COLLECTOR 6-2 HF13 release notes

ReadSoft COLLECTOR 6-2 HF13

Contents

What is ReadSoft COLLECTOR?
About this CD
System requirements
Disclaimer
Features in ReadSoft COLLECTOR 6-2
Limitations
Known issues
Features and fixes in Hotfixes
Support
Credits and Copyrights

What is ReadSoft COLLECTOR?

ReadSoft COLLECTOR is an extension to your existing installation of ReadSoft’s INVOICES or DOCUMENTS production system. COLLECTOR allows you to use incoming email as the source for your data capture.

The main benefit gained from using COLLECTOR is that emailed data is processed automatically in the same way that paper invoices are processed. The data is processed by INVOICES or DOCUMENTS production modules, allowing you to handle every type of data the same way, applying the same business rules and transferring the data to your host system in the same way.

ReadSoft COLLECTOR also helps you to reduce the complexity of your data capture system.

About this CD

This CD contains a full version of the ReadSoft COLLECTOR software and associated documentation. To use the software, no special license activation is required.

To install software, perform the following steps on every computer that has INVOICES Manager and Interpret modules or DOCUMENTS Administration or Production modules installed:

Insert the CD. The installation program starts automatically.
If the installation program does not start automatically, open your CD folder using Windows Explorer, and double click the Autorun.exe file.
Follow the instructions in the Installation and Quick Start Guide, available when you click Documentation on the main menu. The file name is "ReadSoft COLLECTOR 6-2 Installation and Quick start guide.pdf".

System requirements

Detailed system requirements for the computers connected with this product are found in ReadSoft COLLECTOR 6-2 Installation and Quick Start Guide.

Disclaimer

The modification of any file in this software application by anything other than COLLECTOR’s configuration tools may negatively affect the functionality of the program. Such modification may cause errors and other issues that are not covered by your support and maintenance agreement (if any), and may cause any warranties to be reduced or become null and void.

Features in ReadSoft COLLECTOR 6-2

ReadSoft COLLECTOR contains the features described below.

New features in COLLECTOR 6-2

Email body text

ReadSoft COLLECTOR 6-2 can create a PDF of the email body text and import it into DOCUMENTS as a document or as an appendix into INVOICES.

Main business functionality

These are the main business features in COLLECTOR:

Processing of invoices received by email

ReadSoft COLLECTOR allows you to use incoming email as the source for data capture. All attachments from the received invoices that match configured criteria are handed over to the INVOICES or DOCUMENTS system for interpretation and further processing.

Mail protocols

COLLECTOR makes it possible to connect and retrieve email and attachments from mail servers that support the standard messaging protocols MAPI and IMAP:

· MAPI or Messaging Application Program Interface (example: Microsoft Exchange Server)

· IMAP or Internet Message Access Protocol (example: Lotus Notes)

It has not been possible to certify or guarantee all possible MAPI or IMAP configurations in connection with all available mail servers. However, the following mail servers have been tested successfully:

· Microsoft Exchange 2003 SP2

· Microsoft Exchange 2007

· Microsoft Exchange 2010 (MAPI and 64-bit clients are not supported—use IMAP instead in that case)

· hMailServer 5.1.2 B346

· gMail

· Lotus Notes Domino Server

· FirstClass Mail Server (MAPI works, but IMAP does not currently)

Input Source

COLLECTOR can configure and use different input sources, defining which email profile (MAPI) or which server and account (IMAP) that will be used to retrieve emails. Different jobs in INVOICES or different tasks in DOCUMENTS can be connected to different input sources, making it possible to simultaneously retrieve email from different mail servers or different profiles.

Old EMAIL files format

For backward compatibility, ReadSoft COLLECTOR supports the reading of files from the file folder in the format used by the old EMAIL solution. This is not the recommended way to import data into the system, but it may be the only choice for some solutions, such as an integration with HP MFP.

Filtering of the supported file attachments based on the file extension

COLLECTOR can provide preliminary filtering of email attachments based on the file extension. By listing attachment extensions in the Accepted or Ignored lists, you can let the system know which types of attachments to process as valid documents (for example, PDF, TIFF, PNG, and so on) and which ones to ignore (for example, TXT, LOG, HTML, etc.)

