Simply finding files can become difficult. Did I save that file in an email? The file server? On my local C: drive? Each one of those systems has its own way to search, but what happens when you need to search them all? X1 Technologies, Inc. (at http://www.x1.com) is determined to provide you the answer with its X1 Desktop Search.

X1 Desktop Search is a smart client that can index all of the files on your machine: your Lotus Notes, Outlook or Eudora email, Lotus Notes Contacts, and even your mapped network file shares.

The breadth of X1's search capabilities is a definite boon to those using Lotus Notes. The ability to index email, as well as the support for the local Personal Address Book have made X1 a fairly thorough search client.

Installation
The installation and setup of X1 Desktop Search is simple. Simply run the executable and follow the default prompts.

When the install finishes, the little animated instruction screen shown in Figure A pops up to show you how to do the basic functions within X1. This was a nice touch, and something I'd like to see other companies follow X1's lead on.

FIGURE A


This little tutorial helps you get started quickly. Roll over picture for a larger image.

Once you are finished with the mini-tutorial, you can click the Finish Installation button and X1 will ask to reboot your machine.

Upon reboot, X1 asks for your Lotus Notes password and includes an option of "Automatically sign in." Doing so makes sure that it doesn't ask you for your password every time X1 starts up.

Once you've entered your password, X1 goes to work indexing your system. My test system took 17 minutes to index over 120,000 files and emails. The indexing went on in the background with no noticeable performance hit.

Once the indexing was complete, X1 was ready to roll.

The client
The X1 Desktop Search interface defaults to a list of files (or emails) in the left hand pane with a preview pane on the right side of the screen, as shown in Figure B. Choosing something in the left pane will quickly show the corresponding preview on the right side of the screen.

FIGURE B


The X1 client has a two-paned screen. Roll over picture for a larger image.

Pictures, documents and emails all preview almost immediately. Choosing an audio file will pull up an in-line plug-in based on Windows Media Player. Even zip files will show up in their appropriate file structure. Once you view a zipped file, you can even extract the contents. This can keep you from having to shell out for another third party product to handle your file archives.