Relationships exist in various forms in the real world and any software, including OfficeClip Contact Manager, could not possibly think of and fulfill all the possible relationships while implementing the system. To fill this gap the Web Contact Manager provides the ability to create arbitary relationships between various entities in OfficeClip. For example:

• For Real Estate transactions, a Broker can be a relationship between two Contacts
• An Account can be a Partner of another Account

Relationships are shown as the "children" of the object (for example Contacts, Accounts etc.) to which it is attached. A relationship is always created between two objects and OfficeClip shows this relationship as a "child" of both these objects.

To create a new relationship, go to the object that you want to create the relationship with and click on the Relationship link (on the object detail screen). For other tips on using the OfficeClip software and the Contact Manager in your business, check out our forum.

We had many requests for this feature and so we have implemented the mileage calculation module within OfficeClip's Expense Report.

To use it the administrator must first set the mileage rate from the Expense Report > Profile screen and create a expense type called mileage.

Whenever a user fills up an expense report and selects the expense type mileage, the number of miles entered will automatically be multiplied by the mileage rate.

Mileage Calculation for Web Expense Report

We are confident that this new feature will help OfficeClip users to better track the expenses for their projects. Inadvertent errors will be significantly reduced and the automatic calculation will save time from entering the mileage rates manually.

To see other new features and enhancements for OfficeClip 8.1.1, check out our blog article that describes them in detail!

Many OfficeClip administrators (who have installed version of OfficeClip) have asked us how they can allow people to access the software from home (or anywhere outside their office). This article will discuss various ways of doing this.

OfficeClip works with the Internet Information Server (IIS), so it is a matter of making the machine with the IIS available outside your organization.

If your organization has a VPN connection

If your company already has a vpn connection, then you can use it to access OfficeClip.

If you are using DSL/Cable Internet connection

1. Make sure you have a firewall rule on the OfficeClip machine that states that TCP/IP Port 80 is accessible outside your organization.
2. Log in to your Dsl/Cable router and go to the port forwarding option.
3. Open port 80 (TCP/IP) and forward all traffic to the IP address of the OfficeClip Server.

If you do not have Static IP Address

Get a free dynamic dns service. There are many free provider out there. We have tested it with a service called no-ip.com. This service allows you to use a real name (instead of the dynamic ip address) to connect to the OfficeClip server from outside your organization.

OfficeClip Issue Tracker can be used in various ways. This articles shows how to use it as an IT help desk.

1. Setup a Binder: Binders are containers that holds issues. You can create different of binders for different things. For example, one binder can hold Internal Software bugs and another binder can hold customer issues. More detail on how to set up a binder is available here.
2. Configure fields: Each binders can be configured in terms of their fields and list values. After you setup the binder, you will be taken to a screen from where you can rename existing fields, add user-defined fields or select which fields should be shown on the opening screen.
3. Setup appropriate Rules: OfficeClip Issue Tracker can be configured to notify users under various circumstances, for example, a rule can be created to email the issue to the person it is Assigned To. Also Escalation Rules can be created to take an action if an issue is not addressed for a specific amount of time. More details can be found here.
4. Setup a drop-in mailbox: A drop-in mailbox is an email address that can be used by your customers to report issues via email. In order to use this feature, you will need to setup a POP account at your service provider. OfficeClip Issue Tracker will periodically go and check for mails in this mailbox. If found, any mails (along with attachments) will be captured and entered into the appropriate binder. More details on how to setup this feature is explained here.
5. Create a web page for your users to report issues: Sometimes it is easier to have a web page from where your users can report issues. OfficeClip Extranet can be used to create an issue capture form. Extranet module will provide you with a URL that you can link to your website. Details on how to set this up is written here.
6. Provide a secured page for your customers to manage issues: OfficeClip Extranet also provides flexibility to create secured extranet user accounts (these are different from your normal user accounts) that you can give to your customers. Using this account they will be able to enter issues, add notes to an issue and also change the status of an issue. See here  for more information.

Although gasoline prices have fallen drastically in the last few, the economy has gotten far worse. Those still employed are looking for any way possible to save money and are putting in more and more hours at work. Now, with online software like OfficeClip, workers can log in from any computer with an internet connection and manage their contacts and issues, and submit their timesheets. This means telecommuting has never been easier or more efficient.

Benefits and Risks

IBM estimates that teleworking can help improve worker productivity by about 20%, while reducing stress, cutting commute time and giving workers a better work/life balance. This is great news for employers and employees alike. While this seems like a good way to make workplace improvements in the current economy, a workable solution must address remote access needs of teleworkers and handle the security risks this can bring. It is important to realize that without proper security in place, an organization's sensitive information can be exposed to outsiders.

Additionally, there are risks of viruses which can be transferred from an infected device to other computers on your network and of hackers who could effectively destroy much or all of your important data and information.

None of this has to be a reason to abandon telecommuting.  There are solutions out there, such as SonicWALL, which delivers real-time security that can fit into the most demanding network infrastructures. Solutions like these ensure that employees can telecommute without risking any company information or exposing the networks to viruses or hackers.

Tell us how you are using telecommuting in your company by leaving us a comment.

This is a really handy feature of OfficeClip. Log in to OfficeClip from your mobile phone and access all your contacts, notes, tasks, appointments, etc. from anywhere you happen to be! This allows you to be even more flexible because you don't need to be on a computer. You could be in a taxi, on a train or having a coffee and be able to get all your OfficeClip information, such as Contacts, easily from your phone.

