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Xobni had its genesis back in 2006 when Adam Smith collaborated with Matt Brezina to try to organize our Outlook inboxes based on contact relationships rather than message objects. It has been almost 2 years since Xobni impressed Microsoft with its analysis of Microsoft Outlook data. Back in March 2008 we did a review of the public beta of Xobni. Now millions of dollars in venture capital later, and a promising business model, we are back to see how the product has evolved and matured.

The primary test environment used for this review is a fully patched Microsoft Windows 7 workstation with Office 2007 installed. The hardware included a processor with 2 cores and 2 GB of RAM which was more than sufficient for our tests. We also installed Xobni on both 32-bit and 64-bit Windows installations and on Vista and XP boxes also. Outlook 2007 was configured in a variety of scenarios including Exchange, IMAP and POP accounts and with the integration with various social media resources.

Prerequisites and Versions

Xobni is, at its core, a search plug in for Microsoft Outlook 2007; therefore, an installation of either an Office 2007 version that includes Outlook or Outlook 2007 standalone on Windows is required. Xobni will also work fine with Outlook 2007 with Business Contact Manager installed also. Xobni does add a little to the hardware resources required for optimum performance, but unless the workstation is already stressed, even low end machines on the market today should manage just fine.

There are two versions of the plug in available for individuals: Xobni Basic, which is free, and Xobni Plus, which is currently listed at $29.95 for the first installation and $9.95 for additional workstations. Xobni offers a 14 day free trial for the Plus version as well. There is a detailed list of the features that are available only on the Plus version on Xobni’s site, so we won’t reproduce it here; however, there are five primary gains in functionality with the Plus as follows:

1. More granular search capabilities with a built in search query builder
2. Some filtering parameters for output in the conversation and network panes of a contact’s profile.
3. Indexing of multiple PSTs, instead of just the primary one.
4. Calendar events and tasks are added to search output for contacts
5. Xobni adds its own auto-suggest feature for addressing e-mails

Xobni also suggests that the Plus version does not show any ads, but the only ads evident in the free version seem to be ads for Xobni Plus. The interface for the free version also includes buttons that, when selected, advise the user that they must buy Xobni Plus for this feature. (These ‘upsell’ graphics are HTML and PNG files and could easily be replaced in the file system, but doing so probably violates the EULA in some way.) This is very annoying, but not uncommon for software with lighter free versions. The download is the same whether you want the free one or Plus. When you make the online purchase for Plus, it unlocks the additional features after it registers itself with Xobni as an Activation.

Xobni is only available in 32-bit (same with Outlook 2007) but it installs and runs just fine on 64-bit Windows. The Xobni Plus version also has an activation step that requires internet access, but it is fairly certain that if you are using an application to enhance search-ability of internet e-mail, that should not pose a problem.

Installation

Xobni is a free 5.07 MB download followed by a simple installation. Outlook must be closed in order to install Xobni, and it will prompt you to do so if Outlook.exe is still present in the process list in Task Manager. This is the same download whether you are going to use the free version or Xobni Plus.

Both the EULA and Privacy Policy content are stored on the xobni.com website for which the links are provided during setup.

• End User License Agreement: http://www.xobni.com/legal/license
• Privacy Terms: http://www.xobni.com/legal/privacy

I recommend reading the privacy policy as Xobni does reserve the right to share your “personally identifiable information with third parties solely for the purpose of providing services to you.”

The Xobni setup finishes with the screen shown in Figure 1. Xobni makes it easy for you to spread the word through Facebook and Twitter, providing a link which pre-populates the tweet field in the Twitter web client. Xobni’s pre-formatted tweet, however, is 141 characters long, exceeding Twitter’s limit of 140 as shown in Figure 2. However, if you want to help them out by spreading the word, this is certainly one way to do so.

Figure 1 also shows that by default Xobni will “Restart” Outlook if it was started already or it will say “Launch Outlook on Exit” with the checkbox selected by default. Outlook reads configuration settings, including some for the Xobni plug-in, from the registry upon startup.

