Moving from Lotus Notes to Outlook

May 9, 2005 3:39 AM

I am changing jobs, and moving from a Lotus Notes environment to an exclusively Microsoft Outlook environment (I will have no choice). How can I transfer my contacts/addresses/calendar and journal notes between the two environments?

I use Lotus Notes V6 at my current job, and have stored 7 years worth of contacts in my personal address book, plus calendar information running till at least the end of 2006.

My new job will have Outlook (2003 I guess) - I have only had a brief flirtation with Outlook at home (before moving to my current Thunderbird configuration) - so I know that the first step will be to installed Outlook at home so I can do the transfer PRIOR to my end date.

I don't have a PDA - but have access to USB keys etc.

Are there any tools, tips, tricks, tutorials for moving from Notes to Outlook? Or is there a place on the web that I can sync all of my info to - that will allow me to sync back to Outlook in the future?

NOTE - My technical skills are only as a reasonable able user - I would prefer not to have to code my solution if possible!

posted by mattr to computers & internet (5 comments total)

Outlook will import Lotus files provided the necessary translators are installed to import files from Lotus Notes 4.x and 5.x (at least, that's what my Outlook tells me, there's no mention of 6.x). You could phone ahead and ask them. Unfortunately I do not have these translators installed so I can't give you more specific information on file types, but I am guessing they cater for at least whatever is the default/most common.

The Microsoft website gives more information.
posted by nthdegx at 4:18 AM on May 9, 2005

Quick answer: File > Import and Export..., then follow the steps in the Wizard. Make sure you know the location of your Lotus Notes files.
posted by Doohickie at 4:57 AM on May 9, 2005

I'm using Notes 6 right now. I just went into my address book and I went under File > Export. It gave me the option to export in Lotus 123, Tabular Text, Structured Text, and two VCard formats. I would export in the latest VCard format onto a place on your hard drive where you'll find your information again. Try making a folder called OUTLOOKEXPORT or something like that on your desktop or C:\

Also, do a search on your drives for a file called "names.nsf" and copy it to your export folder as well. Notes stores address book data in that file.

Calendar export options were all the above minus the VCard formats. I would try exporting in all of them to different files. Make sure the file names are meaningful, like "Calendar_Tabular" or "Calendar_Structured".

Put your folder with all your files on a USB drive.

Outlook has an import feature that will get your data in one way or another. It doesn't hurt to have all your Notes information in a few different formats just in case Outlook won't import from one of them.

If these things make you too nervous, try speaking to the IT guy at your office to help you out. I'm one of those guys and I do this kind of stuff often.
posted by redteam at 7:56 AM on May 9, 2005

Tabular text or comma delimited is always a good way to go because it is human readable. At the worst you could pay some poor student to type all the stuff back in. Plus you know it'll be importable by anything that allows for importing.
posted by Mitheral at 9:19 AM on May 9, 2005

Pretty sure you can just use the export function to create a .csv file, which is easily imported into Outlook.
posted by suchatreat at 11:02 AM on May 9, 2005