How to Delete Duplicate Contacts in Lotus Notes?
Introduction
Lotus Notes, an email client, uses NSF as its storage pool where all the information associated with a Notes account gets stored. names.nsf contains personal address book information of each account like contacts, connections, locations etc. Many a times, duplicate contacts are generated in NSF files of multiple Notes accounts of the employees working in same organization consuming the unnecessary space of Lotus notes Storage. The page will be highlighting the ways on how to remove duplicate contacts in Lotus Notes.
How duplicate contacts are generated?
A Lotus Notes user faces problems when several duplicate contacts are generated in the address book. Some ways that lead to the generation of duplicate contacts are as follows:
When two or more (names.nsf) NSF files of a single account of Lotus Notes are merged to create a single NSF file, it may generate duplicate contacts.
When the address book of ex-employee is imported to another employee’s address book working in the same organization, duplicate contacts may be created.
When the names.nsf file, which is downloaded as an attachment in the Lotus Notes account is synchronized with the contacts already present in the address book, duplicity is likely to occur.
How to Delete Duplicate Contacts in Lotus Notes
Managing the address book of a Lotus Notes account is tough if the contacts file is large. In addition, duplicate contacts that are generated unintentionally, occupy unwanted space that may make the performance rate of Lotus Notes slow. Some of the methods to remove duplicate contacts in Lotus Notes account are:
Manual Method to Remove Duplicate Contacts in Lotus Notes
One of the manual methods is to select the duplicate contact individually and delete them to save space. This option is not feasible when there is large number of contacts present in a single account as it may consume lot of time. Another option to find the duplicate contacts and delete them is by running Lotus scripts in the Domino agent written by Purna. However, these manual methods do not give satisfactory results and it is very difficult for non-technical person to use the scripts.
Alternate Option for Removing Duplicate Contacts From Lotus Notes
The most effective way to remove the redundant contacts easily from the NSF files is by using a third party software tool like NSF Merge. The software merges multiple names.nsf files and generates a single NSF file after comparing the duplicate contact within the files and removing the same contacts. In case of emails also, the tool remove duplicate email from Lotus Notes NSF Files.
The software can combine several NSF files of many Lotus Notes accounts at a time, search for duplicate contacts among them, and generate a new NSF file removing the duplicate contacts. The software will first give options to add NSF file either by file or folder. The user needs to tick the checkbox for Remove duplicate if he/she wants the duplicate contacts to be removed among the multiple NSF files. The destination path where the result will be stored is specified by the user. The tool will give the new NSF file where all the contacts from different names.nsf files will be stored without any duplicate contacts. And additional benefit is you can remove duplicate email in Lotus Notes.