Net Data Design, LLC Blog

I have been asked by a few clients who use vTiger about core features or modules to perform certain tasks that are just not available. While I am a developer, the LAMP stack has never been my preference. Well, vTiger 5.2 is currently in Validation Build 1 stage and they’ve addressed some of these features.

It packs some nice new features such as SMS, ical Import Export and an Assets module. It also appears that some existing third party modules are also being rolled in with tighter integration, those would be the Projects and Mobile modules and API‘s. There are also quite a few bug fixes addressed in this new version, a complete list can be found here.

5.2 Key Features

• SMS Module.
• Mobile API module  (not included in VB1, extension module will be provided in a week’s time).
• Project Management (not included in VB1, extension module will be provided in a week’s time).
• User List view Navigation.
• Calendar ical Import Export.
• Reports Enhancement- Added Line Item Support.
• Assets Module.
• and more – Detailed list can be found in the Release notes,

5.2 Release Plan

Before releasing the final version, we will be releasing a couple of builds of 5.2 to the community to get feedback and fix issues. We plan the following releases before the final version.

• Validation Build1
• Validation Build2 (if necessary – to be determined based on nature of fixes changes made after Validation Build1)
• Release Candidate (RC)
• Final Version

When I start and during testing of this build, I’ll post my findings here. If you are currently testing, please share your comments.

A week ago or so SmarterTools release the first beta of SmarterTrack 5. My main interest was the new webservice methods that have been added and the old methods refined. The reason for this is myself and  a few of my clients use SmarterTrack 4 (ST4) in conjunction with DotNetNuke (DNN) as our main website.

I wrote a web-service that allows a user to login to the DNN site and carry that authorization to the support site (ST4) if needed by the DNN user. ST4 recognizes the authorization fine using the External Provider, but there is a problem. Even though ST4′s External Provider is set to grant authorized users e the ‘Registered User” role, ST4 is not setting it. I have asked ST for a little help, but nothing has materialized. So my hopes where that this was fixed, unfortunately, it’s not yet.

What I did find however are some really nice new features, some would lead you to believe that ST5 is starting down the CRM path. Here are some of the newly added functionality:

• Call logging allows companies to track all incoming and outgoing calls and relate those calls to any tickets or Live Chats in the system, allowing businesses to track all communications regardless of the channel used.
• The task management system allows managers and agents to create tasks and track work associated to a specific ticket, call, or Live Chat, helping them to manage work that may need to be done after the call or Live Chat is completed.
• With follow-ups, companies can keep in constant contact with both existing and new customers. Integrated with the events system, follow-ups notify agents when customers haven’t responded or need additional service.
• Although not available at the beginning of the BETA, SmarterTrack 5.x will provide managers with the ability to monitor agents’ tickets and allow agents to manage their tickets and Live Chats via mobile devices. The WAP interface uses the new Web services available in SmarterTrack 5.x and will work across all major mobile phones, including iPhone, Android, and BlackBerry.  The WAP interface will resemble the phone’s interface, so iPhone users connecting to SmarterTrack will notice the mobile interface has the same feel as an iPhone application.

ST5 Agent View - Click for Larger Image

These list was taken directly from the SmarterTrack Website:

• ADDED: A call logging system that can be used to track and report on incoming and outgoing phone calls and associate them with tickets and Live Chats.
• ADDED: A new licensing manager for future functionality.
• ADDED: A setting specifying whether the portal loads the Knowledge Base in browse mode or search mode by default.
• ADDED: A task management system that allows employees to track tasks
  associated with tickets, Live Chats, and calls.
• ADDED: Agents can now send files to end users through Live Chat.
• ADDED: Agents can now upload files to a ticket without sending a
  message.
• ADDED: An option to hide specific folders when searching the Knowledge Base via the portal. Searches of parent items will still include articles in child folders.
• ADDED: An user information external provider that allows for custom information to be returned and displayed with tickets. Companies can implement this provider to give agents access to company-specific information or links to internal systems.
• ADDED: Auto-responders now include a link to the Knowledge Base in the body of the responder if no related articles were found during the auto-search.
• ADDED: Bulk operations for managing the privacy and status of news items from the grid.
• ADDED: Bulk operations for managing the privacy, status, and folder of canned replies from the grid.
• ADDED: Bulk operations for managing the privacy, status, and folder of Knowledge Base articles from the grid view.
• ADDED: End users can now send files to agents through Live Chat.
• ADDED: New system-level and agent-level Live Chat events.
• ADDED: New system-level events for POP and SMTP errors.
• ADDED: New Web services for tickets (service2/svcTickets.asmx), organization (service2/svcOrganization.asmx), and the Knowledge Base (service2/svcKB.asmx)  that replace and greatly extend the old Web services.
• ADDED: The ability to configure company holidays to identify days when Live Chat should automatically be disabled.
• ADDED: The ability to configure multiple shifts and business hours for each day of the week.
• ADDED: The ability to create multiple root-level folders in the Knowledge Base.
• ADDED: The ability to make the anchor title of text-based Live Chat links different from the text or description of the link.
• ADDED: The ability to mark a ticket for follow-up, which will allow the ticket to reactivate after a specified time period and prompt the agent to take further action.
• ADDED: To improve usability, attachments and uploaded files for a ticket or live chat are now displayed in a new Files tab in addition to the Communications tab.
• ADDED: To improve usability, various tabs in the management interface now display the total count of items within the tab.
• ADDED: Several enhancements to streamline and improve the organization and navigation of the Knowledge Base in the portal.
• CHANGED: If there are no Knowledge Base articles in the system, the area will no longer display in the portal.
• CHANGED: Knowledge Base articles displayed in the portal now show the total number of times the articles have been viewed.
• CHANGED: Knowledge Base articles now display more consistently throughout the portal.
• CHANGED: Knowledge Base search results are now be grouped by folder and organized by relevancy.
• CHANGED: New social networks have been added for Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and more. Discontinued social networking sites have also been removed.
• CHANGED: Numerous usability enhancements to the management interface and portal.
• CHANGED: Revised the names of items in the Workspace and Manage tree views for consistency.
• CHANGED: SmarterTrack now asks for confirmation when an agent clicks on the End Chat button.
• CHANGED: The Agents page in the system settings has been renamed to Employees.
• CHANGED: The option to display the agent’s name when a Live Chat invitiation is sent is now on the Live Chat settings page.
• CHANGED: The option to enable an agent to push a webpage to a customer via Live Chat is now on the Groups settings page.
• CHANGED: The options for activating a license or performing a self-diagnostic are now in the Activations folder in system settings.
• CHANGED: The portal now displays Knowledge Base articles on a single page.
• CHANGED: The Spools page is now a root-level item in the Manage tree view.
• CHANGED: The warning message for disabling user logins on the portal settings page no longer applies and has been removed.
• CHANGED: To improve formatting and display of tickets and Live Chats, resolution search results no longer have line breaks.
• CHANGED: To improve usability, Knowledge Base articles displayed in the portal now appear with an icon next to them.
• CHANGED: To improve usability, Knowledge Base searches performed in the portal now display the top 40 relevant results.
• CHANGED: To improve usability, the login form now displays on every page of the portal.
• CHANGED: To improve usability, the related items grid has been redesigned.
• CHANGED: Users can no longer change the sort order of Knowledge Base articles in the portal.
• EFFICIENCY: Various performance enhancements were made to decrease database calls and increase page load speed.
• FIXED: Deleting a Knowledge Base article or news item now immediately invalidates the cache and updates the portal homepage appropriately.
• FIXED: System administrators and agents can now delete Knowledge Base articles from the portal if they are logged in, even if they are not logged in to the management interface.
• FIXED: The details tab of a ticket now loads properly inTturkish installations of SQL server.
• FIXED: Tickets that are deleted or marked as spam now cannot be transferred without first restoring them.
• FIXED: Tickets that are deleted or marked as spam now cannot have their status changed without first restoring them.
• REMOVED: Because active Live Chats now display in popup windows, the setting to control whether Live Chats are managed in the main window or a popup has been removed.
• REMOVED: Because ticket responses now display in a popup window, the reply mode setting that controls whether ticket responses are created in the main window or a popup has been removed.

The more you use and read about the capabilities of vTiger, the more I’m convinced you’ll find a solid use for it in your business. It has fast become a great tool in my business and I can see how it would benefit any SMB and all businesses as an intranet. Does it pack the punch off say Salesforce or Microsoft’s CRM? No, but it doesn’t pack the price tag either! And don’t get me wrong, because it may not contain all the bells and whistles of the aforementioned, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t meet or exceed them in a lot areas either.

The ease in which you can customize and configure vTiger to meet your needed, without having a team of developers, is astounding. Just recently we followed a published “how-to” on setting up vTiger as an automated help desk ticketing system. The how-to was straight forward and utilized a number of already built in modules and methods to create a custom [support] ticketing system. This particular system allows for the customer to send an email to a predetermined  email address and if that customer was a “know” contact in vTiger, a ticket was auto-generated and a “canned” response returned to them. In this email response are details that gave them the ability to track the tickets progress through the Customer Portal. Also through the Portal, the customer can comment on a ticket in real time, very handy when troubleshooting.

I’m certain that I will be revisiting the vTiger subject again soon, but I’d really like to hear what you have to say about it.

As I previously stated, I held SugarCRM as the defacto open source CRM software. This has changed, the more I delve into vTiger, the more I find functions that rival some of the high-end, high-dollar solutions. And some of these functions are found in SugarCRM, the difference is in vTiger they work!

The vTiger user interface (UI) is easy to navigate, well laid out and is consistent across the application. The icons are decorative but informative design elements, making it easy to spot and move to different options within a given task. The ability to move from item to sub-items is also very easy. Lets say we’re in an Accounts (company) file. From here, we can easily access every aspect of that account, such as its individual employees (contacts), invoics, services they use, service contracts, trouble tickets, quotes and documents. Just to name a few!

I have also discovered a few must have extensions (add-ons.) Such as Timesheets, Trouble Tickets Updates and the Add to Google Calendar. All are easily installed and share a common layout as the core vTiger. The Timesheet extension does require a patch. If you have vTiger on Windows, then you’ll need to move it to a Linux environment to patch it, then move it back to Windows. Fortunately, I have my installs on Linux.

Some other features I’ll cover in my next installment about vTiger will be the outstanding Customer Portal, the ability to create a PDF on demand, invoice templates, EMail templates and custom field values.