Moving from Microsoft® Outlook to IBM®

Lotus® Notes® for end users

Hansraj Mali
Technical Advisor, IBM Software Group
Lotus Notes/Domino Mail & Messaging Team
IBM Pune, India

February 2009

© Copyright International Business Machines Corporation 2008. All rights reserved.

Abstract: This white paper is intended for former Microsoft® Outlook users who have
moved to IBM® Lotus® Notes® 8. It describes the functionalities of Lotus Notes,
mapping these features from those of Microsoft Outlook and describing how to customize
Lotus Notes to deliver a user experience comparable with that of Microsoft Outlook.

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Contents
1 Introduction...................................................................................................................... 3
2 Elements of Lotus Notes.................................................................................................. 3
3 Comparing basic features................................................................................................. 5
3.1 Home Page ................................................................................................................ 5
3.1.1 Customizing your Home Page ........................................................................... 5
3.2 Using the Open list.................................................................................................... 7
3.3 Searching................................................................................................................... 8
3.4 Notes sidebar........................................................................................................... 10
3.5 Tabs......................................................................................................................... 11
3.5.2 Closing a grouped tab ..................................................................................... 12
4 Exploring Lotus Notes ................................................................................................... 13
4.1 Mail window ........................................................................................................... 13
4.2 Mail Action bar ....................................................................................................... 14
4.3 Addressing your message ....................................................................................... 15
4.4 Organizing messages .............................................................................................. 16
4.5 Attachments ............................................................................................................ 17
4.6 Flagging messages .................................................................................................. 18
4.7 Message recall......................................................................................................... 19
5 Maintaining Contacts information ................................................................................. 21
5.1 Navigation pane ...................................................................................................... 21
5.2 Creating a New Contact .......................................................................................... 22
5.3 Creating a group...................................................................................................... 23
6 Calendar ......................................................................................................................... 24
6.1 Main Calendar page ................................................................................................ 24
6.2 Creating a new calendar entry................................................................................. 25
6.3 Quick Check your calendar..................................................................................... 26
6.4 Checking others’ calendars ..................................................................................... 27
6.5 Viewing dates in the future ..................................................................................... 27
7 Preferences..................................................................................................................... 28
8 IBM Lotus Sametime..................................................................................................... 30
9 Widgets and Live Text................................................................................................... 30
10 IBM Lotus Quickr........................................................................................................ 30
11 Lotus Notes Help and IBM Support Assistant............................................................. 30
11.1 Using Help ............................................................................................................ 31
11.2 IBM Support Assistant.......................................................................................... 31
12 Conclusion ................................................................................................................... 32
13 Resources ..................................................................................................................... 33
14 About the author .......................................................................................................... 33

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1 Introduction
Migrating from one application to another can be difficult and time consuming. However,
by reviewing the new application’s features, you can quickly orient yourself to tools with
which you may already be familiar and explore new tools that can help you maintain or
even improve your productivity.

The IBM Lotus Notes 8.0.1 and 8.5 user interface provides easy access to all the tools
you need to be more effective in your communications. If you are a former Microsoft
Outlook 2003/2007 user, after completing the steps in this paper, you should be able to
map the features in Lotus Notes 8 to the features you used in Outlook, accelerating your
migration to (and familiarity with) the Notes client.

2 Elements of Lotus Notes

The Lotus Notes user interface is illustrated in figure 1.

Figure 1. Elements of Lotus Notes UI

NOTE: The information in this section is from the IBM Lotus Domino and Notes
Information Center.

Navigator. The navigator displays the views and folders that are available in the
currently opened application. For example, in your Calendar, you can choose from
several views, such as One Day or One Week. In your Mail application, you can create
folders to organize your messages.

Menus. The menu bar displays menu choices that apply to an application or document.
There is a standard set of menus, plus optional menus that change depending on the

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application. There is also a set of advanced menus that you can enable (View >
Advanced Menus). Context menus appear when you right-click an object (a message,
for example) or area.

