Along with the v5.1 release, we have updated most of our online help. We’ll be posting over the coming weeks.
With ClearContext, you’re just minutes away from automatically keeping all your email, tasks, and projects organized using the folders and filing system you already use! These 4 simple steps will get you started – ClearContext will take care of the rest! If you haven’t done so already, download and install ClearContext here.
File Messages to Suggested Folders
ClearContext automatically suggests the right folders to file messages to based on your past email. Click File Msg to file that folder or the down arrow to see more suggestions.
Clear Your Inbox
Click Defer to move messages out of your Inbox for a specified time. They will return to your Inbox, unread, at the time you choose. Unsubscribe from unwanted email conversations. Future messages in this thread will be moved to the Unsubscribed folder.
Create Tasks and Appointments Click Task and Schedule on the ClearContext toolbar to turn email into tasks or appointments. If you haven’t assigned a project name to the email already, ClearContext will prompt you to select one.
Organize Tasks
Click Organize Tasks in the Dashboard to easily organize all your tasks. Select a bunch of overdue tasks in the Date tab to re-assign their due dates, then go to the Project tab and hit Assign Project to make tasks part of a project.
View Your Projects
Now go to the ClearContext Dashboard sidebar in your inbox. Select Active Projects to see a summary of your projects and upcoming tasks/appointments. Click on a project name to switch to the Project Dashboard for detailed project information.
ClearContext learns where you file email from specific people and threads then automatically creates projects for those folders to keep all your project email, tasks, appointments, and notes organized. Just follow the simple steps above and ClearContext will keep you on top of everything you need to get done in Outlook!
View a video demonstration of these concepts here.
Posted by brad at 10:59 am on July 7th, 2010.
Categories: product, tips.
“What we don’t see clearly is that we do damage to our reputations and to our time management systems when we don’t manage individual habits. A bad habit that becomes a ritual can drag down our productivity, without our knowing it.”
“Taming email means training the senders to put the burden of quality back on themselves. What’s the best way to train everyone around you to better email habits? You guessed it: You go first. Set the example, be the role model. Demonstrate a policy for a month, and if people like it, ask them to start doing the same.”
Posted by brad at 4:43 pm on January 28th, 2010.
Categories: infomania, tips.
“To truly get a handle on your email communication, you need to have a goal of emptying your inbox regularly. When asked why they do it, most people who keep everything in their inbox respond with, “I can’t delete it; what if I need it?”
The problem with this kind of thinking is that it doesn’t scale. If you are only receiving 5 email messages per day, then sure, you can probably keep everything in your inbox and find the items you need when you need them. But if you start receiving 50 email messages per day, that gets a lot harder, very quickly. I would argue that even if you only receive 5 emails per day, you should still empty your inbox as a habit, because your email volume will invariably increase over time. Good habits are just as hard to break as bad ones are, so instill good ones now.
Happy New Year from the ClearContext team! Thanks so much to everyone who has upgraded to v5!
There are a number of big changes in ClearContext v5. This post provides information about these changes, links to relevant forum discussions, and a little bit about what we’re working on now. We hope this will post will answer your questions about v5 and help you get the most out of the software.
We’ve posted a list of changes in v5 on the upgrade page, along with a little more detail in this blog post. We’ve also (mostly) updated the User Guide.
Key changes in v5
Multi-machine support – if you run Outlook on multiple machines, you can now run ClearContext on all of them at the same time!
Multi-mail file support – you can now file to as many different Outlook mail files as you want – see point 7
2010 Support – v5.0 provides provisional support for the Outlook 2010 x86 beta. We’re working on 64-bit support.
Smarter threading – v5 takes advantage of Outlook’s conversation ID where available to more accurately connect related messages
Message Prioritization – Known and important messages are now marked with “CC OK” or “CC VIP” categories. Set ClearContext >Options >Configuration to use icons or flags for prioritization.
Contact Prioritization – Click the Mark Important button on contact records to highlight emails from that person as important.
Views – Outlook color categories now take the place of the old ClearContext inbox views, but we’ve provided 3 color-coded inbox views for people who prefer them. See this forum thread for discussion and to offer suggestions on specific ways you’d like to have v5 organize and display your email.
Options – some options in v5 can be configured to work more like v4 if that’s better suited for your personal workflow. Details here.
Coming in v5.1 and v5.2
Some v4 features are being redesigned for v5 and will be in later 5.x releases.
