now you can choose any of the Xobni Gadgets you want—or the whole batch if you like—for prices ranging from free to only $9.99/year (with 30 day free trial).

We’ve made it easy for you to add Gadgets to Xobni. Just click on over to the Xobni Gadget Store and take your pick of the gadgets available. Then make sure you’re on the latest and greatest version of Xobni for Outlook. That’s version 2.0.1 for Xobni Pro subscribers and free users (most of you), and an updated 1.9.6 for existing Xobni Plus users (release notes).

For enterprises, the Xobni Gadget Platform now makes it easy to create private gadgets based on your existing internal services to help employees become more productive and effective. Xobni Business Solutions customers can deploy their own customized gadgets via the Xobni Enterprise Admin Portal. You can find out more about these programs here.

Today, Xobni Gadgets are available for Xobni for Outlook.  Over the coming months, we’ll be looking at ways to widen the platform to Xobni for Gmail and Xobni mobile as well.

Customers we’ve talked to are pumped up about the new era of Xobni Gadgets, and we hope you are, too. It’s just one more way we can make your inbox the best it can possibly be.

Developers – interested in creating your own gadgets, or just kicking the tires of the platform? Join us on Monday, May 9th, for the Xobni Gadget Hack day (you can start coding now). Hacks will be judged by Michael Arrington and others. Register now for free – limited spots available.  

Xobni for Outlook 1.9.5 Released – First Xobni Gadgets Available

by Josh Jacobson

Earlier this year, Xobni announced that we would be porting the OpenSocial-powered Gmail Contextual Gadgets into Xobni for Outlook, and made a preview version available to developers.  Today we are releasing Xobni 1.9.5, which includes a taste of Xobni Gadgets for the public to enjoy.

Scores of developers have approached us about creating workplace gadgets that increase productivity and collaboration. We’ll be working with trusted developers over time to make their gadgets available to millions of Xobni and Outlook users.

Today, the first reference gadgets that are available are Flickr, Yelp and YouTube.

How it works in Xobni 1.9.5: When an email is sent to a Xobni user that includes a Flickr photo link, YouTube video link or Yelp business listing link, a rich preview of each link will appear at the bottom of the email.  Sometimes a preview is all you need to save the seven-second trip to the browser.  Other times, the preview will simply be a quick way to click straight to the full browser page.  If an email contains multiple links (see picture below), we’ve created a tabbed experience to preserve precious screen space.  Of course, the Xobni Gadget bar at the bottom of messages easily expands and contracts as needed, and can be turned off through Xobni Options.

Over time, new message and sidebar gadgets will become available to users through the Xobni Gadget Manager, which is accessible through the Xobni options.

In addition to Flickr, YouTube, and Yelp, Xobni for Outlook 1.9.5 includes the following changes since 1.9.4:

• Sidebar integration with Huddle (full post here)
• Faster search speed
• Better performance in slow or unreliable network situations
• Ability to disable “search as you type” (in options)
• Tons of speed and stability improvements
• Bug fixes in many areas including AutoSuggest, conversation threading, and memory usage

Developers interested in making their products/services available in Outlook can go to http://www.xobni.com/developer to learn more.

Note: After you download, you will be prompted to close Outlook and the new Xobni version will be installed. All of your data (Xobni profile merges, contact information entries) will be maintained, no matter what version you are using currently.

If you have already purchased Xobni Plus, this download will simply update your software. You will not need to sign in again and no extra fee is required.

Update: Version 1.9.5 was first released October 12th with a build# of 12548, but was updated on Oct 19th with build #12601, which addresses an issue fetching Facebook photos.

Thanks for using Xobni!

Download the Latest Xobni Now

Xobni 1.9.4: Not a single new feature. (Just tons of improvements)

by Josh Jacobson

Xobni understands that first and foremost, your email experience must be fast, reliable, and stable.  Since the release of Xobni for Outlook 1.9.3, we have been focusing on improving Xobni’s core components and working with customers to make many of the highest priority bug fixes.

Xobni for Outlook 1.9.4 (build 11981) is now available and includes a number of improvements in stability and performance, as well as bug fixes, including:

Performance

• Many Xobni users would go off to lunch and then come back and feel that Outlook/Xobni was slow.  Xobni was running a number of background indexes and now pauses them as soon as you return so there is no slowdown when you’re working.
• The “precompute all profiles” stage of indexing will take less time.