Toolbars. Toolbars are made up of buttons. You can set Toolbar Preferences to specify
which toolbars display, and you can add or remove buttons from each toolbar.

Action bar. Each window tab optionally includes an action bar, specific to the
application or document open in the Window tab. Action bars may include icons and text,
or be composed of text only. Items on the action bar are also available from the Action
menu.

Icons. Icons display throughout Lotus Notes. To see a description of an icon, move the
mouse pointer over the icon.

View pane. The contents of what you select in the navigator display in the view pane.

Window tab. Each tab displays a page. As you work, you can open multiple tabbed
pages. If the row of tabs exceeds the width of your screen, left and right scroll icons
display that you can use to access tabs that are out of view. Alternatively, you can set a
Windows and Themes user preference to group documents in a single tab.

Status bar. The status bar displays action buttons and messages about current status
and activity.

Open list. Click the Open button for a list that includes your Lotus Notes applications,
bookmarks, folders, IBM Lotus Symphony™ Documents, Presentations, and
Spreadsheets, and your workspace. Right-click Open and select Dock the Open List, to
display icons down the left side of the window.

Preview pane. The preview pane displays a preview of a selected message or calendar
entry. You can display the preview pane vertically, beside the view pane (the default), or
horizontally, underneath the view pane. You can also hide the preview pane.

Home Page. The home page (previously called the Welcome page) is the first item that
appears if you do not have a view set to open when you first launch Lotus Notes. The
default home page gives you a central location from which to access your Mail,
Calendar, Contacts, To Do list, Personal Journal, and productivity tools.

Switcher menu. You access the switcher menu by clicking the small menu icon located
in the upper-right corner of your navigator. Use this menu to switch to another
application, for example, to switch from Mail to To Do or to Calendar.

Sidebar. The sidebar gives you easy access to Lotus Sametime® Contacts, Calendar, a
Feed Reader, and Activities, depending on how your administrator has set up your Lotus
Notes account. You can collapse the sidebar to a thin bar showing icons only (the
default), or hide it.

Search. Search appears at the top right of the toolbar. You can use Search for a Notes-
style search or a Web-style search. You set a user preference to enable Yahoo!™
Search or Google™ Web Search.

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3 Comparing basic features
Let’s begin by comparing some basic features of Microsoft Outlook and Lotus Notes.

3.1 Home Page

When you start Microsoft Outlook, you begin in your Inbox folder, whereas Lotus Notes 8
opens to your Home Page, from which you can launch any application you need (see
figure 2).

Open an application by clicking the associated icon, or quickly create a new entry in any
of the applications by clicking the New button for the application of your choice.

Figure 2. Default Home Page

Launch New
Application Application

3.1.1 Customizing your Home Page

You can customize your Home Page options to match your personal preferences by
clicking the Home Page options arrow (see figure 3). The current Home Page selection
displays in the drop-down list, which contains pre-configured Home Page options.

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 Figure 3. Home Page options

Click here to
customize Default
Home page

You can select from these pre-designed options or customize your Home Page to match
your preferences, using the Create a new Home Page button (see figure 4).

Figure 4. Create a new Home Page button

Click here to create

new Home page

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Figure 5 shows an example of a customized Home Page.

Figure 5. Customized Home Page

TO DO
Inbox

Web Link

Calendar

3.2 Using the Open list

In the top left-hand corner of the window is the Open button (see figure 6). Clicking it
gives you access to all the information available from a Lotus Notes client, including
email, Calendar and Contacts, Web pages, rich text documents, spreadsheets, and
presentations. The Open list has a context-sensitive search field; simply typing part of an
application’s name causes it to appear on a shortened list.

Figure 6. Open list

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In addition, you can right-click on the Open button to convert the Open list to Dock list
format (see figure 7).

Figure 7. Dock list

3.3 Searching
Microsoft Outlook is a mail, calendar, and contacts client with which you can search your
mail, calendar, and contacts entries. Lotus Notes 8, on the other hand, can be used to
view many more types of information.