Xobni also maintains a Product Improvement Program, for which you can optionally allow Xobni to send diagnostic information to their servers to help identify performance issues. Personal information is not sent, but some configuration data is sent. The box to opt-in is checked by default at setup; however, the user can deselect it during installation or change the setting at any time thereafter.

The installation log for the .msi installer, located by default in c:\Program Files\Xobni\gac-install.log, is available to troubleshoot installation issues. The path is c:\Program Files (x86)\Xobni\gac-install.log for 64-bit Windows.

First Run

After installation, there is some work to be done before Xobni can be effective, but that work is performed by the plug in itself. When you first launch Outlook with Xobni installed, Xobni checks internet connectivity and automatically and obnoxiously launches a video which is a very short introduction to the product. It seems a user-prompt to play the video would be preferred here. The embedded player that this video uses does not have its own audio volume control either, other than to turn the audio on or off.

Xobni examines some very recent messages to provide basic functionality right after installation. Xobni will then index older messages in your primary PST or OST file behind the scenes after the user has selected the “Let’s Go” button in the Xobni pane in Outlook shown in Figure 3. How long it takes for Xobni to complete the indexing depends on several factors, most notably system resources, the size of the Outlook data file(s), and the type of account(s). Content from IMAP accounts takes longer to index. In my tests, the full indexing took on average several hours using Xobni Plus covering multiple large .pst files. This also depends on what else is happening on the workstation, as full indexing is performed in the background when resources are available to do so.

After indexing is complete, based on my testing Xobni may require 60-80% of the size of the .pst or .ost files to maintain its index and cache on a per Outlook account or per user basis. On Windows 7, the index and cache are stored at:

C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Xobni\

Xobni does run as a service running as SYSTEM, reflected in the Task Manager process list as XobniService.exe.

Features

Xobni is more than just eye candy. At first glance it has almost a Fisher Price-like appeal, but that is really a bright, dynamic presentation layer for e-mail contact-based data queries. Its greatest value for increasing efficiency for e-mail users is found in its ability to quickly return information on the sender of an e-mail. This is the key to the value that Xobni brings – more comprehensive, very accessible information on an individual that you communicate with. Xobni sometimes refers to this as a relationship-based representation of content. The immediate attraction to the user is the presentation panel within Outlook and the exposure of the network of information related to a contact, especially given that the information is not created. It was already available. It is just presented in a more consolidated manner anchored by individual contacts and their communication patterns.

Xobni creates a new vertical pane within the Outlook. The Xobni pane does increase overall contention for screen real estate, but like other Outlook panes, namely the To Do Bar and the Navigation Pane, it can collapse into a narrow band with one click of the chevron arrows at the bottom of the pane. I’d still like to see the option of a separate, minimize-able window for the Xobni data.

An example of the Xobni pane is shown in Figure 4. This pane (also called a Sidebar) remains through the different views in Outlook – Mail, Calendar, Contacts, Tasks, etc – and will present information from Xobni’s index where an e-mail address of a contact is the basis for the information gathered and presented. This content forms the contact’s profile with Xobni. The content shown in the Xobni sidebar is specific to the object selected in Outlook, such as an e-mail, task or contact. For example, tasks may be assigned by a contact through e-mail, and the address of the sender becomes the search item for Xobni to call.

So, the Xobni sidebar, shown in Figure 5, is the main mini-dashboard of information for the user. As different items are selected in Outlook, Xobni displays a wealth of communication-related content based on the contact’s e-mail address identified in the selected item. The Xobni pane is separates into two main sections – the upper window shows personal identification and social networking activity. The lower window identifies different communication between the user and the contact, including conversations and attachments. It also shows additional people (by e-mail address) that have appeared in the contact’s communication. Xobni refers to that list as their ‘network’. Above and below these two windows are two search fields. The top one provides search of the Xobni index, while the bottom one opens a new browser window for a Google search initiated from within Outlook through Xobni. Finally, just about the Google search bar at the bottom resides a menu and status bar for Xobni.

