For the list of all release notes click here.
The following list will give a quick overview about the newest improvements that contentACCESS version 5.2 brings to you:
SharePoint archiving
✓ OneDrive archiving
Each OneDrive is associated to a user. The administrators are assigning the users to one or more AD groups. This helps them to simplify the management of the users. In this version of contentACCESS we have introduced Azure AD user and group level management of OneDrive archiving. The administrator can include existing AD groups into contentACCESS and these groups will be then used during OneDrive archiving. The administrator can specify different archiving and retention rules for every group or a single user.
The end user experience has also changed, and the users OneDrive were separated from the SharePoint sites in Connect To menu.
✓ Extended versioning
The SharePoint archive versioning function was extended. This new logic can combine contentACCESS and SharePoint versions. You do not have to be afraid that you forget to turn on versioning for some of your lists or libraries. contentACCESS will always create an internal version for these lists and libraries. Even later, you can just turn on SharePoint versioning and contentACCESS will keep all the current versions and add the new SharePoint versions too.
As a bonus, in comparison to SharePoint, contentACCESS can also version the list item’s attachments.
✓ Extended recover functionality
Ransomware attacks and disaster recovery scenarios are more and more common nowadays. As a respond to the new requirements, we strengthen our contentACCESS archive exactly in the necessary way to give into the hands of IT administrators a powerful tool to solve these cases. Now, the administrator can recover data into different locations and even choose the exact point-in-time of the original data he needs to recover.
From now on we can support enhanced use-cases when the administrator wants to clone and re-use the folder structure only. Because now, contentACCESS can re-create it on a different location.
The recovery job can be also executed in a report mode. Using this feature, the administrator can see, what will be recovered even before he runs the recovery in the live mode. This report can also be used as a comparison check between the current version and an older one.
Email archiving
✓ Saving the email under the name of its subject
If you are downloading an email from the client apps or shortcuts, from now on, contentACCESS will use the email’s subject to create the file name. This function leads to a better identification of files on the user’s machine.
Sharing
✓ Notification about a download
In contentACCESS 5.0 we have introduced the platform level document sharing. Since then, we are working hard to make this feature even greater. A common situation is, that the user wants to know if the sharing party has already downloaded or checked the shared documents. Until now, it was not easy to find the exact shared document and to check it’s sharing status.
But in our new version of contentACCESS we are happy to introduce the download notifications feature. If you enable the sharing notifications, contentACCESS will send you an email to let you know, that your recipients have downloaded the shared document.
Common
✓ Email address introduced for users
We have extended the contentACCESS user information by an email address. This email address will be used for the notification emails. This new email address field will be also filled in automatically by the provisioning job, when it creates a new user. This address can be also specified or edited by the user himself at his profile page.
✓ Detection of a pending invitation
Most of the issues that occur during accessing a shared file by a new user are caused by the fact, that the user does not know that he must firstly accept the invitation which is sent in a separate email. This invitation must be accepted to register the account in contentACCESS. contentACCESS account is used to access the shared file. This was confusing for the users, as most of them were trying to access the shared content directly without accepting the invitation.
Now, contentACCESS will check for the user if he still has a not accepted invitation and will notify him with the information about this pending request.
✓ Elastic search updated
Elastic search was updated to the version 5.6.16. This version is fully compatible with the previous elastic search version, so the existing index structures do not have to be modified.
✓ Improved security
Improvements were made to bring contentACCESS to a higher level of security.
✓ Performance and stability fixes
Improvements were made to make the system faster and more stable, so your contentACCESS experience could be better than it has ever been before.
Update from older versions
✓ Update path: Update is supported from contentACCESS version 3.1 and later. Older versions must be first updated to contentACCESS 3.1 and then from version 3.1 to the latest version.
If the update is done from an earlier version than 3.3, then some new features must be configured manually after the update.
One of these features is the Task runner, which requires a resource storage, where the export files will be stored. This storage must be configured in System -> System -> Resource storage settings. This store must be accessible by all contentACCESS nodes inside a cluster, so it is highly recommended to use a network share.
✓ Application pool identities changed: To increase the security, all application pools of contentACCESS are using the isolated IIS App Pool Identity. This requires a switch to the server-side rendering in contentWEB for email archive.
✓ .NET Framework support: The minimum required .NET version was increased from 4.5.2 to 4.8, for all applications.
✓ Mail app activation: As a result of redesigning the Mail app activation method in contentACCESS Email Archive, new permissions “Org Marketplace Apps” and “User Options” are needed for the super user in order to work.
✓ Outlook forms: If the update has been done from an earlier version than 3.4, because of some internal changes in the email archive shortcut format, the Outlook forms must be updated to the latest version to maintain the correct functionality. For contentACCESS 3.8, the Outlook forms must be also republished due to the authentication changes.
✓ Remote file archiving: While updating from contentACCESS 3.6, existing remote agent definitions will not work, since some of the database structures have been moved from file system archive database to the tenant database.
✓ SQL server support: The minimum required SQL version was increased from MS SQL 2008 to MS SQL 2012.
✓ Redesigned filtering: The old filtering was converted to the new format. Therefore, we recommend checking all job filtering settings after the update from 3.7 or earlier.
Documentation
Please check the updated documentation and manuals.