Configuration and administration

Database Maintenance tool

COLLECTOR has a Database Maintenance Tool that is installed as part of the solution to help administrators perform basic configuration tasks such as creating and maintaining the configuration database.

COLLECTOR Configuration

COLLECTOR general settings, such as the location of attachment folders, and the administration of input sources and logging settings, can be configured using a special COLLECTOR configuration wizard. The wizard is accessible from the Plugins menu in INVOICES Manager module, as well as from the Interpret Job settings. In DOCUMENTS, it is accessible in System specifications > Add-ons on the Configuration tab in the Administration module

INVOICES Job or DOCUMENTS task Configuration

INVOICES Interpret jobs can be configured to use COLLECTOR by selecting ReadSoft COLLECTOR in the Data source extension field on the Source page of the dialog. In DOCUMENTS, you open the task in which COLLECTOR is to be used, select Input > Source > Add-on (dropdown list) and select COLLECTOR as the add-on. All job-specific parameters, such as whether to treat attachments as one document, which attachment-file extensions to accept or reject, which user-defined variables to initialize, and whether to rename received mail attachments before passing them to INVOICES or DOCUMENTS, are defined here in subsequent dialogs.

Customization

Creating custom plug-ins for COLLECTOR

COLLECTOR’s functionality can be enhanced with the help of custom plug-ins. There are at least five main scenarios in which customization may be required:

· The conversion of file attachments from a non-supported file format (Word or Excel, for examples) to another supported format (such as PDF).

· The preliminary validation of file attachments (to see whether received PDF files are in a format that is supported by INVOICES or DOCUMENTS, for example).

· The sorting of file attachments and the rerouting of certain files to other systems (workflows or archiving solutions, for example) instead of sending all files to INVOICES or DOCUMENTS

· The extraction of additional data from email and / or file attachments to pass to INVOICES or DOCUMENTS (initializing UDVs, Queues, Buyers, etc.)

· The handling of signed and or encrypted emails

There is no built-in support for these tasks in COLLECTOR itself. However, there is an infrastructure in place that allows ReadSoft Professional Services and ReadSoft Partners to build separate custom plug-ins using required business logic. In simple terms, ReadSoft COLLECTOR configuration tools provide activation mechanisms that make it possible to easily configure these plug-ins and incorporate them into the COLLECTOR flow.

INVOICES specific features and enhancements

Creating custom plug-ins for COLLECTOR

Except for database-connection information, all settings have been moved to COLLECTOR's user interface (see the Advanced tab).

Windows authentication

Starting with COLLECTOR 6-2, Windows authentication can be used to connect to the database .

Installation and upgrade

COLLECTOR is supplied on a separate release CD. The Autorun program helps users install various components of the system and easily view documentation. (See To begin installing…, above.)

The installation program performs all required deployment actions.

Licensing

COLLECTOR does not require any special license key and can be installed on any INVOICES or DOCUMENTS system that meets the system requirements.

Compatibility

COLLECTOR supports INVOICES 5-5 Service Pack 4 or later.

COLLECTOR supports DOCUMENTS 6-4 Service Pack 1 or later.

COLLECTOR supports DOCUMENTS 7-1 or later (starting from COLLECTOR 6-2 Hotfix 2).

Translations

COLLECTOR is available in English only.

Documentation

COLLECTOR documentation is available in English only.

ReadSoft COLLECTOR 6-2 Installation and Quick Start Guide provides complete instructions on how to install and configure the COLLECTOR product. The installation guide is available on the installation CD (see above).
ReadSoft COLLECTOR Help assists users with the key tasks such as how to configure and use the product.
ReadSoft COLLECTOR Database Maintenance Tool Help assists the system administrator in specific tasks of creating and maintaining COLLECTOR databases.
Writing and Using plug-ins in COLLECTOR provides an overview of the customization capabilities of the COLLECTOR product and a detailed description of the programming interfaces.

Limitations

System requirements and general limitations are listed in ReadSoft COLLECTOR 6-2 Installation and Quick Start Guide.