General

• Your custom Outlook signatures are now shown when generating “Schedule Time With,” fun facts, and invitation emails.
• A number of crashes were diagnosed and fixed (thanks to those who are in the Product Improvement Program)

Phone Numbers

• Improved the automatic phone number extraction to recognize more international numbers

Conversations and Attachments

• Conversations are now grouped more reliably instead of occasionally being split into multiple conversations.
• Attachment indexing is now more thorough; some instances of missed attachments were fixed.

AutoSuggest

• Many improvements to the display & reliability of the Xobni AutoSuggest window
• Restart of Outlook 2010 is no longer required to disable Xobni AutoSuggest

Search

• Names with foreign characters can now be searched for in mixed case

Thanks to everyone on our community forums, our alpha users, and those who filed support cases with “Inspector X” files to help us track down issues and make the email experience more productive for everyone.  Now download Xobni and get back to work 🙂

Note: After you download, you will be prompted to close Outlook and the new Xobni version will be installed. All of your data (Xobni profile merges, contact information entries) will be maintained, no matter what version you are using currently.
If you have already purchased Xobni Plus, this download will simply update your software. You will not need to sign in again and no extra fee is required.

Thanks for using Xobni!

Download the Latest Xobni Now

General info: After you download, you will be prompted to close Outlook and the new Xobni version will be installed. All of your data (merges, contact information entries) will be maintained, no matter what version you are using currently.
If you have already purchased Xobni Plus, this download will simply update your software. You will not need to sign in again and no extra fee is required.

Thanks for using Xobni!

Download the Latest Xobni Now

OUPW: Sue Rothberg, Video Production Company Principal

• Name: Sue Rothberg

• Position & Company: Principal, Sue Rothberg Productions, a Boston-based video production company specializing in a documentary-style storytelling approach for clients.

• Xobni user since: the Beta days (over a year ago)

• Product she uses: Xobni for Outlook

• Favorite feature: “the way Xobni indexes all my emails with sub categories such as attachments, network of other people, etc. What used to be a very time consuming task of searching for an email is now a breeze.”

• Product request: Xobni for the soon-to-be-released Outlook for Mac

Taking care of email to get to the real work

As she runs her own video production company, email is not the core component of Sue’s business (that status might be better granted to, say, producing video), but the time she spends in Outlook is still vital for client relations and putting the pieces in place for her work to get done.  We originally set out to help people spend less time searching their inboxes, so hearing accolades such as the following gets us PSYCHED.  Sue said of Xobni for Outlook: “I would say it is one of the best applications ever invented…and I am not kidding.  I have been an Outlook user for the better part of 10 years, and Xobni has made the application easier to use, more robust, and most importantly, it has made me more efficient.”  Awesome.

File deleted?  Not a problem if it lives on in your inbox

Sue’s Xobni to the Rescue story: “Once I had deleted an image, but when I searched, Xobni found the attachment within an email. There have been many other times where it saved me by finding something that was deleted or by getting to an email address very quickly so I could locate a file that had been exchanged…this application is a must for anyone who is an Outlook power user.”

Many thanks to Sue for sharing her Xobni experience.  Have a Xobni story you’d like to share?  Want to be featured in One User Per Week?  Let us know in the comments!

OUPW: Sarah Craddock – University Residence Hall Director

• Name: Sarah Craddock

• Position: Residence Hall Director

• Company: University of Northern Colorado

• Xobni user since: 2007

• Product she uses: Xobni for Outlook

• Favorite feature: Files Exchanged

• Email philosophy: “Inbox zero, whenever I can”

Between carrying out closing procedures for the academic year and gearing up for the summer schedule of conferences and other events, Sarah had tackled one of the busiest weeks of the year at her job as a university Residence Hall Director just before I caught up with her.  The amount of activity Sarah is responsible for managing naturally leads to a flurry of time-sensitive email–and a great opportunity for Xobni for Outlook to have a big impact on her efficiency.

“What’s that thing on the side of your screen?”: Sarah has first-hand experience of the “over-the-shoulder” factor of Xobni’s sidebar in Outlook.  Coworkers walking by are accustomed to the standard colors and UI of Outlook, but when Xobni’s presence grabs their attention, they often stop and ask Sarah questions about the plugin.