Xobni pulls information from e-mail addresses, contacts, message headers and bodies, and signature files. The Edit button on the top right of the sidebar showing a contact profile can be used to manually change information if you don’t agree with what Xobni has selected or if you have other information you want to change. Manual edits to contact information are maintained in Xobni, replacing values found in other sources. The image used by Xobni for a contact profile can be retrieved from Outlook, Facebook or LinkedIn. The Edit screen allows you to select your preference for the source of that picture as shown on the top right in Figure 6. If you update contact information using this form through Xobni, it does not make changes to other sources, such as your Outlook contacts. A small annoyance with Xobni’s edit contact information window is that it is configured to persistently remain on top of all other windows. If you want to check something or tend to another item while editing contact information, you need to either close the edit window or work around it. Information added to the form in Figure 6 is then reflected in the contact information window in the Xobni sidebar.

The Xobni Sidebar contains a set of tabs for what they call Extensions. Most of these tabs represent the Social Networking interaction with Xobni (I’ll look at those in a separate section). The first tab, however, is for one of the most eye-pleasing and valuable features of Xobni, maintained from the first betas. The Xobni Statistics window quantifies the digital communication relationship between the user and the contact currently highlighted in Outlook. Figure 7 shows an example of the Xobni Sidebar with the Xobni Statistics tab selected. This contact is ranked 24^th in relevance to the user and follows a fairly standard pattern of office hour messaging. The contact starts sending e-mails around 7am and works into the evening sometimes as well. These numbers would include list or group e-mails that may not be addressed directly to the user as well. This chart can provide some insight as to when to expect a reply to an e-mail based on past experience data. The Share This button in Figure 7 is another promotional option. Selecting that button generates a pre-populated HTML e-mail from your default Outlook account to the contact with the Xobni Statistics chart embedded advertising the use of Xobni.

The Communication pane highlights exchanges between the user and the selected contact. The first tab, as displayed in Figure 7, has the Xobni logo and presents summary information of the content displayed in the next five tabs. The next five tabs represent, in order, Conversations, Network, Files Exchanged (attachments), Links, and Appointments. The last two items require Xobni Plus to view. Unfortunately, there is no apparent way to hide the tabs requiring Xobni Plus from the standard view. The summary tab will show the few most recent items visible from the other tabs. The tabs themselves show the number of items found in the Xobni index for that type. Figure 7 shows that the contact has exchanged 11 attachments from 191 conversations with the user. The contact’s Network of 188 people stems from other e-mail addresses observed by Xobni in conversations with that contact and their Social Networking connections.

Below the communication pane lies a status bar or menu bar. Here you can collapse the Xobni Sidebar when you need more screen area for other things. The circle formed by two arrows represents an easy way to see if indexing is current. If Outlook was completely indexed by Xobni, this would be a checkmark in a smaller circle. The button with the heart shape is for telling others about Xobni and the question mark is for Help of course.Somehow I feel this menu bar should be at the top of the Xobni Sidebar, but it seems to work at the bottom as well. Also in this menu bar is a button with a gear which opens the Xobni Options menu, which we will discuss next.

Xobni Menu Options

When you install Xobni, it adds a drop down menu to the menu bar atop the main Microsoft Outlook window. The options in this menu are visible in Figure 8. This same menu is displayed when selecting the button with the gear on the menu bar at the bottom of the Xobni Sidebar. Most of the selections here are self explanatory, such as Help, About Xobni and Product Video. The most configurable selection available here is simply the Options item. Clicking Options will open the dialog box shown in Figure 9.

The General tab of the Xobni options menu controls the buttons available on the menu bar at the bottom of the Xobni Sidebar. By deselecting the boxes shown in Figure 9 and then selecting OK, the buttons will be removed. I find this interface to be inconsistent with the similar tab format and the Manage Extensions window in the Contact Information area (covered later under Social Networking Integration). The user can also configure whether Xobni starts with Outlook and whether Xobni uses its own auto-suggest feature when addressing e-mails. Outlook maintains its own ‘nickname cache’, a cache of recently used e-mail addresses used as suggestions to the user as they type a recipient in the To:, Cc:, or Bcc: fields. Xobni will do the same, but pull from its index. This may be a place where Xobni is too effective. You need Xobni Plus for this feature, but Xobni may suggest dozens of addresses as you type letters into a field, including some that are from recent e-mails, including spam that resides in the inbox still. Figure 10 is an example of Xobni’s auto-suggest feature.

