A suggested way through a request

Every request in RedactBox goes the same way: upload the mailboxes, triage what is relevant, redact what you approved, then export. The tools in the Tools menu are side roads. Take one when a step gets big, do that part in bulk, then come back to the main route.

This article is the map. Each step has its own article with the detail.

The main route

1. Upload. Add the mailboxes and documents for the request to one project. The files attached to each message are listed under it, and RedactBox sets junk aside for you: logos, pictures from signatures, tiny images, calendar invites, contact cards and copies of the message text.

2. Triage. Go through the messages and Approve, Flag or Trash each one. Each file is a linked attachment and goes with its message: approve a message and its files are in the export, trash it and they are out. (That holds while the project setting Include attached files in exports is on, as it is for a new project.) See 1. Triaging Items.

3. Redact. Review what you approved and cover anything that must not be disclosed. Files in the export are converted to PDF so you can redact them like any other item. A file attached to many messages is kept and redacted once. See 2. Redacting Items.

4. Export. Produce the PDFs and the log. See 3. Exporting Items.

In Triage, a message with files has an arrow in front of its subject and a count after it. Open it to see each file on its own row, with what will happen to it.

Most small requests need nothing else. You only decide on a file when it should not go with its message.

When to branch off

Every tool is in the Tools menu at any step. Each one answers a single question, and a decision made in a tool shows on the rows under each message, and the other way round.

One file on many messages, or 50+ files

Open Tools › Attachments. It lists each file once, however many messages it is attached to, so a newsletter sent to 200 parents is one row and one decision. It is also kept once: the other 199 copies are left out as duplicates automatically. Leave a file out everywhere, or keep it even where its messages were trashed. See Using the Attachments tool.

With a handful of files, stay in Triage. Each file row offers the one action that fits: Leave out under an approved message, Keep file under a trashed one.

The same name in many items

Use People and identifiers, Search & Redact or Word Lists instead of redacting item by item. They redact everywhere at once, and converted files are covered too: RedactBox applies those redactions to each file as it is converted.

Before you export

Open Tools › Stats and read the Attachments section. It says what is in, what is left out, how many files are kept once, and what could not be converted. Anything that could not be converted or prepared is not in the export, so deal with it before you send. See Project Stats.

What carries over between steps

• One set of decisions. A file's decision is the same on its row, on its tab, in Tools › Attachments and in Stats. Change it in one place and the others follow.

• Redactions reach the files. What you redact with Search & Redact, Word Lists or People is applied to converted files automatically. Patterns are the exception: run a pattern again after files have converted.

• The export counts files separately. Before you export, the plan shows the split under Review coverage, for example 73 items in this export and, under it, 36 messages + 37 attached files. Each file is counted once, however many messages carry it.

• You can go back. Nothing locks when you move on. If Stats shows a problem, fix it in the tool it points to and return to Export.

Example: a school SAR

A parent asks for everything the school holds about their son, Sam, in Year 9. The deadline is a month away.

1. Upload. The Data Protection Lead uploads the mailboxes of the head of year, the SENCo and the school office: 6,200 messages. The school logo in every signature is set aside as junk straight away.

2. Triage. She searches for Sam's name and approves the 340 messages that are about him. The rest are trashed. Their files go with them.

3. Branch off: Tools › Attachments. Sorted by Most attached first, the top file is the Year 9 trip letter, attached to 186 messages. It is already kept once, with 185 copies left out as duplicates, but it is a template with nothing about Sam, so she chooses Leave out. One decision covers all 186.

4. Branch off: People. She redacts the other pupils and parents named across the project. The converted files pick up the same redactions.

5. Redact. She reads through the approved messages and the converted files, adding the few redactions the tools could not know about.

6. Before export: Stats › Attachments. The status line says one file in the export needs a password. She asks the SENCo for an unlocked copy, uploads it as a document, and leaves the locked file out.

7. Export. The plan reads 340 messages + 41 attached files. She exports and sends the response.