Here are the release notes for Advanced interface versions 1.7.003 and 1.7.004, currently available on ContactOffice servers. Display most hours of the day in the Calendar We received feedback about the Advanced interface calendar displaying “less content” than its Classic interface counterpart: some events are not displayed in the visible part of the Calendar. Of course, you can display them by scrolling up and down. In other words, events taking place in the first or last hours of the day are not displayed immediately. This is because of the calendar grid resolution. The “60 minutes” option was lacking in the Advanced interface Calendar preferences and is now available. Using this setting, each calendar cell will cover an entire hour, whereas the default setting is 30 minutes. Take a look at the screenshots below. They belong to the same ContactOffice account. Calendar with 30 minutes grid resolution (default setting):

Calendar with 60 minutes grid resolution:

Improvements to the “Infos” tab “Infos” is a special tab that you can see just after logging in. It appears only if you belong to at least one group. Its purpose is to allow group administrators and co-administrators to display a message to group members. We’ve fixed a bug preventing the Infos content to appear when the account was member of a large number of groups. Besides, if a group has no Infos available, it is now completely hidden in the Infos tab in order to gain space.

More languages for Contacts The Advanced interface is available in English, French, Dutch and Portuguese. You can now select not yet translated languages (Dutch, Italian, Spanish, Swedish and Finnish) when you create or edit Contacts. As system-generated e-mails (meetings and meeting polls invitations, reminders, etc.) are already translated, these contacts will get the e-mails in their own language.

After 10 years of good service, the previous version just retired today as ContactOffice launched its new website. So long old chap, you did a good job. From now, users logging on http://www.contactoffice.com will be prompted the Advanced interface, now selected by default. The Advanced interface benefits from all the new features while the Classic interface doesn’t. In addition, the Classic interface is not maintained anymore and will disappear one day. So now, use the Advanced interface instead. If you can’t get rid of the classic interface, just check “classic interface” under the “ENTER” button on the login page. We look forward to your feedback on facebook, twitter or on our blog. CO

Using multiple email accounts at the same time Almost everybody has at least one private and one professional email address. When you use ContactOffice as default professional email address (ex: me@contactoffice.com), you can also consolidate your other private (and professional) email accounts in ContactOffice’s interface in order to have all your mails in one singe interface. This can be done either by downloading your external emailaccounts in Pop3 or viewing them through our IMAP client. In addition, for each email account created, ContactOffice allows to set up a different signature. Finally, ContactOffice will automatically select the correct email address used in any discussion when you reply to an email.

Contextual help for each function There are two user modes: “Beginner Mode” and “Expert Mode”. They can be defined in the general preferences. The “beginner mode” shows for certain functionnalities a question mark button with some extra information about this functionnality which is visilble through ‘mouse over’. This ‘Contextual help’ option can be activated or de-activated at any moment.

Writing emails, checking your calendar and uploading documents at the same time Sometimes you want to suggest a meeting when writing an email to someone and you don’t remember your available time slots. In addition, you might want to upload a document into your private or group storage space but you can’t because you are busy in the email tool. Tip: press “ctrl+t” and a new Tab will appear in your browser. Open your virtual office by typing its URL (ex: http://www.contactoffice.com). Because you are already logged in in the first tab, your account will open automatically in the second tab. There you will be able to open other tools: your calendar for example. Using such Tabs allow you to have several tools open at the same time within the same browser and will allow you to switch easily from one tool to the other one.