For example, the Search Center interface (see figure 8) lets you search your mail,
calendar, contacts, applications, and even the Web, from one search location. It is
context sensitive. If you are in your Mail, it will search that by default; when you switch to
your calendar, it will search that.

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Figure 8. Search view

Click here to search in a

application

Figures 9 and 10 show examples of Recent Searches and an Internet search from a
Notes client, respectively.

Figure 9. Recent Searches

Search String

Search result

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Figure 10. Internet Search from a Notes client

Google search from Lotus Notes

3.4 Notes sidebar

Figure 11 shows the Notes client sidebar, from which you can get quick access to IBM
Lotus Sametime® instant messaging, a day-at-a-glance view of your calendar, RSS
news feeds, Quickr Places, and a quick view of your collaborative activities. Other
sidebar plug-ins can be added, including My Widgets, Google gadgets, and third-party
plug-ins.

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Figure 11. Notes sidebar

Sidebar
3.5 Tabs
Microsoft Outlook uses a Navigation pane for quick access to applications such as Mail,
Calendar, and Contacts. The Navigation pane varies depending on the application
you’re in.

Lotus Notes uses tabs along the top of the Home Page (see figure 12) for easy access
to open applications and documents—the same model used by Web browsers.

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Figure 12. Notes Client tabs

Windows Tabs

3.5.1 Grouped tabs

You can set a user preference so that window tabs are opened in groups, instead of
each individual document opening in an new window tab.

With grouped window tabs, when you open a Notes application, a window tab opens.
Then, each document you open from that application opens in the same window tab. A
number in the window tab tells you how many open documents are grouped in the
window tab.

To select one of the open documents, select from the number list (see figure 13). To
return to the primary view of an application, click the window tab.

Figure 13. Window tab

Figure 13. Grouped tabs

3.5.2 Closing a grouped tab

To close the active open tab, click the red X at the end of the window tab row, making
sure your focus is on the tab you want to close before you click the X (see figure 14).

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Figure 14. Closing a tab

4 Exploring Lotus Notes

Email is an essential part of conducting business. Lotus Notes 8 has tools and features
that can help you communicate more effectively and provide you with more control over
the information you send.

4.1 Mail window

The overall appearance of the mail application is similar in layout to that of Microsoft
Outlook (see figure 15):

• The Navigation pane along the left-hand side of the window lets you select the
view you want to appear in the main view.

• In the Follow Up pane (in the bottom-left corner of the screen) you can quickly
access items you’ve flagged for follow up and remove the flag when you’ve
finished.

Figure 15. Mail window

Toolbar

Action Bar
Navigator pane

Preview Pane

Follow up Pane

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 • The toolbar across the top provides similar functions as those in Microsoft
Outlook. In addition, you can skip ahead in your view to the previous or next
unread message and, with your cursor on the toolbar, you can right-click and
customize your toolbar with those options you need most (see figure 16).

Figure 16. Customize toolbar

Right click on Toolbar to customized

4.2 Mail Action bar

The Action bar changes automatically, depending on the application you are in, enabling
you to quickly find options that are specific to that application. You can use the Action
bar to create a new message, reply to or forward a message, and flag a message for
follow up (see figure 17).

Figure 17. Action bar

Move Document to Show Unread

Folder Mails

Click Here to Create Follow Up Flag

New Message

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In the Calendar, the Action bar provides the ability to create a new meeting, appointment
and to import holidays.

You use the Show button (in the upper-right corner) to select preferences for viewing
messages. Options include displaying preview panes (both on the bottom and the side of
the Inbox), viewing unread messages only, and viewing conversations or individual
messages.

4.2.1 Conversations
One of the more innovative features of Notes 8 is something called conversations. To
understand this feature, it's helpful to think about how we communicate in everyday life.
If I have a conversation with someone, I'll usually end that conversation before starting a
new one. This may sound obvious, but it's a contradiction to what goes on in our Inbox
every day.

