Thursday, October 25, 2007

Daylight Savings Time: Round 2

This is a reminder that the 'fall back' of the daylight saving time change this year is one week later than last year, as mandated by the Energy Savings Act of 2005. It will go into effect on November 4th.


As we advised you in the spring, unless certain Microsoft updates are applied to your computers, it is possible that the time zone settings for your system clock may be incorrect during this period. Note that Microsoft has made additional Daylight Savings Time and time zone changes since those released in January 2007. For full information, including directions to Knowledge Base articles, recommended preparation, and general sequence of update actions, see the Microsoft Daylight Saving Time Help and Support Center, at http://support.microsoft.com/gp/cp_dst.


Provided that you apply the applicable Windows updates to all your computers, TrialWorks products are not directly affected by this change. However, those who use TrialWorks third-party integrations that affect your calendar scheduling (like Outlook, Palm and other mobile devices) should ensure that they apply any patches or updates made available by those third-party vendors and follow their recommendations for avoiding appointment inconsistencies.
It is recommended that you check your TrialWorks appointments during the adjustment.

/Author: KJ

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

TrialWorks version 9.37b and Outlook Add-In Functionality.

TrialWorks 9.37b with the latest TrialWorks Add-In is available as of 10/24/2007. The package is a supplemental patch, and not a complete upgrade. Version 9.38 is expected in the next few days, so users are encouraged to wait for the next release. The version of the TrialWorksAddin.dll is 7.3.0.3253

This version addresses a few e-mail filing problems which would have resulted in messages not being filed from the INBOX, under certain cricumstances. Issues related to this fix typically involved e-mail messages with attachments, but were not limited to that.

TrialWorks Add-In problems may result from an array of problems. Assuming that all other potential problems have been reasonable dealt with (such as WinWord as email editor, LoadBehavior, DisabledItems, Registration, and that users are running MSG functions) the next step is to examin the TrialWorkAddIn.LOG file for this error:

"Error in EmailFilerTimer_Timer:Object variable or With block variable"

IF the error is seen and all other potential failures have been eliminated apply this update immediatley.

Since it is crucial that OUTLOOK be closed during the install of the new add-in, in some cases it may be more efficient to deploy the patch using the Windows logon script than using our TrialWorks messaging option.

Here is a list of commands that may be helpful:

----[ open SBS logon script in notepad from RUN command]------

notepad file:////[servername]/NETLOGON/SBS_LOGIN_SCRIPT.bat


---[insert the text below to the logon script] ----

REM - TrialWorks Aoutlook Addin Update 10/24/2007
xcopy file:////[SERVERNAME]/TrialWorks/Temp/Binn/TrialWorksaddin.dll %windir%\system32\ /D /Y /C
%windir%\system32\regsvr32.exe %windir%\system32\TrialWorksaddin.dll /s

---- [ save the file ] ------

Ask the users to restart their computers. ASking them to Log off and back on can be misunderstood.

Wednesday, October 03, 2007

Defragment the Exchange Information Store after MSG Conversion

If you are the system administrator for a firm using TrialWorks Case Management Software, than you may have already switched to the Save as MSG function for the TrialWorks/Outlook Add-In available since version 9.36. Well, if you have than you may need to complete a few cleanup procedures to improve performance of your Microsoft Exchange Server.

After the TrialWorks Save as MSG Conversion you should be able to export the existing Public Folder to a PST file. After the folder is copied to a PST (or exported) you can delete it from Microsoft Exchange. However, you will notice that the Exchange Public Folder Store does not decrease in size after deleting the Public Folder. By the way, the expected change in size will likely be huge.

Microsoft Exchange Public Folders will not immediately decrease in size, by design, until you complete a Defreg (defragmentation) on that specific public folder store. To do so you must budget about two hours of Public Folder downtime. When you are ready to complete procedure, you will need to dismount the Exchange Public Folder Store and trigger a defrag from Command Prompt using the ESEUTIL.EXE utility available in Exchange. For more details please review the Microsoft Documentaiton on Exchange Defragmentation.

//KJ

TrialWorks 9.37 Released

The TrialWorks 9.37a release has been available for about one week now. The majority of the changed focused on internal functions associated with the Outlook Plug-In for TrialWorks (using the new MSG functions). In addition, we have added a feature to streamline access to the TrialWorks Account Manager.

In regards to the TrialWorks/Outlook integration, 9.37 addresses several problems that affected ability to file certain types of messages. Primarily, errors that were caused by repeated opening and closing of previously filed e-mails (this item is locked error messages). In addition, it enahances the Public Folder to MSG Migration options with new procedures to verify the migration.

As far as the Account Manager is concerned, we have added a Help Menu item that automatically populates the firm's logon credentials. The Account Manager can be used to submit trouble tickets, view basic account information, and schedule/download upgrades.