The Xobni Options window has several tabs covering an array of feature configurations. The Integration tab allows the user to index a single Yahoo! account. It also offers the user some control of what is being displayed in the Xobni Sidebar. You can block LinkedIn and Facebook data from populating the contact information and allow Skype to be launched when a phone number is clicked (if Skype is installed locally). The Schedule Time tab controls the way appointments are displayed in Xobni. The Folders tab allows users to control which Outlook folders (and Yahoo! folders if enabled) are indexed as shown in Figure 11. By default, Xobni does not index deleted items, drafts, outbox or junk mail. The next tab is labeled Performance. The user can scale back the resources consumed by Xobni by disabling real-time indexing or stopping the plug-in altogether in troubleshooting scenarios. You can also schedule indexing for hours when you are away from your workstation if necessary. Aside from some slight hesitation by Xobni, I have not found any reason to prevent real-time indexing. The final tab in the Xobni Options dialog box is one of the many places you can initiate the purchase of Xobni Plus. After doing so, the Xobni Plus tab identifies the account you are logged into Xobni with.

Search

Xobni is certainly an efficient search application for Outlook. It appears much faster, but I did not quantify the improvement. To the my eye, equivalent searches seem no more than twice as fast searching the same term with at least 200 results. Xobni’s index and cache system is able to return responses very quickly. The Plus version of Xobni really increases the value here with more granular search queries using its own query builder; however, the query builder requires the user to add or remove search fields one at a time with a plus and minus sign beside each one as shown in Figure 12. Outlook search has a more sensible drop down to add the exact criteria you need instead of adding them one at a time until you get the one you need.

Xobni needs efficient retrieval of data because it performs a search, with the help of caching, for every contact object you highlight in Outlook. Click on an e-mail in your inbox and Xobni queries and returns a list of related content for that contact, each time. For 99% of searches, Xobni will likely provide a better search experience for users; however, Xobni does not seem to account for all the fields available in Outlook for describing a contact. Outlook can do a more detailed advanced search using properties such as Category, Message Size and Flag Status. Not everyone will need this granularity, but some might and will have to use Outlook Search for those queries.

Social Networking Integration

Xobni provides some integration with social networking sites. Internet interaction and collaboration continues to evolve. Some daily online communication has moved from individual serial messaging to group broadcast messaging through web application resources such as Twitter and Facebook. Xobni likes to suggest that they identify networks of contacts that you did not know you had. With the numbers of people using these social networking sites, it was critical for Xobni to reach out and bring that content, in some form, into their Outlook plug-in.

They have successfully done this to an extent. While Xobni does present related information pulled from social networking sites, it is not, itself, a viable social media client. You can update a Facebook status and send a tweet through Xobni but it really lacks most functionality expected in a client like the Twitter client plug-in TwInbox for Outlook. It does a great job, however, of presenting a wealth of information on a person you communicate with, including their latest tweets and Facebook updates. In order to access private Facebook or LinkedIn content, you need to have an account with those services and the individual contact for whom information is being requested has to be a friend in Facebook or a contact in LinkedIn. In order to view Twitter content, the user must either follow the contact or the contact cannot have their tweets set to private. Xobni will access public profiles in LinkedIn and Facebook where the e-mail address used for those social networking sites matches that used for communication by the selected contact in Outlook. Xobni can pull contact information and even a profile picture from LinkedIn.

Xobni will open a small browser window for the user to authenticate to the Social Networking service the user may want to use within Xobni. The one for LinkedIn is reflected in Figure 13. Once authenticated, Xobni can then access secure content available only from contacts that you are connected with in LinkedIn. If you select the Facebook or LinkedIn tab you will be prompted to log in if you are not yet authenticated. Xobni also extends the Social Networking experience by allowing you to ‘add’ people without leaving Outlook. That is, you can connect with a contact at LinkedIn or ‘friend’ someone at Facebook initiated through Xobni.