If we look at email communications as conversations, it quickly becomes clear that it

differs from how we would communicate with someone if they were standing in front of
us. We hold multiple conversations in our Inbox and try to follow each as they transpire.

Imagine trying to have a dozen people in front of you and holding a conversation with
each one at the same time. This is what we do through email every day. To make things
worse, the responses are not ordered sequentially. Email is a great way to communicate
with colleagues, but it is difficult to manage because the response to our conversations
are scattered throughout our Inbox.

Lotus Notes 8 makes this much easier by gathering the various conversations, allowing
us to see the entire conversation in sequence (see figure 18).

Figure 18. Example of a Conversation

4.3 Addressing your message

Lotus Notes 8 keeps track of the people that you communicate with most often and
moves those names to the top of your type-ahead list (see figure 19). Instead of being
sorted in alphabetical order, the type-ahead list is sorted based on the people with whom
you most often interact. If you've never sent a message to Ted Johnson in Atlanta or Ted
Jones, they won't appear on the list, eliminating the possibility of choosing them by
mistake.

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Figure 19. Addressing your message

Address Lookup

It's a simple concept, really, based on the premise that the people with whom you are
most likely to collaborate in the future are those with whom you have collaborated in the
past. It's a feature called Recent Contacts, and it's also used when sending meeting
invitations. One of the best attributes is that the Recent Contact list is stored locally,
along with your other Contacts (don't worry, it doesn't take up much space).

That means that when you're on an airplane or otherwise disconnected from the
network, your Recent Contacts are still there. Once you've stopped collaborating with a
person for some time, they fall off the list, making room for someone else that you're
more likely to collaborate with in the future.

4.4 Organizing messages

Just as in Microsoft Outlook, you can create folders to organize and store your important
messages in Lotus Notes. Simply right-click the folders icon in the Navigation pane to
create new folders.

You can click the folder icon on the Action bar to move messages to a folder (see figure
20), or simply drag and drop them into the proper folder. The Action bar icon can also be
used to remove them from a folder and create new folders.

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Figure 20. Move To Folder dialog box

Select Folder and click

on Move button

Select Folder

Click here to create

New Folder

4.5 Attachments
Adding an attachment to a message in Lotus Notes 8 is similar to the process used in
Microsoft Outlook. To do this, just click the paper clip button (see figure 21).

Figure 21. Attachment paper clip button

Click here to add

attachment

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The Create Attachments window opens, from which you can select a file in the current
folder or browse to the folder that contains the file you need (see figure 22).

Figure 22. Create Attachments window

4.6 Flagging messages

To quickly flag a message for follow up, just click the Flag icon button (see figure 23).
The message will be flagged and added to the Follow Up pane.

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Figure 23. Flag button and Follow Up pane

Follow up Flag

Follow up
Icon

Follow up Pane

4.7 Message recall

As in Microsoft Outlook, message recall is readily accessible in Lotus Notes 8. Simply go
to your Sent folder and select the message you want recalled. Click the Recall Message
button and select the recipients from which you want to recall the message. A Message
Recall Report will be sent to you to confirm the status of the recall (see figures 24—26).

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Figure 24. Recall Message button

Click on Click on Recall Message

Select
Sent View
Message

Figure 25. Select Recipients to recall from

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Figure 26. Recall Message report

5 Maintaining Contacts information

The Notes 8 Contacts page uses a Navigation pane and a toolbar like the Notes mail
application (see figure 27). The Action bar provides a quick way to create a new contact,
edit a current contact, and search for specific contacts. The Action bar also lets you
schedule a meeting, send a message, or start a chat by highlighting a contact and
pressing the appropriate button on the Action bar.

Figure 27. Contacts page

Contact
Action Bar

Contacts

5.1 Navigation pane

Lotus Notes 8 can sort your contact information in many of the same ways you were
able to sort your Outlook contacts. The My Contacts view is easily sorted alphabetically,

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by Recent Contacts, by Groups, by categories that you deem important, and by
company. The Navigation pane also lets you sort your contact information by Birthdays
& Anniversaries (see figure 28). All these sorting options also have a variety of viewing
options.