COLLECTOR can only be used with INVOICES 5-5 Service Pack 4 or later or DOCUMENTS 6-4 Service Pack 1 or later.
Encrypted and digitally signed emails are not supported by the current release.
Microsoft SQL Server is required to store COLLECTOR configurations. Oracle is not supported.
Multi-page PDF or TIFF documents containing several invoices in one file separated by blank pages or bar-codes are not supported. A plugin is required to process these files in INVOICES using COLLECTOR. Contact ReadSoft if you need it.
Interpret cannot be running in more than one process on the same computer at the same time.
The same job cannot be run on more than one Interpret module at a time.
INVOICES Interpret module must be run under the domain user account in order to use MAPI protocol.
The Outlook integration feature cannot provide a valid link to the erroneous email in an email error log message if Interpret is run as a service. In addition, for the links to work, both emails need to be opened on the same computer where interpretation was performed.
COLLECTOR cannot simultaneously receive emails from two different jobs connected to two different MAPI profiles. This was corrected in COLLECTOR 6-1 Hotfix 3. As a result, however, if more than one job needs to be configured and run at the same time, the MAPI input sources must use the same MAPI Profile.
When configuring a MAPI input configuration in COLLECTOR, you must be logged in with the profile for the account that will receive the incoming email. Domain and/or local administrator rights are not sufficient to configure the input source.
Using MAPI when running Interpret as a service is not recommended. If used, only one instance of the Interpret module can be run at a time. In addition, you cannot have two instances running on separate machines either when running Interpret as a service since there is no way to keep the interpretation engine from running a MAPI job, and MAPI jobs cannot be run at the same time. If you need or want to use multiple instances of Interpret, use IMAP.
INVOICES cannot set the Endorser string in the plugin when COLLECTOR is used in versions previous to INVOICES 5-5 Service Pack 5.
When an email fails to be processed successfully in DOCUMENTS in connection with COLLECTOR, any emails or folders associated with it are removed from the harddisk. On the other hand, when emails are processed successfully, the files are retained for security reasons, meaning that they need to be removed manually, if desired, to free up disk space.
When importing body text from email, images and RTF formatting are not included. Only the non-RTF text is contained in the resulting PDF.
Batching is not supported when running COLLECTOR together with INVOICES. Do not specify batching in COLLECTOR job settings.
Using MAPI when running Interpret as a service is not recommended. If used, only one instance of the Interpret module can be run at a time. In addition, you cannot have two instances running on separate machines either when running Interpret as a service since there is no way to keep the interpretation engine from running a MAPI job, and MAPI jobs cannot be run at the same time. If you need or want to use multiple instances of Interpret, use IMAP. These settings may be suitable in a system where multiple Interpret instances are used in connection with IMAP (see INI-file help for more information):

The default value for all three settings is 0 when using a single instance of Interpret per input source system:
- SystemWideMutexTimeout = 120
  This setting serves to synchronize Interpret instances in terms of email server access. Synchronization is on the Input source level, meaning that only one Interpret instance can access the input folder for an input source at any given time.
- MoveEmailTimeOut = 120
  This setting is meant to reduce the number of times when an Interpret instance terminates before it has completed processing an invoice. Once the specified amount of time has elapsed, any Interpret instance can take an invoice for processing. As a result, this setting should be set to a time span that is greater than the maximum time needed to process a mail in the system.
- EmailProcessingTimeout = 300
  To keep invoices from being reprocessed, this setting determines the amount of time all Interpret instances consider an email to be quarantined after it has been completely processed (that is, when all Interpret instances view it as having been moved to the processed or error folder).

Timeout values are all specified in seconds.

Note

When you test the system before going system wide with multiple Interpret instances per input source, it could be advantageous to use the default settings during testing so that you do not have to wait for mails to timeout before you can reprocess them (since the timeouts will be immediate - the default setting is 0).

Known issues

There are a number of known issues in the system. The development team is working to resolve them:

#3091: Simultaneous adjustment of the job configuration from Manager and Interpret modules may generate an error message.

Workaround: Avoid adjusting the same job using two INVOICES modules at the same time.
#3174: Imported invoices may have Source = Unknown when listed in Manager module.

Workaround: The issue is resolved in INVOICES 5-5 SP5

#3184: Importing files in the old EMAIL format may cause a looping effect if an invoice references two or more image files with the same file name.

Workaround: Avoid using the same file name for different images belonging to one invoice (old EMAIL format).
#4981: If DOCUMENTS crashes while a batch is being saved, the batch is lost in DOCUMENTS, the mail is moved to the processed folder, and the COLLECTOR log states that the batch was processed successfully.