FolderContext – The Project Dashboard displays all information that was in the v4 FolderContext. This functionality will be redesigned for the 5.1 release.
Delete upon reply – we’re planning to add this feature to v5.1. Please add any thoughts/suggestions about how you’d like it to work in this forum thread.
File topic – we’re planning to add this feature to v5.1. Please add any thoughts/suggestions about how you’d like it to work in this forum thread.
Notification Managers – Existing Notification Managers will still function, but you can’t edit or create new ones in v5.0. This functionality is being redesigned to be more powerful and easier to use along with AutoAssign for v5.2.
Alerts – v5.0 does not include Alerts. This functionality is being redesigned along with Notification Managers and AutoAssign for v5.2.
IMAP – We are currently working on IMAP support and will post an update on progress prior to 5.1 release. We hope to have some level of IMAP support in 5.1, but we won’t know for certain until we get deeper into testing.
Office 2010 x64 – similar to IMAP, we hope to support this in 5.1, but we won’t know for certain until we get deeper into testing.
As we’ve written previously, v5.1 will be focused on improved project management and dashboard capabilities, with a new flexible project dashboard UI integrated even more tightly into Outlook. And v5.2 will focus on comprehensive automated filing to process your newsletters, notifications, and other bulk email with quick setup and reporting capabilities
We’re very excited about v5 and look forward to all your feedback to help make our upcoming releases as close to perfect as possible! Thanks!
The Succeed step of the ClearContext Daily Workflow is the ultimate goal of the process. You've identified your priorities for the day and have managed your Inbox. Now, throughout the day, succeed by focusing on your work rather than your email:
Turn off new mail notifications via Do Not Disturb so that you can work on your tasks without interruption.
Open the ClearContext Dashboard and select a project to work on via the Topic drop down. Work on your most important tasks for the project.
To stay on top of email throughout the day, sort your Inbox by priority (ClearContext > Inbox Views) and review only your highest priority messages (in red and blue) as needed.
Use the MessageContext to see emails, appointments and other related tasks to get the full context for the item you are working on.
One note on the Prioritized step above – if you look at a message during this phase, make sure that you act on any message you open just as you would in the manage phase. You should strive to only touch an Inbox message once.
By completing the Identify and Manage steps previously, you are free to focus on the work that is most important to you while staying in control of your email.
Posted by brad at 10:25 am on September 11th, 2009.
Categories: ims, succeed, tips.
Once you have finished identifying the day's priorities, move on to the Manage phase of the ClearContext Daily Workflow. Twice daily (or some other specified interval based on email response time requirements), starting with your highest priority email first, quickly act on each Inbox message or determine when you want to act on it:
Act Immediately?
If the message doesn't have a Topic assigned to it, assign one. IMS will link all future emails, tasks and appointments to this Topic.
Reply to the message if you can do so in a minute or two. IMS can automatically file the original message to a Topic folder for you.
Delegate the email to someone else as appropriate.
If the message doesn't have a Topic assigned to it, assign one. IMS will link all future emails, tasks and appointments to this Topic.
Defer messages that you aren't ready to deal with to a later date.
Create a task from email that requires further action on your part.
Schedule appointments from messages that require a meeting.
No action required?
Unsubscribe from mailing lists or long email threads that you have no interest in.
Delete messages that you don't need to keep for archiving purposes.
This phase is the bridge that moves you from sizing up your day to working on your most important projects. Consider it blocking and tackling – quickly and efficiently move through your Inbox and put messages onto your calendar or your task list. The end result will be a cleared Inbox and a prioritized task list, allowing you to focus on your work rather than your email.
Posted by brad at 8:21 am on September 10th, 2009.
Categories: ims, manage, tips.
Taking this time in the morning to get your priorities in place is the key to a productive day. Before you move on to manage your Inbox for the first time, work on one or two of your most important tasks.
Posted by brad at 10:15 am on September 9th, 2009.
Categories: identify, ims, tips.
File Messages to Suggested Folders
to see more suggestions.
Click Organize Tasks in the Dashboard to easily organize all your tasks. Select a bunch of overdue tasks in the Date tab to re-assign their due dates, then go to the Project tab and hit Assign Project to make tasks part of a project.
View Your Projects
Now go to the ClearContext Dashboard sidebar in your inbox. Select Active Projects to see a summary of your projects and upcoming tasks/appointments. Click on a project name to switch to the Project Dashboard for detailed project information. 
Once you have finished 
The first step in the 