Here are the release notes for Advanced interface versions 1.7.001 and 1.7.002, currently available on ContactOffice servers. Calendar: “Working week” view We added the Working week view, so that you can focus on week days (Monday to Friday). This view is also useful on smaller screens. Click on the new tab to activate this view. If you would like your Calendar to open automatically in Working week view, go to the Calendar Preferences and change the “Start page” preference to “Working week”. Moving a large number of items Drag and drop is fun but sometimes you need to move dozens, hundreds or even thousands of items. This version introduces a “Move” feature in Messages, Documents, Bookmarks and Notes. In Messages, you can easily clean up your Inbox by moving messages received before some date to an archive folder. You can also move selected items or all items from one folder to another. Maybe it’s a good idea to clean up your inbox (or sent items folder) a bit at the beginning of the year. Other improvements:

Meeting polls: as first improvement to our latest tool designed to easily find a date and time convenient for a series of participants, we added to possibility to send the invitation mail again, in case some participants would forget to answer your meeting poll. Messages: you could already choose the default font. You can now choose the default font size altogether. These two options make sense only for HTML messages. Calendar: optional confirmation for drag and drop. Activate this option in the Calendar Preferences if you would like to get a confirmation message each time you move an event with drag and drop. Groups: the members list now displays who is a group co-administrator. A group co-administrator helps the group administrator in the group rights management. For more details, see online help. The Fax and Synchro help pages were missing in the Advanced interface set of tools, although these features were still available.

Here are the release notes for Advanced interface version 1.6.008, currently available on ContactOffice servers. Automatic signature In the Messaging Preferences, you could already set a signature for each of your sender addresses. From now on, you can also activate an automatic signature. The appropriate signature will be automatically inserted at the bottom of all new e-mails, including replies and forwards. In case you select another sender address in the pull-down menu, the signature is automatically changed. If you would like to send a particular e-mail without your signature, select “Disable” from the “Signature menu”. If you have not activated the automatic signature, you can insert it anytime at the bottom of the message or at the cursor position. The latter possibility seems to be a ContactOffice exclusive. Other improvements:

Messaging: Hyperlinks in HTML messages are opened in a new window. Messaging: The e-mail window is now bigger. Messaging: When you answer an HTML e-mail, you can now enter your own content in the midst of the original text. Messaging: Filters using a size condition are now correctly saved. Note: the unit is the KB. So, if you want to create a filter for 5 MB or more messages, you have to enter the following value: 5120 (as 5 * 1024 = 5120). Calendar: many descriptions improvements: the full description is displayed in the event preview, the description is also displayed in day view and the long descriptions can be read by participants using Internet Explorer. Calendar: the layers are now ordered by name. Wiki: A Wiki page being a Document, you had to manage the Access rights from the Documents tool. Now, just select “Properties” from the “Edit” menu in the Wiki to display the Access rights immediately. Contacts: the autosuggest feature now takes a contact rename operation into account.

Hi, Paris was the third stop for CloudStorm and followed a successful launch in Brussels in early September and an event in London in October. The CloudStorm event gives its visitors the chance to quickly understand both technical and business benefits of cloud solutions directly from the vendor and to meet after their presentatoins. Once again, CloudStorm was a great succes. View our presentation online: ContactOffice Presentation Cloudstorm Paris

The next editions of the CloudStorm event will take place in Amsterdam, Germany, Madrid… free attendance. More info on http://www.cloudstorm.org Pictures from this event are available on our Facebook Page

Bonjour, Paris était le troisième arrêt pour CloudStorm et a suivi un lancement réussi à Bruxelles début Septembre et un événement à Londres en Octobre. L’événement CloudStorm donne la possibilité à ses visiteurs de comprendre rapidement les avantages techniques et commerciaux de “cloud solutions” directement auprès du fournisseur et de les rencontrer après leurs présentations. Une fois de plus, CloudStorm a été un grand succès. Visionnez notre présentation en ligne: ContactOffice Presentation Cloudstorm Paris

Les prochaines éditions de CloudStorm auront lieu à Amsterdam, en Allemagne, à Madrid… entrée libre. Plus d’informations sur http://www.cloudstorm.org Les photos de cet événement sont disponibles sur notre Page Facebook

ContactOffice recently launched its auto suggestion feature which is really helpful by suggesting email names that are similar to what you’re typing. A couple of keystrokes, an auto-complete suggestion, and you don’t have to type the entire email name every time. It is both simple and handy. The ContactOffice application recognizes any address in your private addressbook. If the written email address is not correct, it will be displayed in red. If it is correct, it will be displayed in blue. In the future, group email addresses and sent email addresses will also be recognized.