Workaround: If DOCUMENTS crashes during the Input activity, look for the latest batch ID in the COLLECTOR logs and check if it exists in DOCUMENTS. If not, the email must be moved to the input folder manually (attachment files need to be removed from attachments folder) and processed again.
When running multiple Interpret instances, deadlocks may be seen in the SQL Server Profiler. They are consequently reported in logs on the debug level, as well, but this does not affect the functionality of the product.

Changes and fixes in HF13

Microsoft Exchange Web Server (EWS) can now be configured as an input source. Note: If Move emails to error folder is used in a job or task in connection with EWS, emails that contain other emails are not moved to the error folder. Attachments with the MSG extension are skipped. All other appropriate attachments are interpreted/processed normally. (TFS-18862)

Changes and fixes in HF12

COLLECTOR now selects and processes the oldest email in the source folder first, regardless of the input source type. (00228466)
The Input source name is now included in the error log. (00228101)

Changes and fixes in HF11

User passwords could not contain spaces or special characters when using IMAP v9 from IPWorks (130314-000022, TFS6421, TFS7374)
COLLECTOR failed and Interpret returned an error when a NetMessageID was too large (121126-000011, TFS5542)
COLLECTOR was not able to process email with Latin-1 (i.e., cp12xx) encodings (121110-000083, 130409-000074, TFS5846)

Changes and fixes in HF10

Email with empty subject can now be processed using MAPI (120824-000031, TFS5274)
Email body text is saved as a PDF even if the email contains one or more parameters that are null. (120830-000136, TFS5373)

Changes and fixes in HF9

HTML and TXT documents were not always recognized as true email attachments (120507-000072).

This has been fixed with version 9 of IP*Works.

Changes and fixes in HF8

Support for DOCUMENTS 7.2

From this Hotfix and later, COLLECTOR 6-2 supports ReadSoft DOCUMENTS 7.2 product.

Changes and fixes in HF7

Custom value Other does not work properly (120327-000032)

The Custom value Other, that is stored as a User-defined variable on the invoice, works now as expected.

MAPI: Unhandled error if PR_MESSAGE_DELIVERY_TIME is missing (120127-000060)

If the PR_MESSAGE_DELIVERY_TIME is missing, or is strange, it is now replaced with value "1753-01-01". The replacement is also logged if the log level is "Information" or greater.

Changes and fixes in HF6

Improved handling of email when it contains email as an attachment (120118-000054)

It is now possible to define how to handle emails that contain emails as attachments. This is done in the Input tab of the COLLECTOR job configuration dialog:

Ignore attached emails (that is, emails are processed as before) -- only the email itself is processed (attached emails are not processed)

Move emails to the error folder when they contain attached emails

Notes:

This does not currently work with LOTUS DOMINO in connection with IMAP, but you can
do the following to make it work the same way:

To ignore emails as attachments - add the EML extension to the ignored list on the
File extensions tab. Note here that when doing this, it is not possible to use Use
accepted extensions only. The extensions for all file types that are to be ignored
need to be added to the list.

Move to error folder - when selected in this case, emails are moved to the error
folder whenever they contain emails as attachments.

You can also get the correct functionality here if MAPI is used.

Changes and fixes in HF5

Email body text can now be processed as the main invoice/document (111010-000016)

A setting has been added to the Email settings tab of the COLLECTOR job configuration dialog (Use body text as invoice when there are no attachments) so that emails without attachments can be processed as if the email content itself was an attachment.

The SamplePlugin has been extended with two additional settings:

- One to switch the use of the body document/email summary and the document attachments

- One to generate a body document with the formatted content (HTML or RTF) of the email.

The API has been updated to make RTF and HTML available on the DocumentSet object, and the plugin is now called before the empty email validation is performed, so that a plugin can populate an empty email.

Fixed bugs

110921-000057 - PDF attachments were not processed sometimes for IMAP

Changes and fixes in HF4

Some issues related to handling email attachments with Lotus Domino were fixed. (110627-000034).

It is now possible to run multiple INVOICES Interpret instances for one or several machines using the same input source. To handle situations when an Interpret instance terminates before unlocking the invoices it is working on, these settings have been added to the initialization file, COLLECTOR.ini, to synchronize between Interpret instances:

[Settings]

SystemWideMutexTimeout
MoveEmailTimeout
EmailProcessingTimeout

The default value for all three settings, which is suitable when using a single instance of Interpret per input source system, is 0.