Xobni connects with the following social networking and information sites:

• Twitter (http://www.twitter.com) – the ubiquitous micro-blogging web application allowing 140-character updates from a variety of platforms. Xobni requires the contact to not protect their tweets for them to show in Xobni.
• LinkedIn (http://www.linkedin.com) – the leading professional networking site with 55,000,000 users allowing status updates for contacts and referrals. You have to log in to LinkedIn and Xobni will pull public information, including profile picture if it is available.
• Facebook (http://www.facebook.com ) – semi-private social broadcasting site with 350,000,000 users sharing status updates with friends. Xobni requires the user to log into Facebook, and that the contact allows their image and information to be available.
• Hoovers (http://www.hoovers.com) – A Dunn & Bradstreet company providing business listings information. Xobni uses the Hoovers API to pull company information based on the SMTP domain used by the contact in Outlook.

Xobni uses the term ‘extensions’ for managing Social Networking integration. The tabs in the contact information section of the Xobni Sidebar can be hidden optionally. They are all available by default. The drop down menu to the far right of the extensions tabs has two commands: Hide Extensions Pane and Manage Extensions. The former hides the small presentation window below the tabs. The latter opens the window displayed in Figure 14. You can deselect an extension to remove the tab from the Xobni Sidebar. You can also manage the order that the tabs are presented.

Mobility

Xobni is still working on a version for the Blackberry. While initially planned for late summer 2009, Xobni’s website still reports that they are ‘fine-tuning Xobni for Blackberry’ and provide no date for release or a beta. While a Blackberry solution is a good start, there is no formal reference to possible Windows Mobile, iPhone or Android versions.

Xobni did have a small kiosk at the Blackberry booth at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, NV in January 2010 where they were promoting their Blackberry application. The Blackberry app compliments the desktop application. Xobni for Blackberry will sort contact profiles in order of perceived relevancy based on communication frequency. Much of the contact profile information we see on the desktop version will be provided on the Blackberry version of Xobni, including their picture and recent e-mail communication, some of which you can see in Figure 15 (image courtesy of BlackberryMotion.com, taken from video posted by Monica Simons, January 16, 2010). With Xobni for Blackberry, it is easier to initiate e-mail addressing even for recipients who are not listed in your address book when their e-mail address resides in the Xobni index. In addition, the Blackberry is used for phone communication with that contact, the recent dates and length of calls are also shown in their profile.

Xobni for Blackberry is expected to come in two versions – a standalone version just for the device and a version that will synchronize with Outlook on the desktop.

Additional Features

Xobni also provides other optional services for users looking to expand on base of summary information Xobni provides. One is found in the integration with Salesforce.com and the other provides indexing of Yahoo! mail.

The Salesforce extension will appear beside the other Social Networking extensions and will be able to query and present information on a specific user including the Salesforce information in the Xobni Sidebar. This does require a Salesforce account, of course.

Xobni provides the option of indexing a single Yahoo! account as well. You can then determine which folders in your Yahoo! account that get indexed through Xobni. You can see this option back in Figure 11. Xobni does not download e-mails themselves, but does need credentials to access your account through the Yahoo! Web Services API.

Xobni can also Skype-enable phone numbers in the Xobni Sidebar if you have Skype installed of course. You can see the Skype logo by the phone number shown back in Figure 5.

Xobni Analytics

I have spent a lot of time over the years in messaging analysis applications on the server-side. Xobni Analytics is the best reporting engine for client-side messaging behavior. Though this feature of Xobni seems outside of its focused goal of showing relationship-based contact information, it still provides a wealth of information on the user’s messaging interaction.

Xobni Analytics is accessed through the Xobni menu at the top of the main Outlook Window. You can generate fairly granular reports on usage statistics for Outlook between any two dates with views ranging from hourly to yearly Report graphs can be e-mailed with a single click or saved as an image. Figure 16 shows a sample report for a year of e-mails.

Xobni Analytics also allows users to see what they have done on a single day or report on communication volume with unique contacts in a specific time window. It is an additional presentation layer and not a searchable user interface like the Sidebar.