OfficeClip was created using the Microsoft .Net framework®, giving it flexible configuration and implementation on numerous web client devices, such as web browsers, Palm® devices, and web-enabled mobile phones. To access your OfficeClip contacts from your Web Contact Manager, and other applications, simply visit www.officeclip.mobi to login to your OfficeClip account. Couldn't be easier!!

Another great feature of OfficeClip is the ability to send SMS messages. Within every member's information, there is a place to add a mobile number and then you can manage the SMS. This gives you the ability to either disable the SMS entirely or to specify what type of SMS messaging you would like to receive. To send an SMS to someone, just click the link beside their mobile number. Remind a team member about a meeting, send an update on a web timesheet report or share information about an account in Web Contact Manager  all from within OfficeClip! This is a an easy, efficient and very quick way to communicate with your colleagues, whether they are in the office, out to lunch or traveling for work.

If you enjoy these features, or have questions, we encourage you to leave comments for us and for other readers!

We’ve been able to add some functionality to the Timesheet Rules feature. This enables you to automate certain communication (or actions) based on the values of a submitted timesheet. For example, if your company’s policy states that certain departments/employees must submit a minimum of hours worked, then this feature will automate the notification of when/if a particular user fails to meet the requirements. Therefore, both employee and manager can be a little more efficient in the submit and approve pieces of the time tracking workflow.

Here’s a quick guide to setting up rules through the Timesheet Admin console:

1. Add a condition to the rule (also, you can set the order of the conditions to set the appropriate precedence)

2. Select the action which you would like to occur, once a submitted timesheet has met the condition(s) of the rule.

3. Name the Rule, so that you will be able to easily identify it from the Rule List view.

Many of our customers (with installed version of OfficeClip Suite) were asking us how to take backup of the database and how to avoid data loss if the server died. Most of our users run OfficeClip on Sql Express database and Microsoft does not provide Log Shipping for the Sql Server Express Edition.

So we decided to write a command line interface which would manage incremental backup and restore for our customer. Anticipating that this would be a useful solution for many other sql express users, we decided to make the source available free. Here are some of the features:

1.  Full backup is taken every day (regardless of how often the program is run)
2. Incremental backup is taken periodically (say 10 minutes) when the program is run
3. It can keep the past backup history for a certain number of days
4. Log file is created in HTML format so it is easy to read
5. Backup can be restored using a single command that first restores the most recent full backup and then restores all the incremental backups in the correct order
6. It is possible to use the Windows Scheduler and run the program periodically and save the files to a destination machine and restore periodically thereby simulating log shipping
7. It can be run from a command prompt

      Notes:

1. Before running this program on a database, you must change the database to “Full Recovery Mode” from the Sql Server Express Management Studio.
2. For restoring the backups make sure that the sql server user name and permission should match in both database.
3. The program is released under BSD License, so that you can also use it commercially without paying any royalities whatsoever.
4. It is written in C# using .net framework 2.0 in visual studio 2005 but should run on any vs.net 2008 editions.
5. If you are an OfficeClip customer, the same program is available in the distribution and it is called ocbackup.exe.

Download: Source Code | Executables Only

Usage:

To see all the options, run the program: OfficeClip.OpenSource.LogShipping.exe (from the LogShipping\bin\debug folder)

Examples:

The following command takes transactional backup every time it is run, takes full backup every day, keeps old backup for 7 days for the database called officeclip. The backup files are stored in the folder E:SqlBackups. It can be run every 10 minutes using the windows scheduler.

 OfficeClip.OpenSource.LogShipping -bd 7 -c backup -d officeclip -f “E:\SqlBackups” -s “Server=(local);Database=Master;Trusted_Connection=True”

The following command restores the backup to the database called officeclipR. The files are read from the folder E:SqlBackups.

 OfficeClip.OpenSource.LogShipping -bd 7 -c backup -d officeclipR -f “E:\SqlBackups” -s “Server=(local);Database=Master;Trusted_Connection=True”

License: BSD License

If you download and end up using this code, please leave a note. We would like to know who is using this code.

Issues are often entered in the system and forgotten. OfficeClip Web Issue Tracker Escalation Rules allows administrators to decide what to do when a critical issue is not attended for a predetermined amount of time. These rules are defined in Condition – Action format. For example, a rule can be set such that if an issue is open and critical and not worked on for a period of two days then an action is triggered. Actions can be set for sending email, changing the value of a field or even sending SMS messages. This feature can be accessed from the Rules Menu of the Issue Tracker Admin screen.

Based on our users feedback we have implemented a field-based access permission for our Web Contact Manager. This allows administrators to provide read, write, delete or append access to a role based on the value of a contact field. For example, if you want to restrict members of Georgia Team only to see the contacts who are in the State of Georgia, you can program this rule in the contact manager at organization level.

OfficeClip Contact Manager has many levels of security; the list below provides a recap of all security levels that can be set for contacts:

1. Organization Level Permission: Allows administrator to set default permission for all contacts in the organization. For example, an administrator can set the system such that only administrators can see all contacts and the contact creator can see only his/her contact.
   
2. Role Level Privileges: Administrators can create roles and provide privilege for the role users.
3. Role Level Object Permission: Allows creator or administrators to restrict a group of contacts accessible to only a particular role.
4. User Level Object Permission: Allows creator or administrators to restrict a group of contacts accessible to only a particular user.
5. Field-based Object Permission: Rules can be defined in the system so that when a contact is added or edited, permission is controlled based on the value of a field.