Figure 28. Navigation pane

Navigation Pane

5.2 Creating a New Contact

To create a new contact, click the New button on the Action bar, select Contact, and
then enter all your contact information on the New Contact page (see figure 29). By
clicking the Photo button, you can add a photo of the contact to give you a visual
reminder. You can also create a Contact by adding the sender of an email to the
address book from the context (that is, right-click) menu.

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Figure 29. New Contact page

Click here to insert

Photo in New contact

5.3 Creating a group

Create a group by clicking the New button on the Action bar and entering a group name
and description (see figure 30).

Figure 30. Creating a new group

Click here to
create new Group

To add members to the group, click the Members link (see figure 31) to have ready
access to your contacts and to add them to your group.

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Figure 31. Add Members from address books

Click here to add

members in Group

6 Calendar
Let’s now discuss how the rich calendaring application in Notes 8 helps you manage
your time more effectively.

6.1 Main Calendar page

The Main Calendar page provides a view of your schedule (see figure 32). Like the other
applications we’ve discussed so far, the Navigation pane is along the left side of the
Calendar page. The toolbar is also similar to the other applications and can be
customized to your particular needs. The Navigation pane features a view selection that
can be adjusted to one of five different possible views.

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Figure 32. Main Calendar page

Action Bar
Navigation bar

Meeting Document

TO DO

6.2 Creating a new calendar entry

To create a new calendar entry, click New on the Action bar, select the calendar entry
you want (see figure 33), and then complete the Calendar Entry page (see figure 34).

Figure 33. Creating a new Calendar entry

Click here to create new

Meeting

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Figure 34. New Calendar entry page

Calendar Action Bar

6.3 Quick Check your calendar

With Lotus Notes 8, you are able to check your calendar while you’re scheduling a
meeting. When you click the Check Calendar button from within the Meeting Creation
window, another screen opens displaying your schedule (see figure 35), so that you can
quickly finish the scheduling process.

Figure 35. Check Calendar

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6.4 Checking others’ calendars
Lotus Notes 8 provides a quick and easy way for you to determine if others are available
to attend a meeting or appointment. To do this, after opening a new calendar entry and
entering the names of those you would like to invite, click the Find Available Times tab in
the lower-left of the screen (see figure 36). A coordinated view of schedules for all those
you’ve invited displays.

Figure 36. Find Available Times tab

The green highlighted area is the time you initially proposed. If there is a conflict, the
column will be red, indicating that an attendee has a conflict. To explore different times,
simply click and drag the highlighted area to another time on the schedule. When
everyone is free, the column will turn green.

6.5 Viewing dates in the future

To quickly look at dates in the future, simply click the month or year in the Navigation
pane. You can also click the right and left arrows that surround the month and year in
the calendar to move forward or back one month at a time (see figure 37).

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Figure 37. View future date

Click here to see

future date

7 Preferences
Among the many additional features of Lotus Notes 8 is Preferences. You can access all
preferences settings by selecting File > Preferences from the main menu (see figure 38).

Figure 38. Preferences menu

Click here to open

Preferences

The Preferences screen displays. Here we’ve highlighted the example of the Windows
and Themes option, in which the “Open each document in its own tab” option is selected
(see figure 39).

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Figure 39. Open document in new Window

Window Management

Click here to select

Theme

If you are not sure where to find the preference settings you are looking for, use the new
filtering ability at the top of the list of preferences to quickly pinpoint the preference that
matches your search criteria (see figure 40).

Figure 40. Preferences window

Click here to
search
Preferences

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NOTE: Sections 8—10 below are taken from the IBM Lotus Domino and Notes
Information Center.

8 IBM Lotus Sametime

Lotus Sametime instant messaging software gives you quick and easy access to your
coworkers. It's simple and versatile so that you can work with colleagues in whatever
way suits your needs.