Rising in Xobni Rank: Once she had shared Xobni with her coworkers*, their discovery of Fun Facts, including Xobni Rank, brought out the competitive spirit in some of them.  Developing strategies to get to the top of someone’s contact list has become a running joke in her office.  The winning tactic?  Of course, working closely with someone tends to lead to them becoming a highly ranked contact for you, but there was a quick and dirty method of making use of company listservs alluded to as well…

It was interesting to hear how Xobni works for Sarah in her position within Higher Education (especially since it was quite different from the experience of my first OUPW interviewee in Higher Ed).  If you’re interested in sharing how you use Xobni as part of the One User Per Week blog series, let me know in the comments, and I’ll be in touch.

______________________________________

*Oftentimes, Sarah uses our in-product invite system to share Xobni with others.  We love it so much when people do this that we give away one Xobni Plus license a week for a user who sends invites through the product.  Try it out: just click the heart button at the bottom of the Xobni sidebar, and Xobni will suggest Outlook users to invite from your contacts.

OUPW: Xobni & the First Job

• Name: Joe Troyen-Schwartz

• Position: Business Analyst

• Company: Opera Solutions, a technology-powered consulting firm

• Heard about Xobni through: Matt Mak, an Analytics specialist at Opera

• Product he uses: Xobni for Outlook

• Favorite feature: Attachments Exchanged

• Product request: Xobni for Gmail

I’m excited to feature Joe in OUPW this week, not only because he’s an enthusiastic Xobni devotee, but also because he exemplifies a user type that has yet to make an appearance on our blog: the recent (well, within 2 years) college grad.  Although frustration with enterprise software is widespread, using stodgy business software can be especially painful for those of us who have gone through school accustomed to using all the cool tech tools we choose.  The functionality Xobni brings to Outlook makes the office software behave in a way much more like what Joe and other Millenials have come to expect from the technology we use.  It certainly seems to resonate with Joe–here’s what he had to say about Xobni:

Detangling the inbox jungle: “Xobni organizes the jungle that is my mailbox into meaningful views.  Groups all conversations by contact, and then allows me to slice and dice from there- by conversation, attachments, links, or just superpowerful search.”

Attachments in a flash: “I don’t even save files on my hard drive anymore.  Seriously, it feels like cheating.”

Email invincibility: “Today my Outlook wasn’t working so I had to spend the day without Xobni.  I felt mortal.”

It’s always awesome to hear Xobni having such a dramatic impact on an Outlook user.  It’s particularly reaffirming that workers at Opera are adopting Xobni, as the consulting firm is known for leveraging the best tech tools for both internal and client use.

If you want to participate in OUPW and get your name in lights on the Xobni blog (and a free t-shirt!), let me know in the comments.

Y2K + 10. Xobni now fully supports Outlook 2010 32-bit and 64-bit!

by Josh Jacobson

Remember the massive effort undertaken to make sure that the world’s technology was ready for Y2K? The BBC reported that the work done in preparation for Y2K cost over $300 billion. Most of that work was considered a success if it remained completely invisible.

At Xobni, we’ve had our own little Y2K in recent weeks (minus the $300 billion price tag) and we call it “Y2K+10.” When Microsoft announced that Outlook 2010 would be available to consumers in June, we were excited to integrate with the updated platform. Since then, a select group of us have been heads-down (others were slightly pre-occupied). Integrating with the new 64-bit flavor of Outlook accounted for a hefty portion of the effort, though users of all versions of Outlook + Xobni will now benefit from that groundwork.

Today, I’m pleased to announce that Xobni now fully supports Outlook 2010 – a full six weeks prior to the expected consumer launch of the brand-new version of Outlook. In addition, Xobni 1.9.2 is also fully compatible with the free Outlook 2010 beta that is currently available to the public.

While most of our focus has been on making Xobni work seamlessly with Outlook 2010 (in fact this has been the #1 feature request recently), we have also incorporated Xobni into the new Outlook ribbon for 2010-only functionality. In addition, there are a few features, detailed below, that will be attractive to Xobni users with Outlook 2003 and 2007 as well.

So please download Xobni 1.9.2 (build 10908) and enjoy the “invisible” features today. 🙂

Update: CNET’s Download.com has given Xobni five out of five stars! See the full review.
Update 2: Build 10605 has been replaced with build 10908 to fix an “Xobni not loading” issue that some were experiencing.

