The X1 Files

X1 Professional Client 6.2.4 Released

This week we released the X1 Professional Client 6.2.4 with several performance improvements and bug fixes. A year ago we introduced a registration format change, moving from a 13 digit to a 16 digit registration code format. The older 13 digit codes continued to be valid forms of registration while the new registration format was being introduced and fully integrated into the product. With the release of X1 version 6.2.4 this integration process is complete.

Beginning with the release of version 6.2.4, X1 will only accept registration codes that are 16 characters in length. If you have an older 13 character registration code you will not be able to unlock v6.2.4 or later releases. Continuing to install the product without a valid 16 digit code will cause X1 to install as a 30 day trial. 

X1 Professional Client v6.6 Public Beta Release

X1 Professional Client v6.6 is now available for beta testing and can be downloaded here: http://forums.x1.com/viewtopic.php?t=3964

 

The 6.6 client fixes several improvements/bug fixes since version 6.5 and introduces a neat feature in the preview pane: the ability to highlight and search for names and emails. This new feature is integrated with three actions: send email, add to contacts and schedule time. We’ve leveraged our email indexing process to match proper names with email addresses and create a new database of pseudo-contacts. This new database is used to provide X1 style matches against highlighted names in the preview area. Try it out and let us know what you think.

 

This year X1 made a big push into the eDiscovery market, particularly in the identification and information management area. The 6.6 client introduces new features that allows users to tag search results for either locally indexed results or results indexed in the X1 Server. Other features include annotations for locally indexed items and tracking search sessions. These features are not available by default so the only way to test them is to contact X1 sales and tell them you are interested in an eDiscovery trial.

 

We hope you enjoy this version of the X1 client. Send us your feedback in the forums section.

Dive into the X1 Professional Client 6.0!

X1 Professional Client 6.0 is finally here!  After a year of research and development, we have some exciting features that we think will change the way desktop search is used.  Specifically highlighted in this release are a new plugin framework,  federation, and post search action model.

Federation

Federation is perhaps one of the most important yet least understood concepts of search today, perhaps because the name itself is not completely intuitive.  Federation involves the unification of search results from several different sources, in one plain view.   The federation model in X1 v5.x was somewhat complicated to understand.  Users may not have explicitly been made aware they were viewing results that were federated.  X1 6.0 changes that and clarifies the concept of Federation by making it explicit rather than implicit in the X1 user interface.  The result is that Federation is now a concept that is easy both to understand and use in day-to-day desktop search experience.

Post-search actions

The ability to perform a rich set of actions on search results today is limited. The most obvious reason for this is that results are typically tightly bound to their underlying object type.  Based on the result type displayed, applications typically provide post-search actions that directly apply to the object type. Due to this restriction, applications are severely limited to what actions they can offer to the user.   We felt this was a significant detriment to user productivity and had to be solved: search applications had to be able to apply post-search actions on federated result sets.  We’ve solved this problem in X1 6.0, and defined five standard actions that can be applied to any federated result set: Open, Print, Send by Email, Add to ZIP, and Drag and Drop.   Additionally, X1 plugins can define custom actions that can be applied on their data type, specific to the source.  For example, the Yahoo plugin has an “Open Cached” action, that allows users to quickly open cached versions of the webpage from Yahoo instead of waiting for the live copy to render.

Demo Plugin for 6.0 Client:X1 Connector for Skype Software

One of the most exciting things about The X1 Professional Client 6.0 is the ability to add plug-in data connectors. This new framework has encouraged our engineers to research and generate exciting new demo plug-ins that are made available only on this blog for you to try. Note that these are not released products and thus will not have any customer support.

The first demo plugin we have is the X1 Connector for Skype Software chat history plug-in.  This plugin will index and allow content-based search across an entire chat history on a machine from the familiar X1 interface.  Users can apply actions on a single or multi-selection of chat windows in the X1 results pane. These actions include Open (web browser), Open with Skype, Send by Email, Print, Add to ZIP, and Drag and Drop. Add to ZIP and Drag and Drop are great for storing and archiving your chat history as html files. Skype search results can be federated with any other X1 search using X1 6.0’s new explicit federation model by right-clicking the search and selecting “Federation”. X1's new post-search action model will allow actions to be applied to heterogenous result sets including Skype and other plug-in results.

How to Install the X1 Connector for Skype Software 

To install the X1 Connector for Skype Software:

1. Download the X1 Connector for Skype Software.
2. Install the plugin through Tools->Options.
3. Add a source through Tools->Add Source, no need for username or password. You will also be prompted by Skype to "allow" X1 access to content via an authorization dialog.



4. As long as you are logged in to Skype, X1 will automatically start indexing your chat history.  You can immediately perform search and post-search actions during this initial indexing phase.

Note that the initial indexing phase may take a few minutes. If you keep your incremental indexing to a short time period (defaults to every 5 minutes), X1 should only ever need to keep the index updated by indexing your “most recent chats”, taking about 10 seconds. If your recent chats list has circled once since the last incremental scans, X1 will need to scan your complete chat history again.

If you like this plug-in or would like to provide feedback or feature requests, please let us know. If demand is there, we plan to include indexing other Skype content including call history and voicemails.