First, you create a contact list that is displayed in the Notes sidebar. A contact list
contains the names of people with which you want to be in touch. From the contact list
you can do the following tasks:

• See each person's availability status, whether the person is online and available,
logged off, and so forth.
• Hover the mouse over a name to see information about that person, including
photograph and telephone number.
• Right-click a name whose status is available to display a menu of tasks that you
can perform for that person.
• Organize the contact list names into groups and lists that are meaningful to you.

9 Widgets and Live Text

The Widgets and Live Text feature enables end users to see and act on automatically
recognized Live Text in a Notes document, using widgets created specifically for their
use. For example, a user can see a specially highlighted Live Text string (for example, a
flight number) and instantly act on it (for example, look up a flight status) by opening a
third-party flight status widget that is linked to that Live Text.

Widgets and Live Text also enables power users and administrators to create and edit
widgets, and deploy them to users to engage a Notes form, view, or document, or third-
party services such as Web page, feed, or Google Gadget™.

10 IBM Lotus Quickr

Lotus Quickr is team collaboration software that’s used to share content. Lotus Quickr
works inside and outside firewalls and is essentially composed of three elements:

• Content stores or repositories, where you store your personal and team
content
• Team Collaboration, which let you store, organize, access, and share content
and team projects
• Connectors, which provide the end user interface to Lotus Quickr content

11 Lotus Notes Help and IBM Support Assistant

Sometimes you need a refresher on how to use certain tools or features and, to that end,
IBM has provided a robust, yet easy-to-navigate, help resource.

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11.1 Using Help
As you work in Lotus Notes 8, your help travels with you. From any application or
screen, you can press F1 and get a list of related help topics. This dynamic and context-
sensitive help gives you the ability to find the information you need when and where you
need it (see figure 41).

Figure 41. Help menu

Click here to get Help

To use help, simply type a descriptive word or two in the Search expressions box, and
Lotus Notes will present you with information related to your search (see figure 42).
Then, click the link for the topic that best describes the type of help you need.

Figure 42. Help window

Search expressions box

11.2 IBM Support Assistant

The IBM Support Assistant, which can be accessed from within Lotus Notes 8, is a self-
help resource center for issues you encounter while using Lotus Notes. The Support

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Assistant can offer a path for rapid submission of problem reports and automate the
collection of diagnostic data, which can speed up the resolution. To access the Support
Assistant, select Help > Support > IBM Support Assistant, from the main menu. You’ll
see the window in figure 43.

Figure 43. IBM Support Assistant window

Click the Search button and enter your topic in the Search field; the results display on a
window as shown in figure 44.

Figure 44. IBM Support Assistant Search output window

12 Conclusion
We’ve explored the features of Lotus Notes 8, comparing the functionality that you are
familiar with in Outlook 2003/2007 with similar functions in Lotus Notes 8. Hopefully, we
have helped you feel comfortable and productive with the Notes 8 client.

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13 Resources
• Refer to the IBM Lotus Domino and Notes Information Center.

• Refer to the training interface, Moving from Microsoft Outlook 2003 to IBM Lotus
Notes 8.

• Read the developerWorks Lotus article, “How to set up IBM Lotus Notes V8 for
Microsoft Outlook users”.
•
Refer to the developerWorks product page for IBM Lotus Notes and Domino.

• Participate in the Notes/Domino 8 Discussion Forum.

14 About the author

Hansraj Mali is a Technical Advisor for the Lotus Domino/Notes Mail & Messaging Team
in the IBM Technical Support Center in Pune, India. He is a Microsoft Certified Trainer
(MCT) and worked extensively with the Microsoft Exchange server before joining IBM in
2005.

The author extends special thanks to Dwight Morse for technically reviewing this paper
and providing valuable feedback.

Trademarks
• Domino, IBM, Lotus, Notes, Quickr, and Sametime are trademarks or registered trademarks
of IBM Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both.
• Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United
States, other countries, or both.
• Java and all Java-based trademarks and logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun
Microsystems, Inc. in the United States, other countries, or both.
• Other company, product, and service names may be trademarks or service marks of others.

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