Because a file is quite large or because some servers limit the size of incoming e-mails to a very low value, sometimes you just can’t e-mail a file to someone. In other cases, the recipient’s mailbox is almost full and won’t accept a large file… Instead of sending the Document in the e-mail itself, you can send it as an hyperlink by selecting “Document as hyperlink” from the “Attach” menu when you compose an e-mail. The recipient will have a few days to download it by clicking on the hyperlink and you will be notified when he does.

Alternatively, you can start in the Documents tool and select “Send as hyperlink” from a Document contexual menu (right click). This new feature is handy for large documents but you can use it with small ones as well. It is available for paying subscriptions in the Advanced interface.

Not easy to find a date when more than two people are involved! The meeting poll feature (aka “meeting maker”) allows you to gather participants votes on a selection of dates and times. It is much easier to find a schedule that is convenient for all or most participants.

Participants don’t have to own a virtual office account. However, they must be in a private or group addressbook because you will select them from there. Once the final date has been chosen, the meeting will appear in the virtual office calendar. This feature is automatically available for all subscriptions in the Advanced interface. However, the number of simultaneous polls, participants and dates depend on your subscription. To create a new meeting poll, select “Meeting poll” from the “New” menu.

Tons of fixes and enhacements :

NEW Contextual help contents NEW Messaging - Mailing lists FIX Mail proxy: read messages are not set as read on the server FIX Mail proxy: disable unavailable features FIX Common : Share with groups: allow the operation for the owner only FIX Common : The contextal refresh action on groups folder must update the subfolders FIX Common : Refresh action available for all folders FIX Common : Constraint dialog in client window FIX Common : Editing the right of group object : the corresponding group members folder has to be selected by default FIX Common : Refresh action available for all folders FIX Common : COMessageBox: escape and enter keys are not handled FIX Common : Some buttons are cropped on the left and right FIX Groups : Group member selection was not well working FIX Groups : Refresh issue when coming back to the group tool FIX Groups : Search results are not displayed if member of no groups FIX Groups : Group Rights property dialog : only show the selected group in the tree FIX Documents: Can’t change document name and document description in a single operation FIX Documents : Private URL is not refreshed FIX Document : Public access URL is not displayed immediately FIX Messaging : Search results: can’t move a mail to the trash with contextual menu FIX Messaging : Preview pane: message headers disappear on next message if minimized FIX Messaging : Attachments: display contextual menu with right click FIX Messaging : Mailing lists : Can’t create more than one list in a session FIX Messaging - Filters: do not display notifiy by SMS action if SMS is not available FIX Messaging: Window too large if reply with plenty of recipients in IE FIX Messaging : Disable “new message from template” menuitem if there are no templates UPD AddressBook : Search area should be opened by default FIX AddressBook : display problem with Safari UPD Events : attachment panel UI enhancement UPD Events : display an attachment icon FIX Event : Doubble click to edit an event FIX Contacts : splitter was hidden when returning from another context FIX Contacts : SearchPanel is now always displayed FIX Forum : Recent messages: display problem FIX Forum : Refresh FIX Wiki : The Wiki menu ‘Browse’ has no effect FIX SMS / AddressBook : Cannot paste a phone number

After many requests from users, our technical team has developed a brand new function in the mail tool: a IMAP client (Internet Message Access Protocol).

In fact, IMAP is a protocol used by any mail servers active for the reception. This protocol allows leaving e-mails on the server in order to consult them with different e-mails client or webmail.

With this new IMAP client, you will be able to “synchronise” different mailbox with only one interface much easier and more transparently than with the POP protocol.Just enter your email address, the server name, your login and your password in the appropriate windows and enjoy.

Check out the availability of this functionality first on your subscription and try it on the new interface from now.