These settings may be suitable in a system where multiple Interpret instances are used:

SystemWideMutexTimeout = 120
This setting serves to synchronize Interpret instances in terms of email server access. Synchronization is on the Input source level, meaning that only one Interpret instance can access the input folder for an input source at any given time.
MoveEmailTimeOut = 120
This setting is meant to reduce the number of times when an Interpret instance terminates before it has completed processing an invoice. Once the specified amount of time has elapsed, any Interpret instance can take an invoice for processing. As a result, this setting should be set to a time span that is greater than the maximum time needed to process a mail in the system.
EmailProcessingTimeout = 300
To keep invoices from being reprocessed, this setting determines the amount of time all Interpret instances consider an email to be quarantined after it has been completely processed (that is, when all Interpret instances view it as having been moved to the processed or error folder).

Timeout values are all specified in seconds.

Limitation

Only IMAP and Old email input sources support this new functionality. MAPI input sources are still limited to a single Interpret instance per input source.

Note 1

Note 2

You will need to upgrade the database to use the hot fix. Upgrading the database is done using the Database maintenance tool.

Changes and fixes in HF3

All customer-reported issues are described below. Case IDs, when available, are included in parentheses.

COLLECTOR loops continuously when using Clos App on Error (110603-000021)

COLLECTOR is now less sensitive when using Close App on Error so that continuous looping does not occur, in connection with using the ReadSoft COLLECTOR PDF Converter, in particular. The new version, 2.4.2, should be used.

Changes and fixes in HF2

Support for DOCUMENTS 7

From this Hotfix COLLECTOR 6-2 supports ReadSoft DOCUMENTS 7 product.

Changes and fixes in HF1

All customer-reported issues are described below. Case IDs, when available, are included in parentheses.

Issues related to Lotus Domino

The following issues only apply to Lotus Domino mail server:

Required changes to Lotus Domino settings

A number of settings must be changed for COLLECTOR 6-2 to work with Lotus Domino mail server. See the document included with the HF, Setup instructions for Lotus Domino.pdf, for details. Note that the changes will only apply to new emails - not existing ones.

Enabling "Use accepted extensions only" does not work as expected (110207-000056)

the way email attachments and their filenames are found has been improved greatly reducing the number of times when this occurs.

Failing to fetch the filename for the attachment creates the file, FILENAME.PDF, even if the file type is not PDF (CUS11013-111)

Same as above. Since filenames are retrieved correctly, COLLECTOR's job settings for file extensions work. Consequently, the number of times that COLLECTOR creates FILENAME.PDF for the wrong file type is reduced except for those rare cases when there is no other alternative.

Lotus Notes returns NO COPY or BAD COPY (101130-000089, 101206-000035, 110110-000010, 110110-000070, 110315-000072 - 110202-000009, 110223-000059)

Same as above. As a result, the occurences of NO COPY or BAD COPY have hopefully been eliminated.

Issues not related to Lotus Domino

The following are general issues not related to Lotus Domino:

COLLECTOR's behavior has changed when using INV 5-5 SP6 HF6. Only the first page is treated as an invoice page and the remaining pages are considered appendices. If HF6 is not installed, all pages are treated as invoice pages (110308-000043)

The way to resolve this is to uninstall HF6 depending on the results that are desired.

Using the COLLECTOR job settings, "Import body of email" and "Treat email attachment as a separate invoice" together with the Transfer job setting, "Move invoice images here....", does not work properly (101208-000070 and 110301-000017)

This has been solved by putting the email body text in a unique file for each invoice object.

The "Close app on Error" setting is too strict (101222-000014 and 101025-000009)

This checkbox should only be used by users who experience connection problems with the mailserver and no other problems.

COLLECTOR no longer closes on non-critical errors (for example, an email does not contain a supported attachment).

Support

If you have questions or problems, please contact your local ReadSoft representative. Information on how to reach the local support channels is available at http://www.readsoft.com/services/support.htm.

Credits and Copyrights

ReadSoft is a registered trademark of ReadSoft AB.

Other product and company names herein may be the registered trademarks of their respective owners.