(All features mentioned below are new since version 1.9.1 build 10169):

Outlook 2010 Compatibility

• All features available in previous versions are now working and optimized for Outlook 2010 (32-bit and 64-bit) public beta version and later.
• New Quick-Access in the Ribbon (see illustration)
  – Search from Ribbon when Xobni sidebar is collapsed
  – Show/Hide Xobni sidebar with one click
  – Xobni menu always available
• If multiple Outlook windows are open, clicking “Show/Hide Xobni” will move the Xobni sidebar to your current Outlook window.

Non-Administrator Install

• Many users who are not “administrators” on their computers can now install Xobni.

Other Enhancements

• Fewer conflicts experienced with other add-ins (Trend Micro Anti-Spam, for example)
• Xobni AutoSuggestions can be deleted from the compose screen. Simply highlight the suggested email address you’d like to delete and hit the “delete” key. If you email that address again in the future, the suggestion will return after the next Xobni index process takes place.
• Twitter profile images now show in business card area if a Twitter name is already chosen (see illustration).

More Minor Changes

• Users of Xobni One who have more than one copy of Outlook will now see profile photos transfer from one Xobni sidebar to the other.
• Photos of people appear in the Network tab instead of small grey or orange icons.
• The Network section has been moved below the Files Exchanged section.
• Task bar is now to the left of the Xobni bar in Outlook 2010
• Xobni shows the recipient of the currently-selected email if the email is from you, no matter what folder it’s in. This is helpful for users that keep their sent mail outside of the default Sent Items folder.

Known Issues

• In Outlook 2010, the minimized Xobni is slightly wider than in Outlook 2007
• When the Xobni installer completes and runs Outlook for the first time, the message “Windows Desktop Search is not available” may appear at the bottom of Outlook. Restarting Outlook solves this permanently (details).

Please continue to let us know how we can keep improving your productivity through the Xobni Community, and thank you to everyone who participated in the topics that helped inform today’s update.

General info: After you download, you will be prompted to close Outlook and the new Xobni version will be installed. All of your data (merges, contact information entries) will be maintained, no matter what version you are using currently.
If you have already purchased Xobni Plus, this download will simply update your software. You will not need to sign in again and no extra fee is required.

Thanks for using Xobni!

Download the Latest Xobni Now

Xobni for BlackBerry is Now Available!

by Michael Holzer

I am very excited to announce the release of Xobni for BlackBerry. It makes managing your address book a thing of the past – You will never need to “Add a Contact” again. Early feedback from our alpha users is that they have stopped using their native address books completely and use only Xobni for BlackBerry.

The power of Xobni for BlackBerry is found in exposing connections you never knew you had as well as in the depth of the profiles that are created. All profiles are created automatically and are as complete as the information we have to complete them – including recent emails, phone calls, SMS messages, upcoming and past meetings, and the network for each of your contacts. You can even view information and images from your contacts using the LinkedIn and Facebook. Everything you need is a single click away, so you can immediately contact anyone the way you want.

With Xobni Rank, we learn who you communicate with most often and order your address book by that – you always have the most important people at the top. Search for “Mike” and even if there are 20 Mikes in your Xobni address book, the most important one rises instantly.

We built our first mobile application on the BlackBerry platform because we could deeply integrate within the native OS to provide an impactful and seamless experience for our users. If you’re composing a message using the native BlackBerry compose screen, you can access all of your Xobni contacts with a flick up of your trackpad/ball. We love being able to improve our customers’ existing work-flow instead of forcing them to change it.

The icing on the cake is Xobni One. Xobni One leverages our new cloud-based service to connect Xobni for Outlook and Xobni for BlackBerry, giving you all your Xobni contacts on your phone, where you need them most. A separate post on the magic of Xobni One is coming soon.

This is the stuff that excites me – Creating great products that solve real problems!

Learn More about Xobni for BlackBerry

Note: To connect to Outlook, Xobni One requires Xobni for Outlook 1.9.1 (build 10169 or later). This is an optional download for other Xobni users, and contains the following new features since version 1.9.0:

• Xobni One will update automatically when the computer is left idle (after the regular Xobni index process)
• New “Update Xobni One” menu item (see screenshot)
• Ability to delete Xobni One data from the server at any time in the Xobni Options window (under the “indexing” tab)
• Nearly unlimited phone numbers and fax numbers can be added for an existing Xobni profile (though still only the top two will show in the Xobni sidebar)
• When two Xobni profiles are merged, their phone numbers merge as well
• Numbers from Outlook Contacts are shown in the Xobni profile “edit” screen to help show the source of those numbers

Learn More about Xobni for BlackBerry