ContactOffice vision is to offer one central online storage place for all your personal data such as calendar, documents, contacts,… In line with cloud computing, we believe that there is an ever-increasing need to be able access one’s data from any computer or terminal (smartphone, PDA,…). People are on the move and have their data on different devices. That’s is why we have developped import and export modules for all our tools. We want our users to be able to as easily import their data from any tool as export them.
Our calendar for example can be accessed through different browsers, synchronised with outlook or PDA’s and smartphones. You can get notifications through SMS or RSS, you can access it via a calendar client in ICal on a personal URL, you can layer it with external calendars published in ICal and finally you can import or export it in iCal, vCal or a printable PDF file. Our contacts can be accessed through different browsers, synchronised with outlook or PDA’s and smartphones, imported from Outlook Express, Outlook 2000, Outlook 98, Outlook 97, vCard, LDIF (compatible with Netscape, Mozilla and Thunderbird), CSV. Finally you can export it to vCard for Outlook (Hey, they have their own vCard standard??? ;-) ), vCard (standard) and CSV (comma seperated value). Our documents tools is even more amazing. Not only can you access all the documents in ContactOffice from your browser. You can also be notified through mail or RSS. In addition our document server is also a WebDAV server, which means you can access the documents through your file manager as if they were documents stored on a local file server. You can then just drag and drop them from your hard disk to the ContactOffice server via your local filemanager. Our documents are now also an FTP server allowing you to access them through an FTP client. Finally we developped both a webdav and just released a CIFS / SMB client. Users can now access locally stored documents (on a local file server) through the browser interface of ContactOffice when they are on the move. For more in depth information on the Webdav or the CIFS / SMB protocol follow the links to wikipedia.
More about our attachment to standards and access modes in a following post.

Our new beta interface based on Ajax technology keeps on improving and is looking oh so slick. One of the recent novelties is the possibility to create multiple signatures for your email. This allows you to have a signature for each emailaddress that you use.
In addition you can now use a rich text editor in order to give a layout to your signatures. Check it out.

ContactOffice has just released in beta an integration of the Zoho tools including Writer, Sheet and Show. They are Web-based tools and allow you to create, edit, and access your spreadsheets, docs and presentations files from anywhere without the need of having these applications installed on your pc. All documents edited by these tools remain stored in your environement. For traditional interface users, just click on ‘Actions’ near a document and then ‘Edit’. For the advanced interface users (aka beta interface), right click on a .doc, .xls or .ppt document and select ‘Edit with Zoho’. Note : this feature is only offered to paying subscribers. Enjoy.

Having problems with a shared document that is in a format that you cannot open. Or… are you on a machine that does not have the right software to open a specific document of yours? Well as from now you can use our .PDF converter in the documents tool. You just need to ‘click right’ on a document that you would like to open and choose the function ‘View as PDF’. Your document will be converted to an Acrobat (.pdf) file. The following formats are being supported: “doc”, “txt”, “rtf”, “ppt”, “xls”, “odt”, “sxw”, “ods”, “sxc”, “csv”, “odp”, “sxi” Attention: This function is available for paying subscriptions only and must be accessed through the new Ajax interface. Enjoy ;-)

Dear users, We released this morning the capability for all users to easily switch from the classic interface to the new Ajax/GWT interface. This new interface provides a brand new way to present your data, including drag and drop features and much more. See previous posts for more release details.

The release 1.2.003 of the beta is out (.fr users click here).

Beta 1.2.003 is minor release, introducing :

Access to WebDAV remote document stores Wrong access rights for group documents Authorization exception while accessing members directory in addressbooks

As we mentioned in a previous post our very own Luc Claes was selected to Speak at JavaOne. The presentation will take place next week May 6-9 in San Francisco. JavaOne is a leading industry event; a 4-day conference filled with technical sessions, hands-on labs and lots of educational (Bookstore, Java University, …) and networking opportunities. In case you want to learn more about the session check out this link If you want to hook up with Luc to learn more about ContactOffice and its underlying technology platform, let us know be e-mailing info-at-contactoffice.com.