Performance and Troubleshooting

There was some concern about workstation performance back in 2008 during the beta phase of Xobni, and it remains a concern to some extent. Xobni handles the background indexing quite well – it is not apparent that there is even anything happening while using Outlook. Xobni itself seems slower to respond to contacts selected in Outlook if it is still updating its index. If you move too quickly between items in Outlook, Xobni is not able to keep up. I also found occasions where Xobni would not accept a Twitter account manually entered to be the account for a contact. These are not major deficiencies, but they did have a negative impact on my use of Xobni. Outlook is still Outlook and if you use a large number of plug-ins, you are depending on various software developers to write perfect code. I did have to kill the Outlook.exe process a couple of times in testing, but I could not attribute these failures specifically to any one plug-in. Xobni does work best when not competing with other resource intensive plug-ins.

Xobni does produce some detailed logs on a per user basis. In testing we saw several logs per day, each just under 1 MB in size. These logs are found at:

C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Xobni\Logs\

Xobni provides a utility to assess your workstation for troubleshooting purposes. Xobni Inspector X is included in the installation and is run from the Windows menu with Outlook closed. Xobni Inspector X gathers a lot of information on the user’s workstation (hardware and software) and properties for the installation and use of Xobni. Figure 17 shows the interface and output for this utility. It is most likely that Xobni customer support would use this output to help troubleshoot issues with the software.

Xobni Enterprise

When I first saw Xobni a couple of years ago, one of the first things I wanted to do was have a server-side version – a Xobni for Exchange Server perhaps. The next best thing would be a centrally managed Xobni Server to control and report on the client installations.

Xobni Enterprise was introduced in late 2009. A web-based administration portal allows companies to control deployment of Xobni as well as what functionality is exposed to groups of users. For example, companies that don’t allow the use of Facebook for certain groups of users can centrally deselect that extension for that group. Xobni says companies will be able to develop custom extensions to integrate CRM, SharePoint, LDAP directory, Web Service or other software applications into the Xobni sidebar.

Xobni Enterprise is not available for download. My web form request for information on Xobni Enterprise was not answered in a timely manner.

Miscellaneous

Xobni utilizes Outlook Redemption , a Microsoft Outlook development utility produced by Outlook MVP Dmitri Strebelchenko. Redemption is a COM Library leveraging Extended MAPI to bypass certain security measures (also known as the Security Patch) implemented in Outlook since Outlook 2000. Redemption Objects allow Xobni to access Outlook data not typically exposed to the Outlook Object Model.

A lot of the history of Xobni, from its modest start in a dorm room at MIT in 2006 to its current offices in San Francisco (formerly belonging to Twitter), can be found at the Xobni company blog at http://www.xobni.com/blog. Incidentally, Xobni is still growing with several open developer positions posted on their website as well.

Like most software companies, Xobni has a fan page on Facebook as well as a Twitter feed found at http://twitter.com/xobni.

Summary

The initial fascination with Xobni when it first came out has worn off to some extent. But overall, Xobni does what it advertizes. Many users are going to find the immediate and broad information Xobni returns about a contact extremely valuable. Others might be amused, but really have no need for the consolidation of information that consumes any of their valued screen real estate. We saw minor performance glitches in testing, but nothing that represents a showstopper. Overall, a highly recommended Outlook 2007 plugin for professionals who spend a lot of time using the famous e-mail client.

The Xobni sidebar also may be a victim of its own success trying to be the portal for everything you need. There is so much information to present in the sidebar that it can appear crowded at times. Spending time with the product of course will help ease what may seem as clutter at first.

Xobni brings a higher level of mailbox intelligence to the desktop. Others, like Gist, have taken to the cloud instead. With Xobni as a desktop application, the central Enterprise management option seems like the next step in the classic desktop software model.

One of the biggest downsides of Xobni lies in the amount of mailbox data it needs to generate accurate assessments of mailboxes. If you want Xobni to show how many messages you received from a contact, then the e-mails from that contact must be saved. Saving e-mails in Outlook indefinitely will of course lead to very large PST files over time. If you delete an e-mail, Xobni removes it from its index as well. This may be significant if you are trying to use Xobni to accurately measure such statistics. In this regard, Xobni does not replace a server-side message monitoring and reporting application.

What is in store for Xobni in the future? You’ll have to upgrade to the Plus version of this article to access that feature. Yes, that is annoying.

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Last reviewed on Sep 8, 2011