We’ve been getting increasingly excited about our future for ClearContext Inbox Manager. We posted earlier some of the ideas that we’ve been working on and, based largely on user feedback, we have updated plans for our next major release (v2.0) and beyond. As we have said before, we want to keep our product plans closely aligned with user needs, so we are posting them here for your review and feedback to ensure that we build the best product possible.
We’ve broken this information into a few sections – v2.0, Incremental Features, Future Functionality, & Additional Products:
ClearContext v2.0
The next major release of ClearContext will transform the application from an inbox manager to a fully featured email productivity tool. The major new functionality in this release will accommodate many user requests, including some key features that we believe will further our goal of becoming the silver bullet of Outlook productivity and management.
New Functionality – Email Workflow Processing
Convert to task – create task items from email messages
Convert to a calendar entry
Defer or “Snooze” a message – messages moved out of inbox for specified period
Unified view of related items (email thread, tasks, calendar entries)
Response Management – auto-notification based on reply statusUser Interface/Usability
New View – “Received By” with color-coding and threading
Installed Views – additional downloadable views packaged with installation
AutoAssign functionality integrated with Outlook Rules
Import/Export of ClearContext SettingsPerformance Enhancements/Bug Fixes
Prioritization Optimization
Domain Resolution for Exchange Users
Advanced error handling
Topic DDLB UI Enhancement
Incremental Features
These are additional features under development that we plan to release soon after version 2.0 goes out the door.
Multiple machine support – “Master/Slave” mode
ClearContext functionality in other folders
Topic/Priority sharing in groups
Advanced AutoAssign Rule Management UI
Advanced Reply Management
– Change in priority after reply
– Thread expiration / “unsubscribe” on reply
Topic DDLB Enhancements – Better UI for management of large folder hierarchies
Future Features
These are mainly large new areas of functionality that we will be tackling in future major releases of the software and primarily focus on increased automation of message processing. We have not definitively prioritized these features and encourage discussion/feedback on which of these areas you feel are most important to address.
IMAP Support
Message Content Analysis for Message Function
– AutoAssign Topic, Priority
– Suggest What to Do With Message (Convert to Contact, Create Task)
– Adaptive Learning / A.I.
Automated Attachment Processing (documents, photos, etc.)
Additional Products
These are a few more product ideas we have in our longer-term plans. This list has not changed since our last update. Which of these we focus on will be largely based on user demand.
Corporate/ Exchange Server Integration – Port core Inbox Manager functionality (prioritization, scoring, topics, etc.) to Exchange Server for application on both individual email accounts and on emails/threads across the organization.
Mobile Extension – Port core Inbox Manager functionality to mobile devices to allow functionality such as downloading of only high-priority messages.
Vertical Customization – Job-specific customizations for fields such as Sales, Financial Services, Project Management, etc.
Again, user feedback can and does help us refine our product plans, so if you think we should re-align our priorities, we absolutely want to hear it. You can post feedback here on the weblog or in our forums, or send us a note at support ( at ) clearcontext. com. We will update the plan and provide more concrete timeframes as we integrate your feedback and continue product development.
Details on ClearContext
This is exciting. I’m a die-hard ClearContext user, and these promised features are extremely welcome. If you use Outlook and haven’t tried ClearContext yet, you’re really missing out on a wonderful tool. My two favorite features are the priority…
Posted by Shawn's Thoughts on June 14th, 2005.
I would very much like to see CC support for IMAP folders
Posted by rob Olian on July 4th, 2005.
Thanks for your comments, Rob.
We would very much like to support IMAP as well. It’s on the product plan and it will be done in the future, but it’s not an easy task and requires a major development effort on our part. Unfortunately it won’t make it into the next major release.
We will keep you informed of IMAP’s status (along with other product plan updates) on our weblog and in our forums.
Posted by Brad Meador on July 5th, 2005.
I especially like the plans for the Exchange server and mobile integration. I regularly use a Windows Mobile device and would love to be able to filter the email I receive there by priority or thread or contact.
How will your convert to task or calendar entry functionality differ from what Outlook currently offers?
Posted by Perry on September 27th, 2005.
Thanks for the comments, Perry. We’re adding buttons to our toolbar that allow you to create tasks and calendar items from email. Click the button and we automatically create an item with the contents of the message pasted into it. On save, we can optionally file the original message into your topic folders. The most important advantage here is that the item is then associated with the email conversation. Using another new button, you will be able to view all related items for a given email – the entire email conversation and any tasks and appointments that you generated from the toolbar.
Posted by Brad Meador on September 29th, 2005.
Sounds pretty slick! I can’t wait to try it out.
Posted by Perry Reed on October 10th, 2005.
There’s no rest for the weary: ClearContext v2.x Product Plan
Now that we have v2.0 out the door, it’s time for a product plan update. We have some really exciting things planned for the product in the near future that we’d like to share with you. I also want to
Posted by ClearContext Corporate Weblog on May 8th, 2006.