Ever deleted a recent contact and seen in reappear again when addressing an e-mail? Here is some background and improvements in 8.5.2 Fix Pack 2 and 8.5.3 that will help better manage Recent Contacts.

The Recent Contacts feature keeps names in three places:

• in memory
• in the personal address book (names.nsf)
• in the DIP table under … Notes\data\workspace …

Prior to 8.5.2 Fix Pack 2 deleting a recent contact and emptying trash only deleted from names.nsf not the DIP table.  Beginning in 8.5.2 Fix Pack 2 deleting a recent contact is a hard delete and the DIP table is updated so the address does not return.

Beginning in Notes 8.5.3 there is a new notes.ini variable to purge all recent contacts automatically.  If you set PURGE_RECENT_CONTACTS=1 the client will one time purge all recent contacts.  Once the purge is complete the notes.ini will automatically change to PURGE_RECENT_CONTACTS=0 to prevent purging recent contacts again.

There is also a VB Script that can be used to purge recent contacts on notes 8.5.x and 8.0.x clients.

Technote 1570490: How to purge all Recent Contacts from a Notes 8.5x client

The Lotus Notes 8.x Tips blog has additional tips on Recent Contacts and 8.5.3