WHAT IS A “REVIEW PST” STATUS BAR? WHAT DO I DO?

The “REVIEW pst” status will sometimes appear, under specific circumstances described below, after a complex pst is uploaded into Discovery Genie. This status bar alerts you that a pst was received that contains multiple subfolders, and (a) notifies you which ones contain emails that the Genie may process, and (b) assists you in processing the folders you select.

Discovery Genie displays the “REVIEW pst” status when the pst you have uploaded includes unusable data. Instead of simply rejecting your folder, or giving you an annoying error message, the Genie provides the “REVIEW pst” feature to help you move forward with your job, even though the pst file contains unusable data

WHAT IS A PST, AND WHY DOES IT SOMETIMES HAVE MULTIPLE SUBFOLDERS?

A pst is a file type developed by Microsoft that contains email and other data used by Outlook. Unlike many other mail clients, however, Outlook integrates numerous features (calendar, notes, to-do lists, meeting invitations, contacts, etc.) that are not, per se, emails. Many of the types of data Outlook handles cannot be produced like an email. However, Outlook permits the user to attach various types of data to different records throughout Outlook—for example, a user can attach an email to a Contact. As a result, a pst file may have different types of data in each component of its file structure—for example, a “Contacts” subfolder of a pst could contain emails attached to a Contact within Outlook. A pst file can be very complex, and can hold, for example, multiple inboxes, sent folders, contact lists, to-do lists, etc.

WHAT DOES DISCOVERY GENIE DO WITH PSTS?

Discovery Genie does not process pst files directly. Rather, the Genie converts the pst file uploaded by a user into a different type of file called an mbox, which is a standard format used for handling emails—and which may be produced as emails and attachments in discovery. When the Genie converts the pst, it searches for emails (or anything that can be converted into an mbox), and converts the usable data it finds from each subfolder into a separate mbox. If the original pst folder is complex, the Genie may create multiple mbox files, each containing the email data from the original pst subfolder.

The “REVIEW pst” status bar appears when a complex pst is converted, and usable data is found in more than one subfolder from the pst. When you click the “REVIEW pst” bar, the Genie will display the subfolders that were successfully converted into mbox files, and allow you to proceed with processing any of the converted mbox files you choose. In some cases, you may elect not to process one or more of the subfolders, such as the contents of a “Drafts” subfolder (which typically contains draft emails that were not sent), or the contents of a “Contacts” subfolder (which generally contains only emails attached to a specific person in your contact list). However, you are in control, and you may choose which mbox files you want to process through Discovery Genie—you can always designate any unwanted emails or attachments as “irrelevant” if you do not want it included in the scope of your production.

WHAT DO I DO?

If you see the “REVIEW pst” status bar in a job, just click on it to display the available mbox files, and then follow the prompts to proceed.

HOW CAN I AVOID PSTS THAT HAVE UNUSABLE DATA?

You can control what goes into your pst. If you export a single email folder from Outlook following the Genie’s instructions, the resulting pst will only contain the emails and attachments from that folder, without any unusable data. To ensure no unusable data is included accidentally, be sure to uncheck the box that says “include subfolders” when you export your pst. If you encounter the “REVIEW pst” status bar, chances are someone converted an entire Outlook profile, including all of the email files, contacts, to-do list, and everything else, into a single pst. When this happens, the resulting pst will hold data that simply cannot be processed as emails—so rather than reject your job, the Genie runs the “REVIEW pst” feature to move forward with the email data that is contained in the pst.